Suicide Squad: Adam Glass, Fernando Dagnino, Matt Yackey, Jared K. Fletcher, Ken Lashley, Rod Reis

I guess this is as good a place to start as any. I don’t know too much about Amanda Waller, but I know she’s involved in stuff. Lots of stuff. I know there was Team 7, and then Suicide Squad, and now the Justice League. This book takes place after Team 7, apparently, but before Suicide Squad. Here, we get a glimpse at what drove Waller to create the Suicide Squad. Having never read Suicide Squad before, I feel like this is a good way to come at the series fresh…the origin.

The issue begins with Amanda being approached in Malaysia by an old friend, Duren, who has a mission he needs her help on. Coincidentally, their prime contact is here in the same city. Amazing, right? Good thing they didn’t need to fly anywhere or something. Duren reveals to Waller that Basilisk is here and they’re planning on detonating a bomb.

I just want to say real quick how I think this whole “bomb” thing is getting old. Remember when villains had massive schemes? Robbed banks? I get that the “bomb” thing is a hot issue right now, but so what? Ooh, a bomb. What’s gonna happen? If it’s too big a bomb, then it won’t go off. The heroes will stop it. If it’s a smaller bomb, it could go off, but who cares? Who does it affect? A bunch of no-name characters who live in a fictional universe. Where’s the weight? Where’s the consequence?

Waller and Duren chase down the contact and beat information out of him, then burn the monk’s temple down. Then she has the gall to say mindless terrorism isn’t Basilisk’s M.O.. Right, because Waller’s got that one covered. Seriously, she stabs the guy in the ‘nads, beats the crap out of him, and then they set fire to the place. For no reason. Why fire? There’s no evidence there. In fact, if anything, it’d alert anyone from Basilisk who happens to be watching that Waller’s onto them, what with the 50-foot column of smoke.

They find the village where the bomb is supposed to be, and Waller goes after a helicopter that’s leaving, firing at it without prejudice. What if it was a civilian? Or a very sick child being airlifted out of town to a hospital? Can you imagine being that child, when suddenly your bird’s being shot at? Wtf, Amanda? Well, little Timmy’s not gonna need that operation after all, because the helicopter explodes. Regulus, the guy they’re hunting, turns out to be right behind Waller the whole time, so they fight.

He reveals the bomb isn’t a “death” bomb but a “birth” bomb that’ll help usher in a bunch of metas to join the Basilisk cause. It goes off. People are transformed. But, I think the Basilisk guys better take a closer look at their bio-engineers and scientists. The bomb didn’t really do exactly what Regulus wanted. It more…well, it didn’t work. Amanda loses Duren, and vows to never work with indispensable people again…thus the creation of the Suicide Squad. Yay!

Suicide Squad #0, the verdict: I have to say…unimpressed. I liked the dialog in places, but the overall story felt uninteresting and the characters were totally one-dimensional. Amanda Waller had this crazy shoot-first attitude and it made her look like a total noob rookie. Practically everything she does makes no sense. The art by Dagnino looks messy. Which is weird, because I loved his work on Resurrection Man. So what happened? The poses and faces are weird, and people are in different locations in a room from panel to panel without a logical flow of movement. If this was supposed to get me amped for reading Suicide Squad…well, I’m glad I read this one first instead of buying the series or investing more into the title.

(Photo Source: DC Comics)