Suicide Squad: 12 Ways The Marketing Has Been Genius
7. The Gloomy Comic-Con Trailer (They Didn't Want To Release) Made It Massive
We got our first proper look at Suicide Squad at SDCC 2015 with a three-minute long "First Look". And while that was incredibly well received, it was probably where the hype campaign was at its most unconfident. Warner clearly didn't want or expect the footage to get out of Hall H, being incredibly reluctant to put a nice clean version online even after high quality video recordings turned up.
The reason why is pretty obvious in retrospect - the gloomy visuals, moody score and general grit are a universe away from what the finished film is shaping up to be. Still, once it was online and scored bigger views than Batman V Superman's trailer, all worries seemed to abate; even if it was different, it got people talking, and proved this was a movie people were hungry for.
What makes it "genius", then, is that the fiasco is something Warners has since learnt from, with the studio readily releasing all of its trailers from this year's SDCC almost instantaneously (although I still don't agree with the odd classification of early footage - just as that First Look was a trailer, "Justice League Special Comic-Con Footage" is a much weaker title from both a user and SEO perspective).