Unknown Suicide Squad Millennium art recently discovered

I recently found this art work on DC's wikia page. Although I don't know where this art work originated from I'm always never the less delighted to uncover some Suicide Squad related art from the late 80s and 90s. We see there Rick Flag and Bronze Tiger along with Karen Grace (mission casualty) who's got some some "history" with Flag back from their pre Ostrander Squad days together. There's also The Privateer (a.k.a Mark Shaw), a former manhunter recruited to help Task Force X for the Manhunter Louisiana fortress assault mission (see Millennium week 4, Suicide Squad 8 and 9).

Ok I just wanted to open up this next segment of the posting by saying I was a graphic designer for 10 years so I thought these panels were funny as Hell. Last night I came across this these panels (issue 4) while watching some youtube videos that basically let you read the Suicide Squad Rebirth series in slide show format they have issues 1- 7 so far. Considering how easy it is to read a comic book series these days online I think you must really really want to buy something for the sake of having a hard cover in your collection.
Anyways, this latest Squad series is much of an improvement from what DC came up with when the DCU relaunch first happened not to mention The Squad title reboots prior to Rebirth. This rebirth series is certainly worth taking the time to read on youtube but not worth buying and taking up space at home. It does have it's moments, like Captain Boomerang getting killed in issue 2. Just go to Youtube and paste the following in the search bar...suicide squad rebirth #1. Or start with a later issue but either way after the video finishes it'll go right to what ever the following issue is until you finally reach # 7.

Swamp Thing and The Golem

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I recently found a couple of volume 2 Swamp Thing issues (only fitty cent each) from the early 80s I used to have back in the day. I really like rereading old issues like these because you really do often get more out of it when you read these stories as an adult as opposed to a teenager. I had almost forgotten how the early story line of that series was heavily steeped with an Old Testament and World War II narrative mixed in with some of the same Jewish folklore that Ragman mine is derived from. The few panels I posted here from Swamp Thing 11 do a good job of explaining the nature of The Golem.
 In this story line Swamp Thing teams up with a group of guys going after this evil mutant girl who they think is the herald of the coming "anti-Christ" that will bring the apocalypse with him when he/it comes to Earth. As you can see here they utilize a golem to help fight this evil mutant but we see later that the golem can sometimes get confused about it's mission due to it lacking a soul and mind. Think of a computer given a task a bit too complex for it's fairly simple programming. Let me digress for a moment to make this point. This imperfection in the golem is a fundamental aspect of the Ragman suite which was created from rags with a variation of the golem spell by Jewish mystics in order to create a protector with a human mind and hence the ability to reason.

BACK ISSUE magazine #92  October 2016

December 8th Update: It's December and that means it time for Hannukkah.

Well it had it's moments at least

Did you know that out of the entire Ostrander run for The Suicide Squad there was only one annual? And admittedly despite having been written by John Ostrander it wasn't a very good read in what was other wise an awesome series. But it did have it's moments like the exchange between Rick Flag and Boomerang as well as between Shade and Manhunter. In case you didn't know during his time with Task Force X Shade was known for having something of a condescending attitude toward Earth technology which other Squad members found to be annoying at times. So it was kinda funny seeing someone talk down to him for a change when it comes to the comprehension.

Amanda Waller vs Barack Obama

So just this past Wednesday DC Comics relaunched for what I believe is the 3rd reboot of the Suicide Squad title since the inception of the New DCU. There was the original series that was part of the New 52 line up that eventually gave way to another title called "The New Suicide Squad". I dropped the original title after issue 11 and didn't keep up much with what went on with the series after that but I think that first series ended some where in the 20s and then became the "New" Suicide Squad and who knows what after that.
Although not getting a lot of great word of mouth the Suicide Squad movie is something of a commercial success so I guess DC Comics is looking to capitalize on that with a relaunch of the title that mirrors the movie in many respects.

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Coincidentally we now have a Suicide Squad that looks a little more like the Ostrander series from the old DCU. Waller is a plus size woman again along with Rick Flag and Enchantress being added to the line up of Squad members. Also, Deadshot a.ka. Floyd Lawton is back to having his signature mustache/goatee but that might have been the case again after I dropped the first series for all I know. All that aside this ideological debate between Waller and Obama was pretty well written I have to say I really enjoyed it. Not saying I'm gonna go out and buy this book but for now it's at least worth keeping an eye on. If you want to read a real review of the Suicide Squad Rebirth there's close to a half o dozen videos on youtube already among other places on the internet.

Now, why am I posting this photo of Voila Davis? Is it because she played Amanda Waller in the movie? No, I did for no other reason other then that she looks fucken gorgeous here.

August 23rd update
A little something interesting here I wanted to share with any Ragman fans out there. I'm sure most of you recognize this Batwoman cover art and have probably figured out the writing at the bottom left is Hebrew. But I doubt most any of you knew what it meant. Pronounced "emet", that's Hebrew for the word truth. Which is interesting because in according to Jewish golem folklore part of the spell that animates the clay creature known as the golem is to inscribe the word truth on it's head. As some of you know the Ragman suite was created from a variant of the golem spell so I imagine that has something to do with the Hebrew inscription of that Ragman dominated Batwoman 35 cover art. Almost bought that issue at one point but it wasn't quite what I was hoping for on the inside.

My obligatory Suicide Squad movie review

Ya know the day before I saw the movie I had caught this cool scene on youtube of Waller having the Enchantress magically teleporting some military secrets out of iran during a meeting with some top brass to help make the case for the Task Force X program and I was like fucken eh. Finally I'm at the theater and the movie starts and it opens up with this introduction of the main characters that reminded me of DC's Assault on Arkham and I started thinking that this might not be bad after all. I even liked a lot of the music in the movie especially the use of these classic songs that really were spot on for the moment. Probably the best example was the Rolling Stone's Sympathy for The Devil with the introduction scene for Waller. Unfortunately that along with some funny one liners is about all the movie really has going for it.
I think my biggest problem with the movie was the plot. The disaster Task Force X gets called up for is over some shit (shit that I never really fully quite understood) The Enchantress stirs up so basically she's not even a member of The Squad she's actually in effect the primary villain of the movie. That didn't really work for me, and aside from that the movie felt a bit disjointed as far as how the story flowed. Also, there were a few cool scenes from the trailers that were absent in the film I didn't like that much either.
Some of the characters hardly made any impression at all on me. Ok we had Slipknot. who's purpose in the movie literally was to be a mission fatality I mean they gave that character nothing to do but die. They don't even introduce him in the movie he just shows up and dies 15 minute later after 2 or 3 lines. Katana seemed to also show up out of no where and in spite of her swinging around this soul stealing sword she still some how manages to be absent from the story line. Boomerang didn't have much to do either other then some extra comedy relief. Killer Croc was more present in the film but they didn't do much to develop his character into something a little less predictable and two dimensional. They probably did a little bit better with the Rick Flagg character then the before mentioned cast members. Then there's El Diablo, who they did alright with his character up until the end when he transforms into some kind of demonic "Aztecy" fire kinda thing for what was supposed to be this epic battle scene you probably won't care much about at that point in the movie even though Diablo sacrifices his life for the mission. That was one of those huh? moments. Are all my spoilers bothering you? It's ok trust me you really won't care much once you start watching the movie.
As expected the stand out characters were Amanda Waller, Deadshot and Harley Quinn what you saw in the movie trailers as far as how those characters are portrayed is pretty much what you get in the movie. Jared Leto as The Joker wasn't bad but certainly fell short of Heath Ledger's legendary performance. Another issue that bugged me was how through out the movie many of the character's seemed to be out of character. Toward the end of the movie Rick Flagg tries to give Deadshot a hug and I'm like no way that would ever happen. In any universe cinematic or published you couldn't even get a hand shake out of those two they can't stand each other. I think you'd best save your money for now and wait for this movie to show up at a nearby Redbox.

Stop, Waller Time!

Apparently all this old school Amanda Waller fan art has been up for a little while on deviant art I just happened to have discovered it today. It's nice to have something to post about here for a change I realize it's been a while. Just in time it would seem for our new commentator to this blog welcome Jeson Holder now the number of people following this site might be up to 3 now how exciting. The fan art on the bottom is fairly self explanatory but the top side fan art leaves a bit more to the imagination. I like how it shows that Waller isn't just some pencil pushing bureaucrat despite being a plus size middle age woman she's willing to get into the fight when she has to http://biram-ba.deviantart.com/art/Amanda-Waller-486215893

http://bielero.deviantart.com/art/286-Amanda-Waller-497984946

Well the Suicide Squad movie isn't quite so much off in the distance any more. No way of knowing for sure if it'll be any good but I know I'll see it at some point no matter what I hear about it although I'll most certainly be catching a matinee. But good or bad or some thing in between I'll certainly be doing a review of it here so all 3 or 4 of you who follow this blog still can see what I thought of the movie.

Suicide Squad issues spotted at Philadelphia newsstand

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Was reading an online article yesterday from the Philly Voice about how a Philadelphia newsstand had turned to comics to help keep business afloat. As you can see to the left there those are a copy of Suicide Squad 41 and 50. Newsstands in big cities were quite common back in the 80s but in 2016 they're about as common as an honest politician. As both an old school comic book fan and as someone who also worked in the news paper industry at one time I wish these guys the best of luck.