It's time for the Suicide Squad to fully embrace the brave new world they're now living in. Spoilers for Suicide Squad Isekai Episode 10 follow.
Suicide Squad Isekai Episode 10
With the Undead King in the skies over the kingdom, the Suicide Squad seems to be on their back foot. But Cecil and Fione are both ready to step up.
Early in the episode, the knight Cecil is wounded and bequeaths his armor to Deadshot, who shares the armor with his team mates. Fortunately for them, this armor doesn't need to be united to be magical, and soon every member of the squad is wearing a piece; Deadshot takes the gauntlets, Harley gets the helmet, and so on.
This is easily one of the best moments in the series, with each character getting a magical girl-style transformation sequence that both has killer animation (they must've spent a significant portion of the show's budget on this) and is hilarious in ways befitting each of the characters.
My favorite is definitely Clayface, who takes the cuisses and greaves of the armor--the legs, in other words. Without the rest of the armor they look more like thigh-high boots, and so Clayface busts out his best Michael Jackson-style moves, perfect for the suit he's been wearing all season. Harley gets her hyenas, we see Peacemaker's butt again. The sequence feels kind of perfect here; it's both laugh-out-loud funny and stupid-awesome in the way the best Suicide Squad moments tend to be.
But the whole episode is filled with great moments. Rick and Clayface dragging Enchantress' unconscious body after freeing it from a skeletal dragon is one stand-out moment, as is Fione and Harley finally making good on the identity-swap moment, but flipping the script on it in a way that empowers Fione.
The most interesting twist is the biggest spoiler of them all, though. Following in the footsteps of The Dark Knight, The Batman, and Batman: Caped Crusader, the final few minutes are handed to the Joker. He's appeared throughout the series here and there, acting as a sort of influence on Harley. I've been more interested in him than I usually am with the Joker since the beginning. It wasn't just his car that he steered by playing piano keys, though.
This Joker seems genuinely ambitious in a way that fits Joker's chaotic M.O., but what I love most of all is that he has an authentic-feeling relationship that hasn't, thus far, been built on abuse. So often, the Joker and Harley's relationship has been wildly toxic, to the point where it's become an almost canonical part of her character--the fantabulous emancipation of one Harley Quinn. Here, though, it's more like the Bonnie and Clyde relationship people like to mistakenly assign to the duo. The final minutes of the show reveal that the Joker has been orchestrating things the entire time. Looking back, there have been clues, such as the way that Katana says "Harley" during their second battle.
It reframes a lot of the series. Amanda Waller knows more than she's been letting on, and it makes moves like exploding Clayface's bomb look more theatrical than arrogantly ignorant. As someone on Reddit described it, it looks more like a sort of Danger Room for Harley, or even a LARP D&D campaign. The series begins with Harley talking to Joker about how she wants to go to a whole new world to experience something interesting. And so, he went to a new world, took over, and gave her a fun battle with plenty of danger and triumph, while playing the part of every character she fought. Again: it seems kind of like the ultimate romantic gesture. He remade a whole world to act as a potentially deadly amusement park for her.
The question the ending leaves up in the air is, will there be a second season, and should there be?
We don't know the answer to the former question. DC and WIT Studio haven't announced anything, and may not for a while. But does it need a second season, even with this cliffhanger? I don't think it does. There's a way to read it that suggests a second season would make sense; they fought the Undead King and won, but it was all a ruse--now they have to fight the Joker, the most dangerous enemy! On the other hand, though, I think that's somewhat of a red herring. The reveal of the Joker doesn't have to be a lead-in to a second season. It's just the reveal that, yes, this whole thing was just a fun sidequest he put together for his best gal Harls. It doesn't need to turn into a second season at all, because whatever happens next just doesn't matter for this story.
If Suicide Squad Isekai Season 2 happened, I would happily check it out, and be eager to see what they would do with it. But what I'd like more is for DC to send more of their characters over to anime houses like WIT Studio, letting them run wild with the character for a short series. We've had Batman anime before, but what about a Batman anime series? Or something with Gotham City Sirens? Booster Gold and Blue Beetle could be perfect for an anime. The Flash has the kind of too-powerful ability that would be great for a Dragon Ball Z-style multi-episode battle. I don't need this trend to continue with Suicide Squad Isekai, but I'd hate to see it stop here. DC, pay attention. You have a killer idea on your hands.