"It's Another Example Of The Dysfunction Of Our Industry:" Screenwriter Reveals Scrapped Suicide Squad Sequel Focused On Will Smith's Deadshot

Writer Gavin O'Connor explains why a direct sequel to David Ayer's Suicide Squad was replaced by James Gunn's DCEUThe Suicide Squad reboot. Suicide Squad introduced Margot Robbie's extremely popular Harley Quinn and Viola Davis' superbly-portrayed Amanda Waller. However, David Ayer's Suicide Squad was met with overwhelmingly negative reviews. Five years later, James Gunn wrote and directed the soft-reboot The Suicide Squad, which barely referenced the events of the first movie.

In a new interview with Collider, writer Gavin O'Connor recalls the moment he dropped from Suicide Squad 2. O'Connor explains he was writing a "specific take" that featured "a father-daughter story with Deadshot and his daughter." Unfortunately, "the new DC president" wanted to transform Gavin O'Connor's finished script into a comedy. Since the changes signified a drastic deviation from the original plans and O'Connor's "agreement [with] the studio," the writer dropped out of the project. Check out Gavin O'Connor's comments below:

"It's another example of the dysfunction of our industry. I had a very specific take. They wanted to do it. I think I was probably three-quarters of the way into the script when they brought in a new regime and all the DC people I was working with were gone. I was writing on the lot, I got a little bungalow there; my writing partner and I would just meet there and write every day. There was a knock on the door, and it was the new DC president. He said, 'So where are you with the script?' I said 'It's almost done,' and he said 'Can I read it?' And I said, 'Well, you can read it when it's finished.' A couple of weeks later, I gave it to him, and he said 'Can you make it a comedy?' And I said, 'That's not what I wrote, and that's not the agreement I have with the studio.' He wanted me to make it into a comedy, and I was like, all right, I guess I won't be working here."
"It was really a father-daughter story with Deadshot and his daughter."

What Gavin O'Connor's Suicide Squad 2 Comments Mean

Suicide Squad 2 Would Have Been Similar To David Ayer's Original Suicide Squad Plans

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Suicide Squad established an interesting subplot starring Will Smith's Deadshot and his daughter Zoe. Floyd Lawton's backstory was only explored through flashbacks, dream sequences, and lines of dialog, but his enmity with Batman and his desire to reunite with his daughter was made crystal clear. A Suicide Sequel would have been the perfect place to delve deeper into Deadshot's individual storyand possibly set up his own spinoff. In fact, the DCEU's Deadshot spinoff could have been the second or third installment in a three-movie arc for Will Smith's anti-hero.

Split image of Savant looking serious and Blackguard cracking his neck in the suicide squad

The Most Shocking Moment Of James Gunn’s First DC Movie Perfectly Explains Why It Can Also Be Part Of The DC Universe

James Gunn's first DCEU movie may have baked in the answer to how it can be incorporated into the DCU's central narrative without too much confusion.

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At the time, Warner Bros. was experimenting with different approaches to the expanding DCEU, and David Ayer's Suicide Squad went through extensive rewrites, reshoots, and reedits that made it much more colorful, fast-paced, and comedic. Warner Bros. seems to have been pushing for a similar tone for Suicide Squad2. Gavin O'Connor refused the idea, and Suicide Squad2 didn't move forward. Then, James Gunn wrote and directed a more comedic yet more explicit The Suicide Squad.

Our Take On Gavin O'Connor's Suicide Squad 2 Comments

A Fully Serious Suicide Squad Duology Could Have Worked

The seeds for a mostly serious Suicide Squad movie with a distinctive style are evident in the theatrical cut of David Ayer's Suicide Squad. The existence of the director's heavily-discussed "Ayer Cut" of the Suicide Squad, which hasn't seen the light of day in almost a decade, also suggests that a more serious version of the movie could have hit theaters if the studio didn't demand a reedit. Without studio interference, Gavin O'Connor's Suicide Squad sequel could have been possible, and it would have been more consistent with the first movie than The Suicide Squad.

Source: Collider