The First Suicide Squad Roster Was Built To Kill The Justice League Vision (Complete With Its Own Superman)

Warning: Spoilers for Absolute Power: Origins (2024) #2 ahead!

The modern day Suicide Squad is infamous for being Amanda Waller’s personal task force of expendables, but that was never the original plan. DC has instead revealed that the original lineup of Task Force X was fully equipped to take on the Justice League – even having their own “Superman” on the roster.

Absolute Power: Origin (2024) #2, by John Ridley, Alitha Martinez, Norm Rapmund, and Andrew Dalhouse, reintroduces readers to the very first version of Task Force X, made up of a motley list of names like Cyclotron, Johnny Sorrow, and Rustam. But there are heavy hitters in the roster, too: Dr. Polaris, the Emerald Empress, and even the Main Man himself, Lobo.

This lineup reinforces the notion that the original Task Force X was never meant to be a “suicide squad” – it was fully equipped to take out the Justice League from the beginning.

Task Force X Was Always Meant To Be An Anti-Justice League

While most of the villains comprising the first Suicide Squad may be obscure, the roster actually comes from the pages of Justice League vs. Suicide Squad (2016), where they are recruited by Maxwell Lord to take their revenge on Waller. Absolute Power: Origins #2 fills in the critical information as to why they want revenge: namely, for Waller nearly killing them in the explosion that ensued after she ordered Lobo to execute Cyclotron. Justice League vs. Suicide Squad emphasizes the power this original team held, having them hold their own against the modern Suicide Squad and the Justice League combined.

Lobo in particular is critical to this lineup. As a nigh-immortal Czarnian and one of Superman’s classic foils, he provides power that Waller has been hard-pressed to match in subsequent rosters. Case in point, the Suicide Squad team featured in the Absolute Power lead-up series, Suicide Squad: Dream Team (2024), banks heavily on Bizarro to provide the team’s muscle – but Bizarro is a poor man’s Lobo, being much more difficult to control and work with despite arguably possessing greater power (especially with his innate magical talent). Waller knows that without a Superman stand-in, her Anti-Justice League isn’t complete.

The Suicide Squad Was A Watered-Down Version of Waller’s Ambition – Until Now

Absolute Power: Origins #2 makes it clear that after the first team’s disastrous mission, Waller had to make do with members she could control through her brain bombs – severely hampering the power she could command, and turning what was intended as an “Anti-Justice League” team into a smaller-scope covert ops squad. That no longer applies: not only does Waller have her own squad of Task Force VII Amazos, she also has Failsafe and the Brainiac Queen under her thumb. The Suicide Squad was always meant to take down the Justice League – but only now are Amanda Waller’s ambitions fully realized.

Absolute Power: Origins #2 (2024)
	Writer: John Ridley Artists: Alitha Martinez, Norm Rapmund Colorist: Andrew Dalhouse Letterer: Steve Wands Cover Artists: Edwin Galmon, Pasquale Ferrera