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Review of The Suicide Squad (John Murphy)

FILMTRACKS RECOMMENDS:

Buy it... if you have a high tolerance for campy panache in your style-over-substance film scores, John Murphy returning from a long break to wreak musical havoc on this concept.

Avoid it... if you didn't much appreciate Steven Price's similar approach to the concept in 2016, this soundtrack's album a simplistic souvenir of discordant flair from the story.

FILMTRACKS EDITORIAL REVIEW:

The Suicide Squad: (John Murphy) Is it a sequel? A reboot? A spin-off? Does it matter? The most important thing about 2021's The Suicide Squad is that it carries over some actors from 2016's Suicide Squad and retains the same irreverent attitude. With characters and a plotline insanely stupid by design, the concept is unashamed in its quest for campy comic book craziness. The gang of misfits that comprises the Squad is brought out of prison to invade a mysterious South American island and annihilate a Nazi-inspired lab that is, not surprisingly, experimenting on people. Along their merry journey, they kick some ass, are betrayed by comrades, and discover that the enemy lab actually consists of Starro the Conqueror, a giant space starfish that wipes people out and uses their bodies for its various world domination schemes. Writer and director James Gunn, having been dispatched from the Guardians of the Galaxy franchise, attempts to balance gore and humor with interludes containing backstories for some of the more interesting characters. While Steven Price's score for the 2016 telling was certainly adequate, Gunn had always been impressed by composer John Murphy's music for 28 Days Later and Sunshine and approached him for the 2021 project. Murphy was just starting to re-enter the composing scene after a ten-year absence following Kick-Ass to spend more time with his family. While he embraced the challenge given his tendency for rock and experimentation in his music, he also described tackling The Suicide Squad with the following eloquence: "It was fucking terrifying!" (Murphy is known for his colorful language.) Fortunately for him, Gunn is the type of director that does not interfere with the artistic process, and when Murphy provided to him a few alternate options for vital moments in this score, the director invariably encouraged him to go with the most brazenly unintuitive variant. Murphy is not well-versed in the complexities of orchestral music, a reality he freely admits, but his approach to The Suicide Squad did include a sizable traditional ensemble pressed into sectional recording duties as required by the pandemic. The composer wrote the score via guitars rather than keyboard, though, and ultimately used his guitars as a method of boosting the ambient sound of the orchestra when its less-than-desirable size failed to yield enough muscle. Don't expect complicated orchestrations in the work, for like Price's score, it's the style of the individual soloists that wins the day.

Murphy throws a lot of paint at the walls in The Suicide Squad, defying expectations with unconventional tones for certain scenes and characters. Sometimes this involves vocal elegance while at other times resorting to smashing rock explosions. Chilled keyboarding offers respites in between these and the crescendos of orchestral force. The overarching simplicity of the constructs will annoy some listeners, however, especially in the main theme. That primary identity isn't really a theme; rather, it's a rhythm of five notes on key for electric guitar, pounding away repeatedly on end. It dominates the early cues in the score and on album and eventually, by "The Star-Crossed Wake Up," becomes a continuous rhythm without any limitations of the original five notes. It's simply a staccato blasting on key. Murphy does adapt it into a military-tinged counterpart, though, building off of the five-note rhythm but adding strings in "Waller's Deal - Meet the Team." It's expanded with a more dynamic identity in "The Squad Turn Back" and translated to a rock variation by "The Squad Fight Back." The ensemble fight sequences generate several versions of this material, often with basic but sufficient orchestral heft. From there, Murphy opts to handle the score as a series of vignettes for individual characters. Harley receives slowly ascending tonal chords for choir in "Harley Gets the Javelin" and "Harley Sings" before shifting to action mode in "Bombs Go Off." A Polka-Dot Man theme in "Interdimensional Virus" presents soothing keyboarding of an old, analog Moog synthesizer tone. For Ratcatcher, acoustic guitar and strings offer a more European flavor in "Ratcatcher's Story." King Shark is treated to a catchy lullaby for acoustic guitar and female voice in "King Shark and the Clyrax," another rather dour retro expression of whimsy. Bloodsport eventually enjoys a quietly redemptive motif for keyboard and woodwinds in "Bloodsport's Deal." Finally, the music for Starro the Conqueror stomps with vintage Media Ventures-like blasts in "Suicide Squad vs Starro the Conqueror." The defeat of that beast, after a reprise of the main five-note rhythm, is handled with a happy-go-lucky choral, rock and, orchestral expression of glee in "Ratism" that reaffirms the score's ultimate, counter-intuitive panache. The whole score struggles to develop its thematic ideas but doesn't necessarily suffer as a result, the narrative strong enough to serve the story well and translate into an engaging album. While not opening with much intelligence and remaining simplistic throughout, Murphy supplies remarkable touches of creativity in style to match the attitude of the movie. It's definitely a souvenir score, one that tortures the brain but tickles the heart.  ***

TRACK LISTINGS:

Total Time: 50:58

• 1. So This is the Famous Suicide Squad (1:49) • 2. Approaching the Beach (1:12) • 3. Mayhem on the Beach (2:13) • 4. Waller's Deal - Meet the Team (2:19) • 5. Harley Gets the Javelin (0:58) • 6. Approaching the Guerrilla Camp (1:46) • 7. Project Starfish (2:03) • 8. Red Flag (2:48) • 9. Interdimensional Virus (2:26) • 10. Ratcatcher's Story (3:09) • 11. Harley Sings (1:31) • 12. Breaking into Jotunheim (1:37)

• 13. Dirty Little Secrets (2:23) • 14. Peacemaker... What a Joke (1:41) • 15. King Shark and the Clyrax (2:16) • 16. Bombs Go Off! (2:57) • 17. Suicide Squad vs. Starro the Conqueror (3:55) • 18. The Star-Crossed Wake Up (1:47) • 19. Panic on the Streets (1:17) • 20. The Squad Turn Back (1:32) • 21. The Squad Fight Back (3:30) • 22. Ratism (3:28) • 23. Bloodsport's Deal (2:10)

NOTES & QUOTES:

There exists no official packaging for this album.

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The reviews and other textual content contained on the filmtracks.com site may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of Christian Clemmensen at Filmtracks Publications. All artwork and sound clips from The Suicide Squad are Copyright © 2021, WaterTower Music and cannot be redistributed without the label's expressed written consent. Page created 9/3/21 (and not updated significantly since).