Warning: Spoilers for Suicide Squad: Blaze #1!
In DC Comics, the Suicide Squad is best known for being an over-the-top superteam consisting of criminals and supervillains alike, and when Amanda Waller brings together a new version of the team, the Squad becomes deadlier than ever, just with a catch. Getting superpowers is all fine and good, but dying only a few months after getting them? That isn’t exactly the best deal around.
As seen in DC Black Label’s Suicide Squad: Blaze #1, by Simon Spurrier and Aaron Campbell, this latest incarnation of Task Force X is a team unlike any other seen before. Consisting of popular OG Squad members such as the demented Harley Quinn, the ruthless Captain Boomerang, the monstrous King Shark, and the peace-loving Peacemaker, this series sees a handful of other prisoners join their ranks all in the name of stopping a new mysterious foe who’s more or less a superpowered cannibal.
Specifically following a prisoner named Michael Van Zandt along with his fellow criminal colleagues, this issue sets up a story that sees Amanda Waller enacting a procedure called “Blaze” on the new members of the team; something that the returning representatives of Task Force X blatantly refused to take part in. Imbuing them with random superpowers to combat their latest threat, this superpowered wrinkle in the Suicide Squad’s dynamic might sound like a fun time, but in reality, turns out to be a far worse deal than fans could have ever imagined.
Telling the Squad that the Blaze procedure will give each person deadly new abilities, Waller slips in the fact that due to the nature of the serum they’re injected with, their lifespan will be cut down considerably to mere months, sending them out in a blaze of glory on the battlefield rather than as a defeated mess in the corner of a cell. And according to Waller, not only will these new powers allow them to “..scorch your names onto the very sky — and be justly celebrated,” but if any of the Blaze recipients are killed in the field, the power existing within them will spread to the remaining prisoners, amplifying their own strength but also shortening their lifespan even further. Talk about a raw deal!
Often using the threat of an implanted micro bomb to keep her subordinates in line, Amanda Waller giving random prisoners a superpowered upgrade only to guarantee their death whether their mission succeeds or fails is a wild next step in the evolution of Task Force X, and one that makes the team far more powerful than usual despite the volatility that comes along with it. Couple this with the fact that this new team is bolstered by ruthless Squad alums like King Shark and Peacemaker, have a limited time to achieve success before their powers burn them out, and will become more and more powerful as each member dies off, and you have a Suicide Squad team that’s by far the deadliest around, limited only by a few caveats that aren’t exactly super helpful in the long run.
So while it’s still unclear how the Highlander-esque power consolidation angle will play out, it can’t be denied that this version of the Squad is DC’s deadliest and most powerful team yet. And although it may be true that the majority of the members on this Suicide Squad most likely won’t survive this series, it’ll still be a treat for fans to see how far this overpowered team will go before it’s lights out for everyone involved.
