A new Task Force X faces a new potentially world-ending threat in the latest trailer for James Gunn's The Suicide Squad - but who is really responsible for "Project Starfish"? Did Starro attack Earth independently, is it a mad science experiment, or is it another attempt to protect Earth that's gone wrong?
Starro might seem like just another wacky D-list villain, but it actually has the distinction of being the first foe ever fought by the Justice League of America in the pages of DC Comics. Introduced in The Brave and the Bold #28 (1960), Starro the Conqueror is a giant alien starfish with a fairly straightforward goal of total world domination. It has the ability to shoot powerful energy beams from its tentacles, and can also release spores that latch onto people's brains and turn them into mindless drones. Starro has been glimpsed in trailers for The Suicide Squad before, but the newest footage shows its origins in a laboratory and strongly hints at attempts to weaponize it.
Amanda Waller tells her assembled Task Force X recruits that they must "destroy every trace of something known only as Project Starfish." In order to do this, they must travel to the Latin American nation of Corto Maltese, which contains a Nazi-era prison called Jotunheim. Like Belle Reve, Jotunheim houses dangerous metahumans, many of whom were created through horrific science experiments. Starro is among the inmates of Jotunheim, but who is really in control of Project Starfish?
Silvio Luna
The pitiless dictator who rules over Corto Maltese, General Presidente Silvio Luna, can be seen in the new trailer for The Suicide Squad staring in awe at the giant tank in Jotunheim that houses Starro. Since Corto Maltese can't match the military strength of the major world powers, it makes sense that Silvio Luna would, like Amanda Waller, turn to metahumans to create an army of living weapons - or even creatures that aren't human at all. The reveal of Superman, Wonder Woman, Aquaman and other superheroes to the world has raised the stakes when it comes to weapons of mass destruction, and nuclear power is no longer the most dangerous weapon that a nation can possess. A ruler as power-hungry and ambitious as Silvio Luna would undoubtedly salivate at the thought of having a pet kaiju to conquer the world with. If Silvio isn't directly responsible for "Project Starfish" (as his reaction to seeing Starro suggests) then it could instead have been masterminded by his right-hand man, Mateo Suarez, who leads the Maltese military.
Amanda Waller
This would not be the first time that Amanda Waller called the Suicide Squad in to destroy a mess of her own creation. In the 2016 Suicide Squad movie, Amanda used Enchantress to pitch her idea of using supervillains as a potential defense against metahumans gone bad, only for Enchantress to escape and become exactly the kind of threat that Amanda was trying to protect against. If there's anyone who would look at a giant psychic alien starfish bent on conquering Earth and turn it into something called "Project Starfish," it's Amanda Waller. This would also explain her specific instructions to destroy all traces of Project Starfish, rather than simply defeating Starro; if she's personally responsible for all the havoc and destruction, then naturally she'd want to cover her tracks.
If Amanda Waller is behind Project Starfish, then the new Suicide Squad may be in even bigger trouble than the last line-up. One of the main benefits of Task Force X is that they're entirely disposable, and it's more or less confirmed that The Suicide Squad is going to have a high body count (the movie's tagline is "Don't get too attached"). But if Amanda really wants to destroy every last trace of Project Starfish, that could well include the team responsible for destroying it. If Rick Flag and the team do manage to take down Starro and get out alive, they should probably watch their backs before Amanda Waller plunges a knife into them.
The Thinker
The new footage in the latest Suicide Squad trailer shows a team of Maltese military personnel led by Silvio Luna looking at the tank containing Project Starfish, and the Thinker is among them. Previous trailers have indicated that the Thinker is not part of the original Task Force X lineup, as Rick and other members of the team are seen giving him a quick orientation (i.e. warning him if he steps out of line, he'll die) while out in the field. It's possible that the Thinker is the mastermind behind Project Starfish - either by creating Starro (which would be a significant change to the supervillain's origin story) or by capturing it when it came to Earth and trying to bend it to his will. A character poster for the Thinker shows him surrounded by Starro's spores, which confirms that the two are strongly linked.
If he was a prisoner of the Maltese government rather than voluntarily working for them, the Thinker may have been forcibly brought in to try and communicate with Starro, given that he has powerful telepathic and mind control abilities. The intention could have been to put Starro under the Thinker's control so that the giant starfish could be wielded as a weapon, but clearly things got out of hand. Though the Thinker may not have created Project Starfish, he could have used their interaction as an opportunity to offer an alliance with Starro, helping the alien conqueror to escape.
Starro
Given Starro's vast intellect, the skyscraper-sized echinoderm may well be the architect behind Project Starfish. Rather than being captured against its will and experimented upon, Starro could have pretended to be captured while really using its spores to control the minds of the Maltese government and its scientists - the Thinker included. The trailer shows people lined up in cages in the Project Starfish facility in Jotunheim, seemingly being used as guinea pigs in experimental use of the spores. Though Silvio Luna and Mateo Suarez might think Starro is their personal weapon and fully under the control of Corto Maltese, they could instead be being used by Starro and manipulated by its spores into thinking that they're acting of their own free will.
