The Suicide Squad (Movie)

The Suicide Squad is a 2021 superhero comedy film written and directed by James Gunn. It follows the eponymous team's mission to dismantle Project Starfish in Corto Maltese. It is set in the DC Extended Universe, but elements of it will remain canon in the DC Universe. It also paved the way for the spin-off series Peacemaker.

Synopsis for "The Suicide Squad (Movie)"

From the black site Belle Reve Correctional Center in Louisiana, A.R.G.U.S. director Amanda Waller sent a Suicide Squad strike team lead by Colonel Rick Flag to the island of Corto Maltese. The team consisted of Harley Quinn, Captain Boomerang, Savant, Blackguard, Javelin, Mongal, T.D.K., and Weasel.

The Squad was flown out to the island via helicopter and dropped in the water near the shore. Unfortunately, Weasel couldn't swim, and he passed out from inhaling water. Savant dragged his body to shore and incorrectly declared him dead. When the rest of the Squad reached the beach, Blackguard blew their cover by calling out to the hidden Maltese Army, revealing he sold them out. He was shot by the Maltese and the Squad engaged in a deadly battle, resulting in Boomerang, Javelin, Mongal, and Savant all dying, while T.D.K. was left in critical condition, and Flag sent running to the jungle where he was captured by soldiers. With his dying breaths, Javelin handed his javelin to Harley, telling her to carry it for a reason he never got to tell her before she was captured by the Maltese forces and taken prisoner.

Monitoring from Belle Reve, Waller decided to check up on her second strike team, which was infiltrating another Maltese beach miles away, as the first team was just a distraction for the Maltese Army. The second team was lead by Bloodsport, who Waller had forced to lead the team by helping his daughter Tyla to drop her court trial, after the latter stole a watch. The members of Bloodsport's team are consisted of Peacemaker, King Shark, Ratcatcher II, and the Polka Dot Man. Their mission was to infiltrate the scientific experimentation facility Jotunheim, located in the Maltese capitol of Valle Del Mar, and destroy every trace of the mysterious and dangerous Project Starfish.

On their first night there, the arrogant Peacemaker and exasperated Bloodsport formed a rivalry over their similar abilities and conflicting ideologies. When they set up camp, King Shark attempted to eat Ratcatcher, but after Bloodsport stopped him, Ratcatcher offered him friendship to make sure he didn't do it again. The team also learned that Bloodsport is afraid of rats, and that Polka Dot Man regurgitates polka dots to get rid of the multi-colored, glowing bulges on his skin.

The next day, Waller's aides located Colonel Flag in a guerilla camp, so Waller directed the Squad to retrieve him and kill all the soldiers in the camp. Bloodsport and Peacemaker turned it into a contest of who could make the best kill, and slaughtered nearly all the soldiers before reaching Flag, who was drinking tea with Sol Soria. He explained that he was rescued by the Freedom Fighters, a rebel military faction opposing the tyrannical regime of new dictator Silvio Luna, and that Soria was their leader. The Squad awkwardly apologized for killing some of their new allies, and Sol Soria reluctantly agreed to help the team make their way to Valle Del Mar.

Meanwhile, the chief scientist of Jotunheim, the Thinker, met with Presidente Luna and introduced him to Project Starfish. He explained that the project's source was a starfish-like alien creature named Starro, discovered by astronauts in the 1990s, and that it was capable of generating spores from its body that latch onto the faces of other creatures then kills them and control their minds, causing the central being to grow larger and more powerful. The creature had been experimented on by the Thinker for thirty years in Jotunheim, and Luna decided to take the Thinker onto his team to weaponize the creature against the U.S., whom Luna hated.

Around that time, Harley was cleaned up and dressed up to meet Luna, who was infatuated with her. The two spent the day together, and fell deeper in love with one another, but when Luna revealed he planned to kill children in the Project Starfish experiments, Harley shot him with a gun from his room that was loaded for some reason. She explained to him as he bled out that she didn't want to fall in love with another maniac like the Joker and fall into yet another abusive relationship. She was then captured by the Maltese forces and held hostage and tortured by Mateo Suarez, Luna's right-hand man and successor.

Back with the Suicide Squad, Flag took control of the team from Bloodsport, and they were making the long trek to meet Soria's contact. During the journey, they noticed that the multi-colored bulges were appearing again on Polka Dot Man, and Peacemaker demanded he tell them what it was. Polka Dot Man explained that it was an interdimensional virus he was infected with by his mother at a young age in an attempt to make him a superhero. His body fills up with the incendiary "dots", and if he doesn't expel them at least twice a day, they'll eat him alive. He also revealed that his trauma was so great, he envisioned his mother as everyone he met. After these disturbing revelations, the Squad continued on to meet Soria's contact.

When they met up with Soria's contact, a friendly rebel operative named Milton, the Squad packed themselves into his minibus to go to Valle Del Mar. Before leaving, Flag convinced Soria to take the Freedom Fighters to Luna's palace while they distracted the soldiers at Jotunheim. On the bus ride to La Gatita Amable, the gentleman's club the Thinker frequents, Ratcatcher asked Bloodsport why he was so afraid of rats. He revealed that his cruel father once punished him by locking him in a crate full of rats for twenty-four hours. Ratcatcher in turn revealed that her father was a kindly man, and a genius inventor who created the remote she uses to control rats, but that she had lost him to a drug overdose at a young age. Despite their differences, Ratcatcher and Bloodsport bonded over their paternal traumas, and promised to get each other out alive.

The Squad arrived at La Gatita Amable and spent a few hours waiting for the Thinker by partying in the club. When the Thinker finally arrived, Bloodsport apprehended him and tried taking him to the minibus out the back, but suddenly, several Maltese soldiers barged in, looking for the Squad after Luna's assassination. Bloodsport gave Polka Dot Man his gun and sent him and Ratcatcher back to the bus and instructed them to meet up with them in half an hour, while he, Flag, and Peacemaker were willingly captured by the soldiers and placed in a truck. On the ride to Suarez' palace, one of the soldiers told Flag that Harley was still alive, just before the trio killed all the soldiers in the truck, sending it careening off the road to where Milton's bus caught up with them. When Bloodsport, Peacemaker, and Flag were clear of the crash, Flag made the executive decision to go rescue Harley from Suarez.

As the Squad made their way to the palace, Harley was being tortured by Suarez for information. After a great deal of torture, Harley pretended to pass out, but when Suarez left the room, she killed the man guarding her and, using various weapons around the palace, including her javelin, she slaughtered all the guards holding her before going out to meet the Suicide Squad, who were attempting to save her themselves. After a happy reunion with Flag, the Squad regrouped with the Thinker and made their way to Jotunheim.

With the Thinker's help, the Squad broke into Jotunheim and split into two teams to plant explosives around the building as the army tried to break in. Harley, Bloodsport, Polka Dot Man, Peacemaker, and King Shark went up to the higher floors, while Flag and Ratcatcher forced the Thinker to show them the full extent of Project Starfish in the basement. When he showed them the horrible experiments performed on Starro and the Maltese people, the Thinker revealed that American astronauts found Starro in space and the U.S. government was funding the project, and that the Squad's true mission was to destroy all records of U.S. involvement now that the country had an anti-American leader.

Furious, Flag removed the hard drive from the building's computer, intending to take it to the press, but Peacemaker, who had followed Flag from the upper floors, revealed he was Waller's inside man who had known the whole time, and wouldn't let Flag leave with the information. The building then began collapsing from the others setting off the explosives too early, freeing Starro who killed the Thinker. Meanwhile, Flag and Peacemaker began fighting over the drive, resulting in Peacemaker killing Flag and Ratcatcher taking the drive. Peacemaker chased Ratcatcher, knocked the drive from her hand, and held her at gunpoint, prepared to kill her to keep the peace.

On the upper floors eight minutes earlier, Bloodsport's team was placing the explosives around the building when Polka Dot Man dropped his all over the floor. Before he could pick them up, the team was ambushed by Jotunheim security, prompting Polka Dot Man to expel his dots at them. The dots ignited the fallen explosives, causing a chain reaction of explosions that killed security and set off all the explosions that had already been placed. The Squad struggled their way to stable ground as Jotunheim began to collapse. Bloodsport ended up hanging from a grappling hook above an unstable floor, but when his hook gave out, he landed on the floor, which collapsed onto the floor below. That floor then collapsed onto the floor below that, and the floors kept falling, Bloodsport balanced on top of them, until they finally reached ground level, directly across from Peacemaker just before he shot Ratcatcher. A furious Bloodsport assessed what was going on, and quickly shot Peacemaker in the throat, causing him to bleed unconscious.

Ratcatcher tearfully explained the situation with Flag and the drive just as Harley, King Shark, and Polka Dot Man arrived from the upper levels. She handed the drive to Bloodsport before the facility's remains shook from the monstrous Starro, now free from its restraints, bursting its way out of its underground prison, emerging just as the Suicide Squad got to safety, only to find the Maltese Army waiting for them, headed up by Presidente Suarez himself. Furious at its captors, Starro enslaved as much of the army as it could with its face spores, and with its new army in tow, made its way towards the center of Valle Del Mar to destroy it.

The team asked Waller what to do, and she merely told them to leave the creature alone, believing the incriminating hard drive destroyed, and the mission complete. Bloodsport wouldn't have it, however, and made his way to the city, with the other survivors following him close behind. An enraged Waller threatened to detonate their brain bombs, and nearly did so, but she was knocked unconscious by one of her aides, who convinced her coworkers to help the Squad fight Starro and save the innocents in the city.

The Squad fought a long and hard battle against Starro and its massive army under Bloodsport's expert leadership. Bloodsport convinced Polka Dot Man to shoot his polka dots at Starro and destroy its foot by envisioning it as his mother. He finally overcame his trauma and fully become a superhero, and cried out in joy right before Starro slammed down one of its legs and crushed him, killing him instantly. Eventually, Ratcatcher sent an army of rats to cover and overwhelm Starro, allowing Harley to jump into its massive eye with her javelin. The army of rats crawled through the hole Harley made, and proceeded to eat Starro's brain, calming it down enough to long for the peace of floating in space once more before it died of blood loss.

In the aftermath of the battle, two of Waller's aides, John Economos and Emilia Harcourt, helped Bloodsport upload the information from the hard drive to a secure server, and when Waller came to, he used that information to blackmail Waller into letting himself, Harley, Ratcatcher, and King Shark go free and not sentenced Tyla to Belle Reve. Meanwhile, Flag's advice to the Freedom Fighters allowed them to overtake the government and establish a new democracy with Sol Soria in charge. Waller then sent a helicopter to bring the surviving Squad back to the States, and Harley Quinn, Bloodsport, Ratcatcher II, and King Shark went off to live lives free of the Suicide Squad.

After the team left the island, Weasel's system forced the water from his lungs and woke him up, still on the beach. Confused and scared, Weasel stood up and ran away into the jungle, past the corpses of his teammates, never to be seen again. Later, Peacemaker was discovered to be alive, and was rushed to a hospital in America, who managed to save his life just in time. When she learned he was still of use to her, Waller drafted Harcourt and Economos on a new team with the insufferable vigilante as punishment for their betrayal, intending to send them on a world-saving mission when Peacemaker emerged from his coma.

Appearing in "The Suicide Squad (Movie)"

Featured Characters:

• Suicide Squad (Disbands)
  • Bloodsport (Robert DuBois) (First appearance) (Joins and quits team) (Origin)
  • Harley Quinn (Harleen Quinzel) (Quits team)
  • King Shark (Nanaue) (First appearance) (Quits team)
  • Polka Dot Man (Abner Krill) (First appearance; dies) (Origin)
  • Ratcatcher II (Cleo Cazo) (First appearance) (Flashback and main story) (Quits team) (Origin)
    • Sebastian (First appearance) (Quits team)
  • Colonel Rick Flag (Dies)

Supporting Characters:

• A.R.G.U.S.
  • Briscoe (First appearance)
  • Dale Biner (Single appearance)
  • Emilia Harcourt (First appearance)
  • Flo Crawley (First appearance)
  • John Economos (First appearance)
• Freedom Fighters (First appearance)
  • Milton (Single appearance; dies)
  • Sol Soria (First appearance)
• Suicide Squad
  • Captain Boomerang (Digger Harkness) (Dies)
  • Javelin (Gunter Braun) (First appearance; dies)
  • Mongal (Single appearance; dies)
  • Savant (Brian Durlin) (First appearance; dies)
  • T.D.K. (Cory Pitzner) (First appearance)
  • Weasel (First appearance)

Antagonists:

• Corto Maltese Government
  • General Presidente Mateo Suárez (First appearance; dies)
  • General Presidente Silvio Luna (First appearance; dies)
    • Isabella (Single appearance; dies)
    • Vera (Single appearance; dies)
• Starro the Conqueror (First appearance; dies) (Flashback and main story)
• United States Government (Flashback and main story)
  • Director Amanda Waller
    • Blackguard (Richard Hertz) (Single appearance; dies)
    • Peacemaker (Chris Smith) (First appearance) (Origin)
  • Thinker (Gaius Grieves) (First appearance; dies) (Flashback and main story)

Other Characters:

• A.R.G.U.S.
  • Doctor Fitzgibbon (Single appearance)
  • Lieutenant Glass (Single appearance)
  • Sergeant Chavis (Single appearance)
• Abner Krill's mother (First appearance) (In a vision)
• Auggie Smith (Mentioned only)
• Avral Kaddam (Mentioned only)
• Belle Reve Inmates
  • Calendar Man (Single appearance)
  • Double Down (Single appearance) (Cameo)
  • Kaleidoscope (Single appearance) (Cameo)
  • Karma (Single appearance) (Cameo)
• Camila (Single appearance)
• Clyrax (First appearance)
• Doctor Alandy (First appearance)
• Herrera Family (On a TV or computer screen) (Dies)
• Isabella (Single appearance)
• The Joker (Mentioned only)
• NASA (On a TV or computer screen)
• Nazi Party (Mentioned only)
• Ratcatcher (First appearance) (Dies in flashback)
• Robert DuBois' father (Mentioned only)
• Robert DuBois' wife (Mentioned only) (Deceased)
• S.T.A.R. Labs (Mentioned only)
• Senator Cray (Mentioned only)
• Shark god (Mentioned only)
• Superman (Mentioned only)
• Tyla DuBois (First appearance)

Locations:

• DC Extended Universe
  • China (Mentioned only)
  • Corto Maltese
    • Valle Del Mar
      • Jotunheim
      • La Gatita Amable
  • Portugal (Flashback only)
  • Porto (Flashback only)
    • • Igreja dos Clérigos (Flashback only)
  • Qurac (Mentioned only)
  • Russia (Mentioned only)
  • United States of America
    • Iron Heights Penitentiary (Mentioned in a file)
    • Louisiana
      • St. Roch
        • Belle Reve Correctional Center
    • S.T.A.R. Labs (Mentioned only)

Items:

• Javelin's Javelin
• Peacemaker's Helmet
• Kryptonite Bullets (Mentioned only)
• Trick Boomerangs

Vehicles:

• Milton's Bus
• Sheba

Concepts:

• World War II (Mentioned only)

Cast

• Margot Robbie as Harley Quinn
• Idris Elba as Bloodsport
• Viola Davis as Amanda Waller
• John Cena as Peacemaker
• Joel Kinnaman as Colonel Rick Flag
• David Dastmalchian as The Polka Dot Man
• Daniela Melchior as Ratcatcher II
• Sylvester Stallone and Steve Agee as King Shark
• Peter Capaldi as The Thinker
• Alice Braga as Sol Soria
• Joaquín Cosío as Major General Mateo Suárez and Starro
• Juan Diego Botto as General Presidente Silvio Luna
• Jai Courtney as Captain Boomerang
• Pete Davidson as Blackguard
• Michael Rooker as Savant
• Nathan Fillion as T.D.K.
• Flula Borg as Javelin
• Mayling Ng as Mongal
• Sean Gunn as Weasel and Calendar Man
• Storm Reid as Tyla DuBois
• Steve Agee as John Economos
• Tinashe Kajese as Flo Crawley
• Jennifer Holland as Emilia Harcourt
• Julio Ruiz as Milton
• Taika Waititi as Ratcatcher
• John Ostrander as Doctor Fitzgibbon
• Jared Leland Gore as Double Down
• Stephen Blackehart as Briscoe
• Mikaela Hoover as Camila
• Natalia Safran as Kaleidoscope
• Dee Bradley Baker, Crisp Rat, and Jaws as Sebastian
• Nick Padgett as Karma
  

Notes

• James Gunn pitched the title The Suicide Squad as a joke to Warner Bros, which they unironically loved. The original title Gunn had planned was Suicide Squad: Dogs of War.^[1]
• The Suicide Squad was released in theaters and on Max simultaneously due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.
• The song "Rain" by grandson and Jessie Reyez, which plays in the film's trailers and when Bloodsport, Flag, and Peacemaker escape the military convoy, was an original song written for the film.
• Peacemaker was originally intended to die in The Suicide Squad, but once the film was completed, Gunn was given a chance to make the Peacemaker TV series, and so shot the post-credits scene of Peacemaker alive in the hospital at the last minute on the set of the show.^[2]
  

Trivia

• Four characters from the comics make brief cameo appearances as prisoners of Belle Reve.
  • The villain Kaleidoscope from Dial H for Hero appears when Amanda Waller takes Peacemaker and Bloodsport to Cleo Cazo's prison cell. Kaleidoscope was originally created by two fans, Chris Lawton and Nancy Mae Lawton, who wrote in to DC Comics and suggested the character for Dial H for Hero in 1982. The credits for The Suicide Squad give special thanks to Chris Lawton and Nancy Mae Lawton.^[3]
  • Batman villain Calendar Man briefly appears to taunt Polka-Dot Man. Special thanks were given to Calendar Man's creators Bill Finger and Sheldon Moldoff in the movie's credits.
  • Flash villain Double Down makes a cameo standing next to Calendar Man and joins him in his taunting of Polka-Dot Man. The movie's credits also include special thanks to Double Down's creators Geoff Johns and Ethan Van Sciver.
  • Karma is seen standing behind Double Down for a very brief moment when Bloodsport asks Waller if he, Double Down and Calendar Man would be on the Suicide Squad team. In the comics, Wayne Hawkins/Karma was once part of Task Force X in Suicide Squad #58. Karma's creators Paul Kupperberg and Steve Lightle were given special thanks in the film's credits.
• The Squad's mission briefing in a theater with a projector is a reference to how Amanda Waller would often brief the team in John Ostrander's Suicide Squad.

See Also

• Characters from The Suicide Squad (Movie)
• Other things related to The Suicide Squad (Movie)
• Movie Gallery: The Suicide Squad (Movie)