Warning: The following contains spoilers for Suicide Squad: Get Joker #1, on sale now from DC.
In his time as a crimefighter, Jason Todd has gone from Batman's angsty sidekick Robin to the ruthless vigilante Red Hood. In Suicide Squad: Get Joker #1, by Brian Azzarello, Alex Maleev and Matt Hollingsworth, the former Boy Wonder is recruited by Amanda Waller to lead Harley Quinn and an assortment of other ne'er-do-wells to hunt one of DC's greatest villains, the Joker.
However, this isn't the first time Jason has worked for Task Force X. He and the Outlaws teamed up with Waller's crew to save the world during DC Rebirth.
Suicide Squad: Get Joker #1 begins when Jason's career as a brutal vigilante is interrupted by the police. He is arrested for multiple murders and sent to prison where he continues to lash out at every criminal he can get his hands on. After being transferred to a maximum-security prison due to bad behavior, he gets a visit from Amanda Waller. She invites him to join the Suicide Squad on a mission to hunt and kill the Joker. At first, Todd is reluctant to join her nefarious team, but the temptation to defeat his old enemy proves too great to resist and he agrees to lead the squad.
As momentous as Todd's collaboration with the Suicide Squad seems, he has actually worked with them before. In 2018's Red Hood and the Outlaws #16 by Scott Lobdell, Dexter Soy, Veronica Gandini and Taylor Esposito Jason, Artemis and Bizarro were captured by Waller and her team in an attempt to coerce the vigilantes into joining the Suicide Squad. Jason and Artemis both escaped from their cells, but before they could flee the facility, they discovered that Bizarro had already volunteered the team's services to Waller.
Bizarro sensed an imbalance in the Earth's seismic activity caused by the villain Harvest's underground bunkers which appeared to be preparing to self-destruct. Between Bizarro's super senses and Waller's access to top-secret technology, the two determined that if the bunkers exploded, the resulting earthquakes would bring about a disaster capable of killing millions of innocent people. Thus, the Outlaws joined Killer Croc, Harley Quinn, Captain Boomerang and Deadshot and ventured into Harvest's bunkers.
When the reluctant heroes arrived at Harvest's bunker, they found the villain's dead body and a cache of powerful weapons. They managed to dismantle the self-destruction mechanism in the nick of time to save the day and the world. When they returned to the Suicide Squad's base, Amanda Waller thanked them for their help and let them go, but she warned that someday they would find themselves on the wrong side of the law and have no choice but to work for her on a more permanent basis.
Waller's parting words have proven to be quite prophetic now that Red Hood is leading Task Force X in the new DC Black Lable series. It seems that this time, Todd's time with the team is destined to last significantly longer, but he also appears to be more personally motivated to cooperate with Waller. The outlaw vigilante seems out of place working for the government, but few are ever thrilled to find themselves working for the Suicide Squad.
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