10 Upcoming Movies That Have Already Been Saved From Sucking
5. The Suicide Squad
The Original Pitch
While never in danger of cancellation due to the sheer amount of money the first film made, Suicide Squad 2 has been stopping and starting for the past several years.
David Ayer was originally going to return to direct, before being replaced by Gavin O'Connor, until he fell off the wagon as well. Scripts and stories were written by Zak Penn, David Bar Katz, Adam Cozad, Todd Stashwick, and O'Connor himself, but all of their ideas have been scrapped. It seemed like nobody had an exciting enough vision to convince Warner Bros to move forward, and it was tough to be optimistic after how badly the studio bungled the original.
How It's Been Saved
But crikey... how this film's fortunes have changed.
The Suicide Squad now has fan-favourite filmmaker James Gunn on writing and directing duties, a major get for the DCEU, since Gunn is the guy who directed Guardians of the Galaxy (and its 2017 followup). Suicide Squad was basically riding Guardians’ coattails and aimed for a similarly offbeat tone and style, so actually getting the guy who did Guardians should mean that, this time around, we’ll get to see the potential of a Suicide Squad movie be fully realised.
Gunn has a distinctive and exciting voice, a proven track record in the comic-book movie world, and - unlike Ayer - is someone who Warner Bros won't push around. Based on the quality of the Guardians of the Galaxy films, his hiring can only be a good thing.