This review contains spoilers.
Death doesn’t scare me
Suicide Squad Most Wanted: Deadshot and Katana #1 is the start of an anthology series featuring stories with the titular characters. The Deadshot story is written by Brian Buccellato with pencils by Viktor Bogdanovic, inks by Richard Friend and colors by Michael Spicer. The Katana story is written by Mike W. Barr with art by Diogenes Neves and colors by Carrie Strachan.
The first story starts with Deadshot infiltrating a drug cartel in search of their leader, Guillermo LaPaz. He is not there so Deadshot takes a prisoner to interrogate. Three months later, Deadshot gets information that someone is in hospice care. He confronts Amanda Waller who sends him on a mission. Deadshot needs to kidnap LaPaz’s daughter from school in order to draw LaPaz out. However, since the Suicide Squad is busy, Waller sends a rookie with Deadshot. While the rookie tries to complete the mission, Deadshot goes rogue and leaves. The story ends with Floyd’s arrival at the house of his father who he plans to kill.
This is a decent start to the story. There is some good development on Deadshot as a character that is delivered naturally and helps inform the story in the background while the hunt for LaPaz takes center stage. The art is well done and I am curious where this story will go.
The second story starts with Katana arriving in Markovia which is being taken over by Lord Kobra. She is shot down by Kobra’s forces and has to fight her way through troops in order to get to Dr. Jace who deals with the relationship between science and mysticism. Katana hopes that the doctor can help with the soultaker sword. However, before they can leave, the villagers ask Katana to help them against Kobra which she reluctantly agrees to. Katana leads a battle against Lady Naja, Kobra’s partner, and her forces. The story ends with Kobra’s arrival who seemingly kills Dr. Jace.
This is a good character story for Katana. I like that she comes to the country for selfish reasons but has to think beyond herself once she actually arrives. She is an interesting character and is fun to read about. The fact that she is fighting a villain named Kobra is a little hard to take seriously. All I can think about is G.I. Joe. The tones do not quite fit together but it’s still a fun read.
Verdict
I was somewhat disappointed that this book was not a team up between the two characters but I quickly got over that. I wish there were more anthology books being printed now because it allows the creative teams to play with characters that maybe could not sell a book on their own. Deadshot and Katana are great characters and it is fun to see them spotlighted in solo adventures. Neither story is great but they’re decent starting points. I recommend picking this up.
