Suicide Squad Dream Team #1: Meet the Dreamer

Amanda Waller is at it again. She’s got another shady mission for another Task Force X, this one including the relatively new character Dreamer. Suicide Squad Dream Team #1 follows Dreamer as she discovers how dangerous Waller can be.

Amanda Waller already put together a new version of Task Force X before Suicide Squad Dream Team #1 opens, and she intends to send them into the island nation of Gamorra to save it from insurgents. To get the team there, she is utilizing Nia Nal, better known as Dreamer, to covertly take the team into Gamorra via the dream realm. A flashback reveals that Dreamer got roped into this mission after acquiring shocking information on a politician that should send him to jail but that Waller is only going to use to blackmail him. Dreamer dares to stand up to Waller, and it goes badly. Back in the present, Dreamer leads the team through the dream realm into Gamorra. The dream realm allows everyone to travel through peoples’ dreams and emerge in a location where someone is sleeping. In this case, transporting so many people kills the person who they use to emerge from the dream realm. But when the team arrives in Gamorra, the situation does not appear to be as Waller described.

Suicide Squad Dream Team #1 is largely a vehicle to further get to know Dreamer. A barebones plot is laid out, but little advancement is made on that score. Much of the issue is spent establishing Dreamer’s upright moral character, explaining what her powers are and how proficient she is with them, and discussing her origin. Maines succeeds in some ways but not in others.

The least successful character development comes late in the issue as Dreamer discusses her origin and the nature of being a hero with Harley. Harley’s dialogue is weird but not necessarily out of place for Harley. Dreamer’s dialogue is less effective. She over communicates at times, and some of what she says is clearly intended to inform the reader because it makes little sense for her to include that information in this conversation with Harley. As a result the dialogue through this sequence is clumsy at times.

Suicide Squad Dream Team #1’s other Dreamer heavy sequences–traveling the dream realm and taking a principled stand against Waller–are much more successful. The dream realm concept is explained efficiently and with much more interaction than the sequence regarding Dreamer’s origin that comes up later in the issue. The opening scene with Waller is Dreamer’s best material in the issue. Waller’s inflexible amorality offers plenty of room to show off other characters’ principles and moral complexity.

There isn’t much of a storyline to evaluate in Suicide Squad Dream Team #1, because there is very little of it. Waller’s “recruitment” efforts for Task Force X are even shadier than usual. And the information she provided doesn’t entirely line up with what little the team sees on the ground when they get into Gamorra. Longtime readers won’t bat an eye at the possibility that Waller is being so underhanded. And the characters, while maybe angrier than usual, aren’t particularly surprised.

The dream realm is an interesting concept. Its visual depiction here, as the edge of a forest with a creek and several mirrors hanging on trees, is lackluster and generic. Perhaps this is what it has looked like in all of Dreamer’s past appearances. But if there is room for variety, it is not realized here. The one place the dream realm does work is in Lucas’ coloring choices. Suicide Squad Dream Team #1 is largely a dark issue. The dream realm stands out in contrast because of how bright Lucas colors it. The book comes alive for those two pages after a bleak opening, and it is memorable as the issue goes on. 

Presumably the dream realm’s lack of inventiveness is a result of how Maines described it in the script as opposed to the art team independently creating it on the page. In any event, in an issue seemingly designed to build up Dreamer as a character, this feels like a lost opportunity to have some fun with her.

The uninspired dream realm aside, the art is this issue’s best selling point. Barrows and Ferreira, largely through thicker lines and heavy shading, deliver very expressive characters. The liberal use of thick black fields as an aspect of shading creates a lot of contouring and depth. There is a splash page featuring Bizarro a little more than halfway through the issue that doesn’t just showcase the artistic choice but also demonstrates how effective it is. His rather explosive anger is palpable. A less extreme but equally effective showcase is Dreamer’s reveal when she is manacled to a chair. In this case, it informs Dreamer’s body language, driving up the character’s anger and tension.

The layouts in Suicide Squad Dream Team #1 frequently move away from more traditional rectangular panels lined up across a page. Sometimes rows are angled. There are many curved panels and curved rows of panels. The layout choices add a generally chaotic sense to much of the issue, especially the second half as we learn more about Dreamer’s powers which involve both dreams and some limited precognitive abilities. The thematic connection is tenuous but adds atmosphere. Whether these choices were strictly described in Maines’ script or more collaborative, Barrows realizes them effectively.

Carey has to tackle a very text heavy issue. Her lettering shines largely in how she manages to organize dialogue bubbles, thought bubbles, and caption boxes to still let the art shine through as opposed to turning parts of some pages into walls of text.