This week in comics: Suicide Squad #4

That other book I'm reading also had an issue out this week. Yay double feature!



Suicide Squad #4: The Black Vault, Part 4
The story so far: Deadshot, Harley Quinn, Captain Boomerang, Killer Croc, Enchantress, Rick Flag, and Katana (gee, movie lineup much?) have infiltrated an underwater Russian base and found a hacking supervillain named, creatively, Hack, and a big black orb containing General Zod. The Russians are also building their version of the Suicide Squad, made up of Tunguska, Tankograd, Gulag, and Cosmonaut, who attached Our Villains at the climax of the last issue. Oh, and Zod killed Boomerang before getting into a big fight with Katana and Enchantress.

The Russian behind this is codenamed "Karla," which I think is bloody hilarious, even though that's probably the Evil Russian Spymaster codename to go to. (It's a Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy reference.)

Zod throws Croc into the Soviet Suicide Squad, knocking them out of the action and getting a hilarious reaction from Harley (seriously, Harley is bonkers even compared to her film incarnation; in an earlier issue, Croc throws her at a group of mooks, and she goes from "Yay! Flight powers activated!" to having a one-sided discussion about neoliberalism while mowing down scores of bad guys. It's a gag that could probably only work in the comic medium, and it's just amazing).

Hack figures out how to put Zod back in his cosmic sphere prison thing and then teleport them all home via the internet. Kinda anti-climactic, actually.

Because "The Black Vault" is apparently a paper-thin story, each issue is split up into advancing the story and doing a flashback with one Squad member, and this month, it's Harley's turn.

"Hey, Flag, do you ever stop and wonder if the entire world's economy is actually a fictional construct created to control us and also if your brain tastes of boogers?"

Flag and Harley take a squad to secure a cache of Joker toxin, but it's booby-trapped, causing Harley to hallucinate the Joker and Flag's men to go homicidally insane. Flag saves her, but takes a bullet in the process, and the gas starts to change him. Hallucination!Joker suggests Harley leave Flag and run for it, but Harley declines. Harley saves Flag, who asks if she was affected by the gas. She says she's immune.

It's fun, but ultimately fairly shallow. The best parts are Harley's insane commentary and Deadshot's utter nihilism.