Review: Suicide Squad Most Wanted: Deadshot and Katana
Suicide Squad is at the height of pop-culture these days. Our Sam McCoy breaks down one of the newest Suicide Squad books to hit comics shelves, as DC Comics attempts to introduce readers to some of the Squad's characters.
With a movie coming out in August and trailers that have done nothing but wow everyone so far (check out the sweet new trailer here) it was inevitable that there would be an influx in Suicide Squad related books to help people become familiar with the characters. Especially with characters not named Harley Quinn. This miniseries focuses on longtime Suicide Squad mainstay Deadshot and original Outsiders member Katana.
Synopsis:
This issue is split into two 20-page stories arcs, one for each character.
Deadshot, Written by Brian Buccellato, Art by Viktor Bogdanovic:
Deadshot's story begins in the middle of a mission in South America where Floyd is infiltrating a cartel. After completing his mission for Amanda Waller, Deadshot is sent to Belle Reve prison for three months where her waits in frustration and solitude. Waller assigns Floyd to a new mission and gives him a new partner, Will Evans. Evans has a very similar skill set to Lawton but with more advanced technology. During the mission, Evans gets overly aggressive and starts a full blown assault and requests Deadshot’s backup, only to discover that Floyd has gone AWOL to seemingly confront his dying father.
Katana, Written by Mike W. Barr, Art by Diogenes Neves:
Katana's arc begins with a rally in Markovia for Kobra. Katana is being sent to Markovia and her plane is shot down above Markovian airspace. After dispatching the members of Kobra sent to deal with the wreckage, Katana makes her way to a scientist named Dr. Jace. Katana learns that this area of Markovia has been taken over by Kobra and is blocking any aid from reaching the inhabitants. Kobra attacks and during the battle Dr. Jace is killed and Katana is bested in battle.
Analysis:
When I picked this up, I thought that it might be a fun idea to have these two books start off on their own and eventually start to weave together but it appears to me that that isn’t going to happen.
Deadshot: I’ve always been a fan of Deadshot but to be completely honest, haven’t read a whole lot of stuff with him in the new 52, as most of the Suicide Squad hasn’t been my cup of tea. First off, I’m just not a fan of the New 52 costume, its way too busy and seems overly intricate. It seemed DC loved the classic color scheme but thought Deadshot’s costume need to be more like armour, as it now appears to be about 50 different pieces. For the most part, Bogdanovich has some pretty nice draftsmanship with a style that seems - at times - like Greg Capullo, but has an issue with repeating the same facial expressions throughout.
On the writing front, Buccellato does a serviceable job setting up the story. The beginning sequence is pretty generic and cliché in terms of action, but it does the job of establishing the Deadshot character. The real problem with this issue is the generic nature of Will Evans. He’s bland, with a big side order of bland. There’s absolutely nothing unique about the guy and if one of the main conflicts of this story is going to be Deadshot against this new young buck on Task Force X, than they need to make Will Evans something more than what he is right now.
Katana: As with the weakness with the Deadshot story, having some bland characters is a definite issue for the Katana arc. Kobra has been a great villain group in the past for the DC Universe (see JSA for my favorite Kobra story) but here it's nothing more than a generic secret organization that could just as easily have a Hydra, A.I.M., SPECTRE, or whatever logo you’d like behind it. The issue works best when it is focusing on Katana and Dr. Jace.
Some of the dialogue is rather stilted and awkward such as “My name is that of my blade - - Katana.” The problem with that particular line of dialog is that Katana then goes on to explain that the weapon has another more specific name, the Soultaker - a scene that takes up an entire page.
For the most part, Neves does solid job on the art for the issue. In particular the full-page spread showing the souls in the Soultaker is really nicely rendered, although I could have done without the reflection of Dr. Jace.
I had some general confusion near the end of the battle as a giant ship appears out of nowhere and, I admit, I’m still kind of confused at what is going on after re-reading that section a few times.
Hopefully, both stories make a jump in quality with issue #2, as issue one was unfortunately a disappointment.
Sam McCoy is a Contributor for ComiConverse. Follow him on Twitter: @realcactussam
Disappointing
Bland villains and some confusing art at times make this first issue a disappointment.