SUICIDE SQUAD: HELL TO PAY

The members of the Suicide Squad

SUICIDE SQUAD: HELL TO PAY (2018 animated feature). Director: Sam Liu. 

Task Force X is a division of the Suicide Squad, a group of super-powered convicts who agree to work for one Amanda Waller in exchange for considerations. To keep the members from simply running off, Waller has bombs implanted in the members' necks that will literally blow their heads off if they try anything un-kosher. The normally obese Waller, now skinny due to cancer, wants the team to get a certain mystical object that will give the possessor a sort of "get out of Hell" free card, supposedly affecting their after-lives. But there are others who want this object, including the immortal Vandal Savage (who was once a caveman), the Banshee, and Professor Zoom, AKA the Reverse-Flash.

Once a caveman: Vandal Savage

The members of the Task Force include the psychotic Harlequin (who has for inexplicable reasons become prominent in the DC Comics universe), Killer Frost, the lovable Captain Boomerang, Deadshot, Copperhead, and the less-malevolent-than-the-others Ben Turner, AKA the Bronze Tiger. Other characters include Vandal's daughter Scandal Savage, and her female lover, Knockout, not to mention a male stripper who turns out to have once been the magical Dr. Fate. 

male stripper attempts to channel Dr. Fate

Just as many comic books today are definitely not for children, the same goes for comic book movies. Suicide Squad: Hell to Pay is full of often gruesome and sadistic violence, especially during the prologue when Waller sets the fifth-string villains Punch and Jewelee against gang leader Tobias Whale on a speeding train. Then there is the sexual content, although none of it could be described as pornographic. What really makes the movie cook is the fluid animation, many exciting sequences, and the suspense over which group or person will wind up winning the prize -- or losing their lives. The actors who do the voices for this feature include Christian Slater (Deadshot), Vanessa Williams (Amanda Waller), and C. Thomas Howell (Zoom).

Verdict: Not your grandpop's super-villains. ***.