Okay, cards on the table, DC aren't doing as well as they should be, but they're not doing nearly as badly as people are making out.
Fans and non-fans alike were quick to blast Detective Comics and Warner Bros for trying to take the Marvel-Disney approach and stick it on fast forward, with Man Of Steel barely taking off before the whole Justice League was getting put in place.
But just because the Marvel's formula of Iron Man movie + Captain America movie + Hulk movie + Thor movie = Avengers movie worked for them, it doesn't mean DC needs to abide by that, too.
Nobody gave 20th Century Fox any flack for kicking off the X-Men universe by introducing everyone at once, and if anything, the standalone Wolverine movies have been the least well received of the bunch so far.
And for those who still believe that Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice was a flop, the $250 million production made $872.7 million at the box office, so we can put that misnomer to rest once and for all.
One thing that can be agreed upon is that in the wake of how successful the Marvel movies have been, when listing household superhero names, the likes of Iron Man and Thor are now listed off alongside Batman and Superman, something that definitely would not have happened a decade ago.
However, the one thing that DC still has up it's sleeve is something that Marvel have yet to tackle properly: the villains, and this is where Suicide Squad steps in.
Marvel villains have, by and large, been quite disappointing. Sure, Loki has proved to be the most entertaining part of the Thor movies, but outside of that you have to go Kilgrave in Netflix's Jessica Jones to find another half-way decent bad guy/gal.
This is not a problem that DC have, as they have a hugely impressive Rogue's Gallery to cherry pick from, and it's something they're putting to good use with Suicide Squad.
Man Of Steel already introduced us to General Zod, BVS gave us Lex Luthor, both two of the most famous comic book villains of all time, and up next we've got Suicide Squad upping the ante with The Joker, Harley Quinn, Killer Croc, Dead Shot, Amanda Waller and more besides.
In fact, the interesting thing in Suicide Squad, is the fact that these villains are being set up as the protagonists of the movie, sent in to action against an antagonist we've yet to be properly introduced to. In a time when promotional materials feel like they're giving away everything before we've even paid for a ticket to the movie, there's still a sense of the unknown to this project, which is rare enough to warrant commendation.
And aside from the obvious, there's something else at play within Suicide Squad that nobody has given enough credit to: the ethnic and gender equality among the characters.
The "leader" of the Squad appears to be Amanda Waller, a black female. There's Dead Shot, a black male. El Diablo is a latino male. We've got Katana, an Asian female. Killer Croc, another black male. And above all else, the break-out star of the movie so far despite the presence of Jared Leto's The Joker, is Margot Robbie as Harley Quinn - the first time a female superhero or villain has properly outshined their male counterparts in a comic book movie.
While the budget of the movie has been kept strictly underwraps at the moment, and the kerfuffle about additional scenes being shot to counteract the sombre tone of BVS and align more closely to violently-comedic Deadpool was quickly swept under the carpet, but box office predictions have the movie's opening weekend in the $125 million region, which would make it the biggest August opening of all time.
In fact, when Suicide Squad opens in Ireland on August 5th, it'll be paired with a 15a certificate, due to "strong violence, and moderate sex and language references". But then when it comes to the worst of the worst, violence, sex and bad language is pretty much par for the course.
