The problem with any comic book sourced film ESP if it is successful is that the publishing house looses it's mind and goes crazy printing books from those characters.
Suicide Squad is not an exception.
The series has been fairly solid for the last several years and the increased spotlight has only given DC
more pressure to turn out a great book.
The cast of Task Force X is in constant rotation since they keep getting killed.
A shockingly clever use for the MANY D grade villains that have piled up over the last 90 odd years.
Grim and dark in ways that Marvel can only hope to be there is reason the book has been around for so long.

Eh, honestly was okay, not the best but not the worst Suicide Squad stories I've read. The artwork is still not up to my standards and could have been done a bit nicer, but who am I to judge if I can't even draw a simple stick figure, right?

It's been about 4 years since I've read the first volume of this series, so I don't really remember anything. But picking up this volume, I didn't feel like I was missing any information. It was nicely told again and we get to read about the "origin" stories from a couple of new Suicide Squad members.

The interesting part is where the title comes from! In a digital attack, that renders the Task Force X's prison unguarded towards an psychiological attack and everybody goes insane and underfall the urges to kill everyone else. Except Harley Quinn, who turns sane instead again. Quite a wild concept, but the execution was somewhat interesting. One character I still utterly dislike is Amanda Waller, does anybody actually like her? Can you explain why? Yeah, I really don't see it.

The storylines surrounding Suicide Squad are always my favorites in DC's comics and this stands up with all of the ones from the past. The art is well done, the story is well-paced and I loved every second of this experience..

I usually enjoy this series, and really liked the New 52 version of it. But this volume felt lacking. It felt like certain elements to the story were missing and it felt rushed. I get that they wanted to get to certain aspects of the story, but as a reader and someone who likes this series development of stories with team interactions are what make this series great. Sorry not impressed with this volume.

Picking up where Vol 1 left off, if you enjoyed the series so far, you'll look forward to this. I do think the volume is too short and they could possibly bind more issues together. I think it cuts between present and past could be a bit more clear; however, overall again if you enjoyed the story so far you should dig this volume.

Suicide Squad, Volume 2: Going Sane by Rob Williams is a story arc that plays on a fairly original gimmick. Picking up right where volume one ended, Going Sane is a series arc that is sure to keep Suicide Squad fans flipping those pages!

After capturing the Kryptonian, General Zod, the crew returns back to Amanda Waller with the orb and its dark energy. Only what they didn't count on was the effect it was about to have on everyone. As they begin to all go insane due to the dark energy's influence, it is up to Harley Quinn to save the day. Only problem is that Harley is not Harley anymore. The orb had the reverse effect on our favorite insane gal and turned her back into Dr. Harley Quinzel. Totally sane and totally unprepared to battle the entire Suicide Squad without her craziness.

Fans of Suicide Squad will love this book but fans of Harley will not. After all, who wants a sane Harley. Being a crazy adorable psychotic is what we love about her. Without that, well she's kind of boring.

Rob Williams's Suicide Squad stories are compelling and his take on the characters is good. Jim Lee's art always brightens up everything. Suicide Squad Vol. 2: Going Sane's back-up stories provide origins for Squad's lesser-known characters who actually need them, including Hack, Enchantress, and Killer Frost. I'm plenty excited for the upcoming Justice League vs. Suicide Squad miniseries so the hints toward it were a thrill.

Last issue saw the Suicide Squad bring back an entrance to the Phantom Zone and General Zod, but lacking Boomerang. Waller had the really bright idea of trying to fit General Zod with a brain bomb and make him a Suicide Squad member, but things went haywire. Unexplained light changes happened, guards and inmates all went crazy except Harley Quinn who went sane. Dr. Quinn, Waller who was barely keeping a lid on her urges, and Hack manage to cobble together a team to stop the madness just in time. The rest of the volume contains some interesting files on individual Suicide members and a couple of short adventures with June Moone and and Harley Quinn. HQ riding Manbat was very strange. You need to read this issue and see that!

I received an eARC of this title from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

More fun and badassery from the Suicide Squad, picking up where Volume 1 left off. It wraps up that story nicely while giving us a preview of the Suicide Squad vs. Justice League event.

Nice side scenes giving us background/character development of Hack, Croc, Enchantress, and Harley. Artwork was fantastic, as expected.

Having had one quick and desperately bitty volume in the Rebirthed Suicide Squad, here we get a second one. The original four comics must have been 50% this story, then 50% a stand-alone witterfest with Waller as we learn the background of the different characters, meaning the real story we're buying this book for is over in moments. At least the rest of the book isn't just a cover gallery as before, but what we swap it out for - a silly and pointless story, drawn in three utterly different styles for no reason whatsoever - is not much better. I know Harley is supposed to be brainless and to have no idea how to fix on something for more than five seconds, but this isn't even her title, and so doesn't have to have the same attributes. DC must try harder.

Highly recommended it. My 10 and 6 years old loved this comic book. I'll be purchasing volume 1.

ARC from Netgalley.
Volume 2's "Going Sane" storyline really is a direct continuation of the previous Volume's "Black Vault" story. With General Zod out of the Vault, Belle Reve starts turning on each other. Criminals fighting and killing guards, Croc and Enchantress hooking up... and the most shocking, Harley Quinn regaining her sanity! Blame it on Zod? Not so...

... turns on this aggression is coming slightly from Zod, but more so from an "echo" of Captain Boomerang. Turns out, when Hack transported all of them back to Belle Reve, Captain Boomerang was still alive and a digital remnant of his consciousness remained in the system. The battle is fought (quite epic at times) and Boomerang is brought back to life as Zod is put back in the Vault.
But who's this coming into the prison now? Killer Frost arrives on the scene and is "to be continued in Justice League vs. Suicide Squad".

Good title overall, but needs a bit of direction for the future maybe. Recommend.

Ward Moore was far from prolific, but some of the science fiction he generated has achieved classic status. The short story “Lot” (1953) and its sequel “Lot’s Daughter” (1954) certainly deserve to be enjoyed by each new generation of sf fans.

“Lot” is the perfect antidote to all of the loathsome prepper porn and self-published survivalist literature that has become so popular with a certain segment of society. Moore seems to have anticipated the genre and savaged it before it was born.

The Jimmon family, car packed full of essentials, no room for the dog, flees Malibu, along with countless others who are heading north from the LA area. David Jimmon is pretty pleased with himself because he put his own selfish interests ahead of those of his neighbors and, for that matter, his family by pushing ahead of the pack on the crowded highways. He views himself as a romantic hero, the individualist who survives while the docile masses perish. His family views him as a tyrant who has gone off the deep end.

David is enormously frustrated with his wife and kids, who (in his view) don’t understand the enormity of the war that has destroyed LA and Pittsburgh, inevitably leading (he believes) to primal battles among the survivors as they try to steal food, weapons, and women from each other. David’s family, on the other hand, is fed up with his “there is no law but the law of survival” attitude.

The war, and the chance it gives him to show off his planning skills, is the only thing that has gone right in a life as a buttoned-down accountant that is primarily defined by David’s insecurity. But the story’s payoff comes in just how far David is willing to go to bring about his vision of a brighter survivalist future.

“Lot’s Daughter” takes place several years later. David is still awash in the constructs of his antisocial mind. His daughter, who believes that humans have an instinct for cooperation, clearly did not inherit her father’s craziness gene. All of David’s survivalist preparations reveal his ineptness at pretty much everything. He is much better at theorizing how to survive than at acquiring the practical skills that might allow him to thrive.

Both “Lot” and “Lot’s Daughter” involve a shock. In “Lot’s Daughter,” the shock arrives when it the reader realizes just what a hypocritical dirtbag David really is.

The quality of Moore’s prose and the depth of his thought set Lot and Lot’s Daughter apart from most modern post-apocalyptic fiction. The stories are small and personal but they hold up a mirror to an outsized, vocal segment of society that, I’m sure, would be just as useless in a crisis at David proves to be. The second story drips with irony, a perfect counterpart to the first, but both stories illustrate the consequences of a misguided philosophy, an eagerness to abandon civilization, that is just as prevalent today as it was when Moore created David Jimmon.

Picks up where volume 1 left off. The Squad has returned to Belle Rive and Amanda Waller thinks she can force an insane General Zod to work for her. Letting him out of the black vault unleashes some energy that drives everyone to violence except for Harley who regains her sanity. Now she has to fix everything before Zod wakes up and kills them all.

The Good: I actually like the main story. It's a shame it was only 60 pages.

The Bad: This story should have been part of volume 1. The rest was just filler backstories just like the first volume.

The Ugly: Feels like a cash grab because they split this over 2 books. The main story in both books could have fit in just one. Then they could have put all the backup stories in another book.

SUICIDE SQUAD VOL. 2: GOING SANE (REBIRTH) is the second installment in the "Black Vault" story arc written by Rob Williams. Like most second books, I think this story has a little extra pizzazz and is more entertaining than the previous book. The science fiction vibe echoes the previous story, and Amanda Waller is still a hard-ass extraordinaire. In this installment, General Zod wakes up to wreak some havoc and things get a little crazier than usual for Task Force X.

There are two major highlights in SUICIDE SQUAD VOL. 2: GOING SANE (REBIRTH) -- Harley being driven sane by the same thing that is driving everybody else crazy, and getting to know new character Hack better. By the end of SUICIDE SQUAD VOL. 2: GOING SANE (REBIRTH), I'm still not totally sure who the bad guys are and what they want, but that off-balance feeling is a staple of this series, as well as a commentary on the Suicide Squad's reality. Somebody is always trying to screw with the Suicide Squad -- whether it be government leaders, superheroes, established super-villains looking for world domination, shadowy figures with no clear agenda, or Amanda Waller. It's fun seeing Harley temporarily sane and having to save the day. Without her security blanket of insanity, Harley struggles to get past her fear in order to be a courageous heroine. June Moone has a wild time in the middle of this deadly wackiness -- both as herself and as The Enchantress. I look forward to seeing how the fallout from the events in this book play out for June Moone. June seems a little Jean Grey-ish to me in this story and it made her a bit more interesting to me.

SUICIDE SQUAD VOL. 2: GOING SANE (REBIRTH) is has psychedelic trips, science fiction fabulousness, and antiheroes to save the day! I love the Killer Croc story "Crocodile Tears" that's included in this book. This tragic personal history makes Killer Croc a richer character. Killer Frost is introduced as a new member of Task Force X at the end of this book and I look forward to seeing how she'll fit in with the rest of the group of misfits. The "Evil Anonymous" story is cute and funny, while also displaying how evil Amanda Waller really is. I wasn't sure if I would like Hack when she was originally introduced, but her skills came into play in a big way in this story, and her background is explained in more detail in this book.

So, Amanda Waller has control of the Black Vault and the Kryptonian that's in it. I mean, where could that go horribly wrong? (A hint, that goes horribly wrong).

We also get Harley Quinn going sane instead of insane, which was cool. I always like when we get to see some Dr. Harleen.

Then there's some prelude-y sort of stories to the Justice League vs. Suicide Squad storyline that were pretty interesting and did make me want to read the JL vs. SS story too.

It wasn't my favorite Suicide Squad TPB to date, but it did have some interesting parts as well as Harley Quinn.

I was given this galley through Netgalley on behalf of DC Entertainment.

'Suicide Squad Vol. 2: Going Sane' tells a story of something that I never thought I'd see, but perhaps I should have expected it to show up at some point.

The Suicide Squad is back from Russia. They lost a team member but brought back the Black Vault. Inside the vault is a gigantic General Zod, who is likely insane from his time in the forbidden zone. When Waller attempts to convert Zod over as a new deadly Squad member, things get weird. Everyone starts going insane and trying to kill each other. The vault's contents have the exact opposite affect on her, and she becomes the only sane one who can save everyone else. She'll need help though because along with sanity, comes fear.

There are some back up Task Force X stories about Hack, the newest member of the team, Killer Croc, Enchantress, and Killer Frost. There is a Harley Quinn flashback story that came out for April Fool's Day, too.

It's an ok story, but it's got so much thrown at the walls that it's just chaos, and maybe that is the point. This is a weird team, and making Harley sane, even for just a little bit, was strange and interesting. The art varies a bit, but overall it's pretty good.

I received a review copy of this graphic novel from DC Entertainment and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Thank you for allowing me to review this graphic novel.

Just a reminder, I am a Comic newbie. I very much want to dive into the comic book world, and read certain series' from start to finish, but I would need a month on a quiet beach, probably. So, I review these comics from the newb, "I don't know continuity, I don't know origin stories", perspective. I'm giving my fellow N00BS my "should I or shouldn't I" on these comics.

I've got to tell you, I really love this volume. It picks up right where the first volume left off, with General Zod, "Here he comes to wreck the daaaaaaaaaaaaay" in his black sphere, ready to kill crush destroy.

The sphere makes everyone in the prison go batshit and want to kill each other. The "Going Sane" in the title refers to everyone's favorite psycho, Harley Quinn. Because the sphere does the exact opposite to her. She's suddenly the smart and competent psychiatrist she used to be, figuring out how to save everyone and stop Zod.

And it. is. awesome.

Along with this main story, we get two fantastic origin stories, one for Hack, and the other for Killer Croc. I loved Hack throughout this volume, but Croc's story was far superior. I want to read an entire series for him.

This volume sets up Justice League vs Suicide Squad and gets us ready for the next volume. I can't wait to see what comes next.

I found this volume a little confusing. I usually love Suicide Squad but I just found this one confusing.

Still profoundly stupid, still terribly written....yet vaguely entertaining enough to keep me coming back.


SUICIDE SQUAD, VOL. 2: GOING SANE collects SUICIDE SQUAD #'s 5-8 and the HARLEY QUINN AND THE SUICIDE SQUAD APRIL FOOLS' SPECIAL, and continues the short lead story/short back-up story format that allows the book to maintain a bi-weekly schedule and keep Jim Lee providing some art each issue. As I said when I reviewed SUICIDE SQUAD, VOL. 1: THE BLACK VAULT, this format does not make for an especially enticing collection if you're just here for the Jim Lee art, like I am. (Writer Rob Williams continues to be atrocious, but more on that later.)


The main story here is continued from the previous collection: The Suicide Squad has liberated "The Black Vault" from its Russian captors, and taken it back to Belle Reve Prison, where Amanda Waller plots to extract crazed Kryptonian warlord General Zod from it so she can have him for reasons. ("Rebirth" Amanda Waller seems to hate superheroes for some reason....I'm sure this will be tied to the tragic backstory that Williams hints at here, which I assume will be revealed in the Justice League/Suicide Squad crossover.)


Oddly, Zod is depicted as being about twenty feet tall, which is explained by Williams with some dialogue along the lines of "Wow, The Black Vault made Zod about twenty feet tall!". Despite knowing that Zod is basically Superman crossed with Hitler, and made about twenty feet tall, Waller thinks that she can control him. Zod, of course, breaks loose and unleashes hell, while The Black Vault (Again, reasons.....) makes everyone in Belle Reve crazy and homicidal. (Except Harley Quinn, who it makes sane. Reasons.) Somehow, Harley, who is really just a lightweight, street-level hood with an education, is able to take down everyone in Belle Reve, from the weakest scientist to Zod himself, to save the day. (Jim Lee's art is fun, and makes all of this nonsense at least semi-palatable.) If I had the impression that this was a Harley-centric book after reading the first volume, this one hammered that point home. It's Harley's world, and the rest of the Squad, save perhaps Amanda Waller, are all just under-characterized set dressing.


Write Rob Williams.....where do I start? For such a high-profile book, DC should have hired a heavyweight author. Considering the fact that no one but John Ostrander and Kim Yale have ever done the team right, and also considering the fact that Kim Yale has passed on, they should have hired Ostrander, who has tremendous goodwill built up among fans of the team. But, since they probably figured that Jim Lee would be enough of a draw, we got Williams, instead. Williams, who makes Captain Boomerang call people "Raw Prawns". Williams, who makes Killer Croc try to eat people while screaming "ENTRAIL RAMEN!!!", whatever that means. Williams, who christens Harley Quinn the "Quinnpin of crime"...ugh. Williams makes everyone in this book think and act as stupid as humanly possible over and over again. I doubt I'll keep going with this series once Jim Lee is done. It is truly an offense to my intelligence.


The remainder of the book consists of the back-up stories, this time featuring The Enchantress, Hack, Killer Croc, and Killer Frost, whose solo story also serves to set the table for the aforementioned Justice League/Suicide Squad crossover. (In what world would it take The JLA more than two minutes to wipe out The Squad...? Just saying....) The stories range from eh to OK.


We also get the HARLEY QUINN AND THE SUICIDE SQUAD APRIL FOOLS' SPECIAL, which is pretty much a regular issue of Harley's solo book, with a small Amanda Waller appearance. Unfunny comedy...not my cup of tea.


This is a stunningly poorly written book, with some nice art that may or may not distract you from how terrible the story is.



SUICIDE SQUAD, VOL. 2: GOING SANE earns a middling six out of ten harlequin heads:

🤡🤡🤡🤡🤡🤡


DC Comics provided a review copy.