‘The Suicide Squad’ Trailer Breakdown: Let’s Take a Closer Look at This Wild Anti-Hero Team…but Mostly King Shark

Now this is what I call a Suicide Squad. After the first iteration of the DC Comics team of bad guys trying to do some good failed to stir up much excitement, Guardians of the Galaxy franchise director James Gunn is giving them a bit of an overhaul. The Suicide Squad is coming to theaters and HBO Max this summer with a whole bunch of new team members eager to die while saving the world. Well, at least one of them seems eager to bite the dust. The rest are basically given no other choice.

The new The Suicide Squad trailer introduces us to the new team, promises some stellar comedy, gives us what looks like another incredible Sylvester Stallone character, and even brings a DC Comics villain who we never thought we’d see on the big screen. Plus, there’s far more banter about dicks than we were expecting, and we already expected a little bit. We dig into all of that in our The Suicide Squad trailer breakdown.

The Suicide Squad trailer throws us into the middle of a mission for the DC Comics villain ensemble. It looks like things haven’t gone totally according to plan, because the team looks like they’ve already seen some action and lost one of their colleagues: the one who’s mentally defective and dressed as a court jester. As Rick Flagg (Joel Kinnaman) tells Peacemaker (John Cena), they don’t leave one of their own behind, and Bloodsport (Idris Elba) takes this opportunity to mock Peacemaker’s helmet for looking like a toilet seat.

Already it’s clear that this movie is operating on another level from David Ayer’s Suicide Squad. The dialogue comes fast and fierce, there’s wittiness and edge in the way that these characters talk to each other. This won’t be dulled down for a PG-13 audience, and this team is constantly going to be at each other’s throats, because they’re not made to get along. They’re just forced to work together, just like any office, restaurant or store you’ve ever worked in.

Viola Davis is back as Amanda Waller, the woman who put the Suicide Squad together. She’s still overseeing operations and keeping everyone in line on the radio and on the monitors.

In case you hadn’t figured it out already, the team member that the Suicide Squad wasn’t about to leave behind is Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie). In typical Harley fashion, she was able to handle herself, getting out of whatever pickle everyone thought she was in. But she can’t help but be touched that her squad came back to get her. You gotta love that level of instability that lets her emotions come through at any given time.

You can’t see his face, but that’s Idris Elba under that helmet, which looks like a xenomorph turned into a motorcycle helmet. Surely he’s going to get mocked at some point for that helmet, right?

It wouldn’t be a Suicide Squad movie if we didn’t get some new recruits forced to risk their lives in exchange for some time off their prison sentences. Here we have Michael Rooker as Savant, looking kind of like Raiden from Mortal Kombat.

Then there’s Pete Davidson as Blackguard, and if we didn’t know any better, this could just be a photo from real life rather than The Suicide Squad. That’s not meant to be a slam against Pete Davidson, because I think I’m a bigger fan of his work on SNL than most, but I think even he would agree that he looks like he just got out of prison almost everyday.

What the fuck is that? It’s Rocket Raccoon stand-in Sean Gunn! Well, it’s Sean Gunn replaced by visual effects as the truly unhinged-looking creature Weasel. We’re not sure how much of an asset he’s going to be in the field, so we’ll make the prediction now that he’s going to be dispatched pretty quickly once the action starts.

In case you forgot what the deal is with the Suicide Squad, they all have a little bomb injected into their neck. If they venture off mission or get out of line, they can be blown up with the push of a button. We’re betting we’ll see a lot more neck explosions this time around, in addition to the gruesome deaths the team will likely face in the field.

I can’t tell you how much I appreciate the fact that the word “visionary” wasn’t used in a bumper like this. Describing James Gunn’s mind as “horribly beautiful” is right on the money, and it’s clear this is going to have the fast and loose vibe of Guardians of the Galaxy with the twisted sense of humor that Gunn has shown since the beginning of his career.

Speaking of twisted, here’s the unicorn-loving Captain Boomerang, the role that Jai Courtney was born to play and the only one that I’d like to see him play from here on out. So hopefully he doesn’t get killed this time around.

Here’s another new character in the form of TDK. That’s Nathan Fillion under the mask, and while we haven’t been told what TDK stands for, the working theory is that it stands for The Detachable Kid. This is believed to be a new version of the obscure character Arm-Fall-Off-Boy, but we don’t know that for sure yet.

All right, folks. This is not a drill. That’s King Shark, and he coul be the greatest character ever brought to the big screen in a DC Comics movie. Here he is eating a person and saying “Nom-nom,” so you can see why we already love him.

In case you needed any more convincing, here’s is yet another shot of King Shark letting everyone know that he has a hand. Oh, and if you didn’t hear, this is the character voiced by Sylvester Stallone, which makes the beefy shark even better.

Because King Shark is such a big goober, Bloodsport is convinced that they’re all going to die. That’s when we get this grim look from Polka Dot Man (David Dastmalchian), who says he truly hopes that he does die. I’m predicting that Polka Dot Man is the only truly suicidal member of the Suicide Squad, but in a cruel twist of fate, he never dies and ends up disappointed every time.

Lord of the Rings, eat your heart out. This is the only fellowship we need, especially since we can see the hulking body of King Shark, our new lord and savior, just shuffling along.

Yes, King Shark is in this shot, but we’ll take a break from gushing over him to give a shoutout to Peter Capaldi as Thinker. You could also catch a glimpse of him in the opening shot of the trailer in the van. Since this sequence involves the squad lecturing him about what not to do, we’re betting that whatever this mission is relies on the intel that he gives them.

Rick Flagg gives one of his familiar Suicide Squad speeches with a laundry list of what will cause Thinker to die. Then Harley Quinn comes in and offers up a couple things that she personally thinks should be reason for Thinker to die, but Flagg isn’t fully on board, though he does agree with her perspective to some extent.

This appears to be Major General Suarez, played by Joaquín Cosío. He’s likely one of the men overseeing a Nazi-era prison and laboratory named Jotunheim on the fictional Latin American island called Corto Maltese. Political prisoners were held here and various experiments were carried out, and one of them can be seen bursting out of the ground later on in the trailer. But we’ll get to that.

While on this island, we’re going to get plenty of hilarious, raunchy banter between the characters. In this case, Bloodsport tells Peacemaker to eat a big bag of dicks. Rather than be insulted, Peacemaker makes it clear just how many dicks he would eat in the name of liberty. The world would be a better place if all superheroes made their stance on eating dickers a little more clear.

Huh. Well, at some point Peacemaker and (seemingly) Ratcatcher 2 (Daniela Melchior) take the time to dance in a club. We’re not sure how much leisure time the Suicide Squad gets, but clearly they enjoy it whenever they can. If you look in the background, you can see Troma Entertainment co-founder and James Gunn mentor Lloyd Kaufman making a little cameo too.

Here’s one of those typical epic action shots with Harley Quinn, Polka Dot Man and Bloodsport making the leap across a crumbling building. If you watch carefully, you’ll see Bloodsport doesn’t quite make it across the gap, falling onto part of the collapsing structure. We firmly expect someone to make fun of him for that.

Alice Braga is also in The Suicide Squad, but she doesn’t seem to be part of the titular team. Instead, she’s playing Sol Soria, a Corto Maltese native and the leader of the Maltese Resistance against Maltese dictator Silvio Luna. Even though she’s not on the team, she will likely be one of their allies.

Here’s a reminder of how tough Amanda Waller is. Bloodsport breaks out of his restraints and brings a pen right to her throat and she doesn’t even flinch. You don’t want to fuck with Amanda Waller.

Finally! Another shot of King Shark. These are the kind of images that cinema was made for. King Shark rips apart a man’s body in a truly stunning fashion. That’s it. That’s the shot.

In another gorgeous shot, Harley Quinn screams as colorful flowers burst behind her. Why? Who knows, and who cares. It’s a great shot!

This appears that it could be the Nazi prison and lab in question, and it’s about to be torn apart by something unexpected.

There’s some kind of colorful mask bursting out of the ground in front of the Suicide Squad. Unfortunately for Captain Boomerang, it’s not a giant unicorn.

King Shark can’t help but look on in a dumbfounded fashion as he chews on a piece of meat, presumably from someone he just killed. He’s a hungry boy.

That’s Steve Agee, the Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 co-star who is said to be playing John Economos, the warden of Belle Reve Federal Penitentiary (a role he’ll reprise in the Peacemaker series coming to HBO Max). He’s apparently very involved in whatever this Suicide Squad mission is, and he’s shocked and maybe a little stoked to see what he dubs as a kaiju.

If you look at the monitor in the background, you’ll notice that’s not just some random monster. It’s a giant starfish. In fact, this is probably Starro, a giant alien being with the ability to adapt to any environment, produce parasite clones, and absorb the energy of a planet and all of its lifeforms. It’s also insanely strong, mostly invulnerable and capable of regenerating. Oh, and it can control minds through its parasite clones. What’s it doing in Corto Maltese? Your guess is as good as ours.

To end on a charming note, Harley Quinn enjoys the rain and compares it to angels splooging on everyone. Isn’t she lovely?

If you needed a reminder of just how stacked the cast of The Suicide Squad is, here you go. You’ll notice that Taika Waititi’s name is in the cast, and he’s one of the few actors whose role remains unknown. There were rumblings that he might be the voice of King Shark, but clearly that’s been debunked now. Is there any chance that he’s the voice of Weasel? Or maybe he’ll be the voice of Starro, who can communicate telepathically in the comics?

The Suicide Squad comes to theaters and HBO Max (for 31 days) starting on August 6, 2021.

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