James Gunn on how The Suicide Squad compares to the first movie

Check out new images from The Suicide Squad, with its nutso cast of superpowered loose canons. Margot Robbie, John Cena, Pete Davidson, Nathan Fillion…

The Suicide Squad, from Guardians of the Galaxy director James Gunn, is a sort-of sequel to David Ayer’s 2016 movie Suicide Squad. It’s also a soft reboot. Mostly, it looks as if it’s going to go in its own radical new direction, with a host of new crazy characters coming into play. But there will be some carry-over…

“Um, it’s its own thing,” James Gunn tells Empire Magazine. “It does not contradict the first movie, I don’t think. It might in some small ways… I don’t know…”

In addition to getting Gunn’s thoughts, Empire has shared some cool exclusive photos from the movie. Polka-Dot Man is already my favorite:

The cover also kills it:

The 2016 Suicide Squad movie wasn’t a hit with critics and got a lot of negative feedback from audiences, although it still made $750 at the box office. Gunn doesn’t feel the blowback was justified. “Listen, David Ayer’s gotten trouble for the movie,” he said. “I know it didn’t come out how David wanted it to come out. But he did one really, really great thing, and that is he picked fantastic actors to work with, and he dealt with these actors in building their characters in a really deep and fearless way. It’s something David definitely deserves to be lauded for, and it’s definitely added to this movie.”

The Suicide Squad takes that original cast, switches a lot of actors out, and pumps the whole up to 11. The new movie brings back a lot of characters from the 2016 film, including Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie), Captain Boomerang (Jai Courtney), Amanda Waller (Viola Davis) and Rick Flag (Joel Kinnaman), all played by their original actors. All-new characters include King Shark (Steve Agee), Weasel (Sean Gunn), Bloodsport (Idris Elba), Polka-Dot Man (David Dastmalchian), Peacemaker (John Cena), The Thinker (Peter Capaldi), Blackguard (Pete Davidson),  Savant (Michael Rooker), T.D.K. (Nathan Fillion) and more. It’s really crazy just how many are involved. It’s a killer cast.

Comparing this cast of heroes to Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy, there’s no doubt in Gunn’s mind which are the more trustworthy:

"I think you know, from pretty close to the beginning, that all of the Guardians are good – apart from Nebula, who’s the outlier. But in The Suicide Squad, some of the characters end up being good, some end up being terrible. They don’t just get in fights and say they’re going to kill each other, they actually do get in fights and kill each other. You really don’t know who’s going to live and who’s going to die."

That might sound extreme for a superhero movie, but Gunn is determined to give us one we’ll remember. He had “full creative freedom” on the film and can kill whoever he likes. “I mean anyone,” he teases. Well, that sounds ominous.

If one thing is for sure: when James Gunn is involved, you’re guaranteed a jam-packed, action-packed, and super fun movie. I can’t wait! The Suicide Squad is slated to release August 2021.

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