SPOILERS WARNING - PLOT POINTS FROM LAST EPISODES DISCUSSED

Having been a fan of DC, Marvel and comic book superheroes and villains way before ever scratching the surface of anime, I came into the Suicide Squad Isekai with high hopes. Even if more recent movies in DC and Marvel were extremely weak, I always found that animation stood a step above, untainted. And upon hearing that one of the most memorable anti-hero/villain groups was getting the love from a Japanese animation studio, (even if in-house DC), I was willing to give this a good try. I wasn't going to take any early opinions as my viewpoint of it, but judge it as a whole. And what did it bring? Nothing but disappointment.

I know that some people will immediately say, "but why didn't you drop it?" - and simply answered, if you want to properly review something, I find that a complete experience is necessary, to avoid any dispute "that it got better at the end." It did not. And look no further then the core team, that resembles their Western counterparts in name only. Harley was enjoyable, but not as Harley Quinn, but as a typical tsundere character in any run-of-the-mill anime. Is that a bad thing? No. But when you are bringing titular, well-established characters to a new medium, assume that your audience are people who are already acquainted with the character. Especially with one Harleen Quinzel, which has been adapted in video games, animation and live-action already. When the whole trifecta has been explored, you have a lot of reference material to compare it to, yet the writing here is never given any of the nuance that it's lent in its other iterations. Clayface, Deadshot, Peacemaker and King Shark are basically reduced to a bunch of bumbling buffoons. Not villains who have given Batman a run for his money, but just some shitty villains-turned-heroesque for the sake of it. The only person given even an ounce of character development is Harley, and even hers is superficial at best.

Now, the plus side to this anime. The actual animation quality is pretty good. It's why my score isn't rock bottom, because a lot of what was being shown was easy on the eyes and actually refreshing considering how many animes in the Summer 2024 slate were just CG'd to absolute shit. So that was a good change of pace, and brought my opinion a cut above. But because character motivation and overall plot narrative never actually have any meaningful factors driving the story forward, and the studio choose to just "let stuff happen" when the plot demands it, it just, well, happens. You're thinking to yourself, yeah, this is cool but I don't even know what the fuck I'm meant to be watching? Like yay, they saved the city! But what or why or how? And why do we care so little about the initial setup with Amanda Waller? I've seen her maybe a handful of times, and this was a solid 3h 30m+ of watch time. Even when James did The Suicide Squad, he had the sense to keep Viola David (Amanda Waller) as a big driving factor for what the team was doing. You felt a sense of urgency for what was going on, and that she might pop anyone's head at any given moment, even for the most minuscule of things. Why did they only leave it for the end and make it meaningless? So you're telling me these guys are heroes now and none of the death threats actually mattered? Even if it was Clayface, you spit in your own stakes and make the effort mean nothing if you make the main antagonistic force a joke. Like this anime turned out to be.

If this is what DC have to offer to the anime community, respectfully, keep it to yourself. We don't need more checklist and assembly-line superhero TV shows that suck. CW did that with a lot of your IPs. You've done some of it yourself with your recent movies. Crisis on Infinite Earths was stellar, and Batman: Caped Crusader is a decent iteration, but you really screwed this up. This doesn't deserve a season 2, even if they set one up. Try again with some other more recognizable name, but a first season for any anime is the most important one to get you invested in the world and what's going on, and I have never been more bored in my entire life. This is an anime you'd watch if you've literally watched everything else that's even remotely interesting. It isn't a top pick, or even a top 20 pick. It's an anime. Or tries to be, at least. And definitely doesn't deserve the Isekai title. Putting this show in the same category as the likes of Reincarnated as a Slime, is a crime.

As a closing note - if you enjoyed this anime, then that's okay too. You can enjoy things for the sake of enjoying them, but I think if you want to use already established characters in a new format, you have to change them which both respects the source but also puts your own spin to it to make it stand out. And this does not elevate, enhance or change anything positively from these characters, but chooses to use them for their namesake as an attraction but never break the mold of any C-tier Isekai, and given how much they gut the source, only hurt these IPs instead. If you're expecting this to be a DC story or anything of quality, look elsewhere. James has once again let us down.