Originally published May 2017

I was stuck on a plane for 11.5 hours recently and in that time I got to catch up on a lot of movies I'd missed in the past year. While most of the films I watched were worthy of significant praise (Arrival & Allied), there were a few that I stopped and skipped out of boredom. Then there was one crappy movie that I watched all the way to the end. I couldn't look away. It was a fascinating train wreck of a movie. When I was finished watching Suicide Squad, I realized that watching it on a plane with nowhere to go was the only way I was going to watch it without a beer in my hand.

I considered writing a review for Suicide Squad—for less than a second—but realized there was no point. If you know about the movie or have any interest in it, you're probably aware of the fact that it's bad and why it's bad. The best I can say is that all the reviews you've likely read or watched about the film are probably accurate because the flaws are so apparent. That being said, it's a bad movie, but not so bad that I was unable to watch it or be entertained by its crappiness. In fact, I'd rather watch Suicide Squad again over The Replacements, even though it has some of the same problems of being a formulaic mess of archetypes and clichés.

So rather than write a review and tell you what you already know, why not come up with some drinking game rules? It's more fun this way and it might make the movie more fun to watch if you find yourself forced into that position.

Suicide Squad Drinking Game Rules - Hair of the Dog

Soundtrack Overwhelming

I get the impression the people making this film were more interested in making music videos for their favorite popular songs than for their favorite anti-heroes. The sound editor for Suicide Squad just turned the volume up for the soundtrack (the pop songs, specifically). The music is louder than everything else and it's distracting. With how over-involved the music was, I half-expected there to be a moment where they'd make the shitty joke of pushing someone, on-queue with the song: Move, by Ludakris.

• If, at any point, you hear a recognizable song playing over the film, take a drink.

Exposition

In a film that is meant to introduce ignorant audiences to a group of characters that most people may not know, exposition is inevitable. As I've certainly said before, exposition has its uses and can be appropriate for storytelling without appearing uninspired or lame. Suicide Squad, however, fails to do much of anything other than explain what's happening. From the mini-music videos of character introductions, to flashbacks, to the random things that the douche commando says about everybody in the group, to the commanding woman who tries to act tough but is just a tool, you are going to be told what is happening as it happens and what people can do a lot.

• Whenever a character takes a moment to tell the audience or other characters what is happening, describes another character in some way.

• One of those stupid introduction music videos plays, take a drink.

Will Smith being Will Smith

Growing up through the 1990s, I liked Will Smith. I was fine with his family-friendly rap albums and I enjoyed his major motion pictures. However, at some point, I realized that he rarely ever left his comfort zone when it came to acting and never seemed to play a different character. He was usually just a variation of Will Smith. Even in the more brooding films like I, Robot and I Am Legend, he was still the same wise-cracking, sentimental, too-cool-for-school hero. Though he was slightly more damaged in those films.

In Suicide Squad, he's doing the same thing. He plays Deadshot, a super-assassin who never misses a shot—even though he does. It doesn't matter what type of character Deadshot was in the comics, because he's Will Smith in this one. As the highest-paid actor in the movie, Smith takes point in most of the story. There's a lot of focus on Deadshot's daughter and their relationship as an attempt to make his character more relatable to average audience members. They gave Deadshot a mask, and I wished he wore it more often because the constant reminder of Will Smith was a distraction, to say the least.

• Whenever you feel like Deadshot is just Will Smith playing every other Will Smith character you've ever seen

• Whenever he feels like he's dominating the film with his presence, take a drink.

• If you have never seen any of his other movies, just drink whenever he says something snarky.

Characters Staring at Something

This rule may be a rough one. There's a lot of staring in this. People stare at Harley Quinn. People stare at the apocalyptic light show you've seen in every other superhero movie. People stare at strange monsters the Power Rangers used to fight. People stare at each other. Killer Croc hangs out in the back of the group and silently stares at people having conversations. It's a sign that they had a bunch of characters and didn't know what to do with all of them.

• Take a small sip whenever a person or group of people is staring at something or someone.

Cameos from Other Characters

Did you know the Joker is in this movie? If you weren't able to avoid any of the marketing leading up to the release of this movie, which would have been difficult, then of course you knew the Joker was in it and played by Jared Leto. They marketed the hell out of his Joker and put him on all the posters, trailers, and press events. Joker, Joker, Joker! He was everywhere for this movie!

In the movie, however, he's got less than 20 minutes of screen time. I'd say that's for the best, though, all things considered. I was more annoyed by Leto's Joker than anything else. I didn't really see a supervillain, just a meth addict with a tendency to snort and growl, who also happened to have green hair.

Nonetheless, that's not the point of this rule, I just wanted to take a moment to shit on Jared Leto's joker like the rest of the internet. The point is actually that since the Joker is barely in this movie, he's basically just a cameo.

• The Joker, Batman, the Flash, and a few other DC characters are mentioned throughout the film. So whenever one of these "jokers" shows up for a split-second, or is mentioned, take a drink.

An Effect, Plot Device, or Style Used in Other Superhero Movies You've Already Seen

This rule is entirely dependent upon you seeing other superhero movies before this one. If Suicide Squad is your first, I'm sorry. You can just skip this rule, in that case. If you have seen other superhero films, however, I would leave the specifics to you. Suicide Squad is a wholly unoriginal mess of clichés, archetypes, and rote scenarios that you have likely seen a dozen times before. Slow-motion explosions, a giant light beam in the sky signaling the end of the world, a character speech that brings the group together to work as a team, etc.

• Take a drink whenever you suddenly feel a little bit of deja vu while watching Suicide Squad.

"We're the 'Bad Guys'"

Okay. I'm tempted to make this a "finish your drink" rule because of how lame it is. As if we needed a more obvious indication that the film's writing quality was poor, the line "We're the 'Bad Guys'" is used, multiple times. Maybe the writers thought we might forget what movie we were watching. The first hour is spent introducing all the characters with their music videos that use clips from later in the movie, illustrating how "bad" they are. The characters then spend a lot of time explaining how someone is "bad." We don't need this line, at all. Yet it is said by multiple characters, on several occasions.

• Maybe just take a sip of your drink when you hear about how "bad" someone is.

• Or, maybe just finish your drink because it's such a dumb thing for a character to say and it irritates you too much to just take a sip.

That's it! I hope you enjoyed my not-review of Suicide Squad and hopefully, these rules will help you through a painful 2 hours if you choose to subject yourself to the film.

For more drinking game rules, see our Hair of the Dog feature and check out our universal drinking rules!

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