Suicide Squad director David Ayer has said making the film "broke" him.
During an appearance on Real Ones with Jon Bernthal (via Deadline), the former DC filmmaker got candid about his experience making the first Suicide Squad movie.
“Hollywood, I tell people, is like watching someone you love get f**ked by someone you hate,” he explained. “The big one is Suicide Squad. That s**t broke me. That handed me my ass.”
It’s fair to say Ayer didn’t have the best experience with Suicide Squad. Following the film’s rocky reception, Ayer has long persisted that his original vision for the film was darker and more grounded.
Unfortunately, it looks as though the studio was still reeling from Batman V Superman, and with the success of comedy superhero flick Deadpool, it decided to push the project in a vastly different direction.
“Come right off Fury, right? I had the town in my hand, could’ve done anything, and I did do anything,” he said. “And [I] go on this journey with [Suicide Squad]. And the same thing — authentic, truthful, let’s do all the rehearsal, let’s really get in each other’s souls. Let’s create this amazing, collaborative thing, right? And then Deadpool opened… and they never tested Batman v Superman so they were expecting a different result, and then they got hammered by all the critics. Then it’s like, ‘Okay, we’re going to turn David Ayer’s dark, soulful movie into a f**king comedy now.'”
The result was a chaotic mess – a film that lived up to neither ambition. However, Ayer has confirmed his own version of the film, the infamous Ayer Cut, is still out there… and could even be released one day.
“All I know is my unseen film plays much better than the studio release,” he said. “The interest in my cut being shown seems real and organic. And Gunn told me it would have it's time to be shared.”
IGN’s Suicide Squad review gave it 5.9/10 and said: “Suicide Squad is a decidedly different flavour than Batman v Superman. It goes for subversive, funny, and stylish, and it succeeds wildly during the first act. But then the movie turns into something predictable and unexciting. It plods on, checking off boxes on a list of cliched moments and meaningless plot points, making you wonder where all the razzle-dazzle went.”
Want to read more about Suicide Squad? Check out David Ayer’s original Joker design as well as why he regrets giving The Joker that ‘Damaged’ tattoo.
Ryan Leston is an entertainment journalist and film critic for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter.
