12 Terrible Movies That Blew Awesome Concepts

12. Suicide Squad

The Pitch

An adaptation of the iconic DC comic, where a team of imprisoned supervillains are recruited for covert government missions in exchange for reduced jail time. Oh, and Batman (Ben Affleck) and The Joker (Jared Leto) are in it, too.

Writer-director David Ayer (Fury) had a ton of prior experience working with ensembles and serving up irreverent action, so with a cast also including Will Smith, Margot Robbie, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Joel Kinnaman, Viola Davis and Ike Barinholtz, there were so many reasons to be excited.

What Went Wrong

For starters, Ayer was given just six weeks to cobble together a script, which to the surprise of few didn't exactly foster the most affable working relationship between the filmmaker and Warner Bros.

And despite a fantastic marketing campaign, Suicide Squad was yet another casualty of the studio's common executive meddling - as was also a problem on Batman v Superman - forcing Ayer to wrestle with them over the final cut of the film.

Numerous passes were made at editing Suicide Squad, with an edgier cut assembled by Ayer, a more broad-leaning cut overseen by the studio, and then a "compromise" cut which was pieced together by Trailer Park, the company who created the ludicrously successful first teaser trailer for the film.

This is the cut that finally hit screens, and which was widely criticised for its rushed pace, excessive over-reliance on popular music and lack of a consistent tone.

Despite solid performances from most of the principal cast (but not Cara Delevingne), Suicide Squad was a crushing disappointment, and far from the apology for Batman v Superman that many were expecting.

Most tellingly of all, James Gunn's upcoming follow-up, The Suicide Squad, is said to be more of a soft-reboot than a direct sequel, with only Harley Quinn (Robbie), Rick Flag (Kinnaman), Captain Boomerang (Jai Courtney) and Amanda Waller (Davis) likely to return.