WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Suicide Squad #5, by Tom Taylor, Bruno Redondo, Adriano Lucas and Wes Abbott, on sale now.
Tom Taylor and Bruno Redondo's new Suicide Squad series began with some massive game changers: First off, Amanda Waller, longtime leader of the Task Force X project, had been replaced by a no-nonsense man named Lok. Plus, the ranks of the team were greatly altered, with the addition of members of a new super-powered team called the Revolutionaries. Since then, the new Suicide Squad has been made up of old and new members alike and they have gone on missions to enforce Lok's orders.
However, it was revealed that while Lok was the one in charge of the Squad, he also answered to someone else -- a shadowy figure who wasn't above torturing Lok to get the desired results. This immediately introduced a new mystery about this new version of Task Force X, as readers began to wonder who was behind it and what their overarching plans were.
Answers arrived in Suicide Squad #5 -- but they only bring more questions, because somehow, the person behind the new Suicide Squad is Ted Kord. Yes, that Ted Kord -- the Blue Beetle.
Suicide Squad #5 picks up right where the last issue left off, with the titular team in Australia in the middle of their latest mission, which is to locate and bring Digger Harkness, aka Captain Boomberang, back home. Although there's an explosive confrontation, the team is eventually successful and they bring Boomerang back to Lok. However, the Task Force X leader proves to be cruel when he asks Deadshot to shoot and kill his friend and former teammate.
Thankfully, because of prior events, as well as a general disdain for Lok, Deadshot had already switched to the side of the Revolutionaries. These are a group of super-powered individuals who, as it turns out, had arranged to get captured and indoctrinated into the Suicide Squad in order to take the program down from the inside.
When given the order to kill Boomerang, Deadshot improvises and instead takes out Lok. Then the rest of the Squad proceeds to eliminate all of Lok's goons, save for one.
This goon connects the Revolutionaries' leader, Osita, to the real man in charge -- the one behind Lok. It's here that Ted Kord is revealed as the one in charge of the new Task Force X. Kord appears on camera wearing a fancy business suit, sitting at his desk in the headquarters of his company, Kord Industries. What's more, he acts smug and he proves to be manipulative and overconfident. One might even say he almost appears villainous.
That can't be right, can it? As the Blue Beetle, Ted Kord is a famous DC superhero known to be courageous and lighthearted. Often depicted as one half of the popular Booster Gold/Blue Beetle duo, Ted Kord recently appeared in the pages of Heroes in Crisis. While the 2018 event series was a dark murder mystery, Ted remained at his friend Booster's side, even though he was a murder suspect at the time.
Ted was portrayed as funny, whimsical and supportive -- but that isn't the man in Suicide Squad #5. This is a man of power, born of deception and control.
Whatever Ted is up to, he reveals the Suicide Squad's missions are tied to some "powerful, unforgiving people." What's more, with the Revolutionaries on the run, Ted even appears to threaten to send the Justice League after them. Clearly, Ted is up to something and it may or may not be of a villainous nature. It's too soon to tell but, for the time being, Ted appears to be as deceptive as Max Lord -- and that's definitely not a good thing.