Dogged DC film fans still demanding ‘Suicide Squad’ Ayer Cut

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Fans of the DC shared film universe are rallying for David Ayer’s original cut of 2016’s critically maligned, box office hit Suicide Squad.

Even audiences seemed underwhelmed at the film when it was released, as it boasts a “rotten” rating on both the critical and audience scores of the review aggregate site Rotten Tomatoes (as of press time). This is quite the opposite from the critically and fan hailed sequel, James Gunn’s The Suicide Squad, released last year.

However, Ayer himself claims that if his director’s cut made it to audiences, instead of the studio-meddled mess that made it to theaters, it would play “like an entirely different movie.”

It’s not simply plugging in a couple deleted scenes. It’s tone, a different first act, different music. It plays like an entirely different movie. Hell, I wouldn’t believe it either. But it does. Night and day. Such is the power of editing. 🙏🏼 https://t.co/OhU9sQVvSM — David Ayer (@DavidAyerMovies) January 17, 2022

Fans on social media were quick to back the director, with the hashtag #ReleaseTheAyerCut trending on social media Monday.

Another fan pointed out how the changes Ayer listed, such as a totally different first and third act and alternative soundtrack, could have definitely changed the net outcome of the film from negative to positive.

Just imagine a different first act, a different third act, a different soundtrack, and a totally different tone. Now more than ever we must demand the AyerCut#ReleaseTheAyerCut#RestoreTheSnyderVerse

now also on instagram @releasetheayercut pic.twitter.com/XEwX1nmQoL — Miguelon_DC #ReleaseTheAyerCut (@Miguelon_DC) January 17, 2022

Another fan expressed that while he wasn’t a huge fan of the 2016 film, it would nevertheless be lovely to see Ayer’s “original vision.”

Wasn’t a huge fan of 2016 Suicide squad but I would love to see the Directors original vision. #ReleaseTheAyerCut https://t.co/PSRxY6xfhG — adam (@adamcleary48) January 17, 2022

To be fair to the director, his filmography up until Suicide Squad‘s release really made it seem like he was a perfect match for the content. Having penned the 2001 film Training Day, for which Denzel Washington won an Academy Award, and both writing and directing the excellent 2014 war drama Fury, Ayer seemed to specialize in focusing his lens on doing character studies of antiheroes in positions of authority. That is arguably the same theme of the 2016 comic book film, with Suicide Squad centering around supervillains banding together to help save the world. And with the success of Zack Snyder’s Justice League, that has undoubtedly turned many a skeptic into believers, too.

What to Know Before ‘Peacemaker’

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The following story, obviously, contains spoilers for the 2021 film The Suicide Squad.

James Gunn’s The Suicide Squad came out in August 2021. Which, in some ways, feels like yesterday. But in 2021 time (or, I guess, now, 2022 time) it also kind of feels like many years ago. So it may feel a little daunting to hit play on Gunn’s new HBO Max series Peacemaker, which follows the story of John Cena’s perfect character, without rewatching the movie first.

But that’s why we’re here. In case you don’t want to take the 2+ hours to fully immerse yourself in Mr. Gunn’s bloody, vulgar, wild world (and it’s certainly worth it if you want to—the movie is still a blast), we’ve got everything you’ll need to remember about Peacemaker himself and The Suicide Squad before you watch Peacemaker, which serves as both a spin-off and a quasi-sequel to the R-rated superhero hit.

Luckily, it’s not that much to recall; outside of Cena’s Peacemaker, we do have a couple more returning characters, but outside of that it’s largely new characters and a new storyline. Still, it’ll help to be on the same page and know what everything’s all about here.

So without further ado, let’s get into it, shall we?

HBO Max

So, uh, who is Peacemaker again?

Peacemaker, real name Christopher Smith, is a “superhero” (in his own mind, at least) who we first meet in prison when he’s assembled as part of a team (alongside Bloodsport (Idris Elba)) being put together for the latest black ops mission by Amanda Waller (Viola Davis). Bloodsport and Peacemaker have an instant rivalry—both basically have the power of being really accurate and deadly with their weapons; Peacemaker claims he’d kill Bloodsport by using a smaller bullet that would puncture his own.

Waller thinks that Bloodsport would be a good leader, but he mostly seems defeated and just wants to do what he needs to do to move on with his life. Both killers are eventually dispatched as part of a team (one of two) to Molto Cortese, where their goal is to destroy a lab holding something called Project Starfish. The other team dispatched to the island are all killed except for two people (Rick Flag (Joel Kinnaman) and Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie)), which allows Bloodsport and Peacemaker’s team to arrive undetected.

The movie follows the surviving characters for a while, merging both teams together at this point (one scene of Bloodsport and Peacemaker showing off just how good they are at killing people is particularly fun). Peacemaker puts his life motto out there for everyone to know: “I cherish peace with all my heart,” he says. “I don’t care how many men, women, and children I need to kill to get it.” Yeah. Psycho.

Warner Bros.

Eventually, something is clearly off, and we all find out: Project Starfish is really Starro the Destroyer, a giant alien Starfish who’s been experimented on for 30 years, and also creates smaller versions of himself to take over humans’ bodies. Scary! Anyway, Waller had given secret orders to Peacemaker to make sure the U.S.’s involvement in Project Starfish was covered up; when Flag finds out about this, he’s furious and wants to take the evidence public. This brings on a fight, and Peacemaker eventually kills Flag with a stab of broken concrete to the heart. “Peacemaker—what a joke,” he says before he succumbs.

At this point, we’re all saying the same thing: Fuck Peacemaker. He’s still covering his tracks, and attempts to also kill Ratcatcher 2 (another member of the team who controls rats, notable because Bloodsport is deathly afraid of rats) to cover his tracks. But Bloodsport takes him out with a taste of his own medicine—a smaller bullet from his own gun, that punctures Peacemaker’s bullet, and gets him in the neck. The building then collapses on him. Peacemaker, at this point, is seemingly dead.

Got it. Anything else we need to remember from The Suicide Squad?

Yes. All the while this is happening on Molto Cortese, we’re also following the story of Amanda Waller and company at her headquarters. Waller is running her corrupt (as usual) mission, and when she goes too far (again, as usual) and wants to detonate the bombs inside our heroes’ heads, some of her team members take her out—including Emilia Harcourt (Jennifer Holland) and John Economos (Steve Agee)—overpower her, knocking her out and save the day.

Warner Bros.

In a post-credits scene, we follow Harcourt and Economos down a hospital hallway where they find out that…Peacemaker is alive! And weirdly not even that hurt for having been shot in the neck and having a building fall on him. And they then reveal that Waller has stuck them with Peacemaker as revenge for them overpowering her when she was going mad with power. (That’s the price you pay, I guess.) And this is where we get the first look at what will be our core Peacemaker team.

Wait…are we supposed to root for this guy?

Ha. Yup! Look, he was definitely not a good guy in The Suicide Squad. And he isn’t much better in Peacemaker either! But think about how anti-hero centered shows work out sometimes; perhaps the best example of recent was Loki, which took someone who killed so many people in 2012’s The Avengers and made him someone we like, care about, and root for. Good writing can do that for basically any protagonist, and when you have as versatile a performer as John Cena, it won’t be hard with those dance moves—even if he’s basically a piece of shit.

Evan Romano Evan is an associate editor for Men’s Health, with bylines in The New York Times, MTV News, Brooklyn Magazine, and VICE.

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Everything we know about Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League

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Rocksteady made a name for itself as one of the first teams to make a universally acclaimed superhero game with Batman: Arkham Asylum. It followed that success up with two sequels, the even more beloved Batman: Arkham City, and the divisive, though still fantastic, Batman: Arkham Knight. With time with the caped crusader behind it, fans were left waiting to hear what this studio would tackle next. Most assumed it would be another DC property, since it is owned by WB games, and those suspicions turned out to be right on the money, though with a property not many would have predicted.

Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League was given a formal announcement as the newest project from Rocksteady at the DC FanDome event in 2020. At the time, outside of the graphic novels, of course, we only had the one flop of a film based on this anti-hero group, so many were hesitant to see them tackle this property. Now that we’ve gotten a few trailers and footage of gameplay, however, it has become clear that Rocksteady hasn’t lost its touch. We took on this suicide mission for you and made off with all the details you need to know about Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League.

Release date

It took a long time from the game’s reveal to get a release window, but Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League is now set to come out sometime in 2022. While that information is better than nothing, that is still a very large window which may imply that a delay could push it into the following year of 2023. We wouldn’t expect that based on how far along the game looks, but you never really know how projects are going behind the scenes. We also need to consider that the other WB DC game Gotham Knights was delayed into 2022 as well. Odds are WB would want to space these two titles out as much as possible, so Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League probably won’t arrive any earlier than the fall of 2022.

Platforms

While we might still be waiting on when we can play Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, we at least know how we will be able to play it. This title is confirmed for all current-gen systems, those being the Xbox Series X and S, PS5, and PC.

Trailer

The newest trailer for Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League came at the 2021 Game Awards. This trailer was just shy of three minutes but was our first real look at the game in action. We open on Captain Boomerang recording a video of himself taunting the squad’s current target, The Flash, before he is interrupted by the man himself. Other heroes mentioned included Superman, Wonder Woman, and Green Lantern.

After a cut we learn from Deadshot that The Flash is, for reasons unknown, is either working for or under the control of the villain Brainiac. After the orders to kill him are repeated, the squad leaps into action in a montage showing how each member will move through the city and fight the mutated techno monsters. Eventually, they encounter Flash again and engage in combat. We get a close look at his face, which shows glowing red eyes and dark veins showing through his cheeks, heavily implying some form of mind control.

The trailer rolls on with a ton more gameplay footage, which we will cover in the next section, before one last encounter with The Flash. This time he runs circles around the squad, literally, to create a massive tornado. It ends with Captain Boomerang about to throw a boomerang at Flash who is somehow charging up some kind of energy ball between his hands. After a cut, it appears like the Suicide Squad won until a giant explosion of light cuts their celebration off.

Taking a step back for those who might be confused, what even is the Suicide Squad? Well, in this game specifically, they are a group composed of DC villains such as Harley Quinn, Captain Boomerang, Deadshot, and King Shark, who are contracted by a woman named Amanda Waller. Their mission? Well, kill the Justice League, obviously. So far, we know this version of the Justice League will at least be composed of Superman, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, and The Flash, if the names Captain Boomerang threw out are any indication. Other possible members, based on other iterations of the superhero team, could include Martian Manhunter, Aquaman, Green Arrow, Hawkman, Cyborg, and more. Naturally, we don’t expect them all to appear, but there may be a few surprises.

We can also reasonably expect Batman to be in this game as well since Rocksteady has confirmed that Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League will take place in the same universe as their Arkham series. Without spoiling Arkham Knight, though, that would all depend on when this game takes place in that series.

The big baddy, though, definitely seems to be Brainiac. Not only does he seem to have somehow taken control of the Justice League members, but the entire city the game takes place in as well, with giant mechanical creatures and structures all over.

Gameplay

Not to be confused with Gotham Knights, Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League is an open-world game where you can play on your own, or with three friends in co-op. If played alone, you will pick one of the Squad to control directly with the ability to jump between them at will, and anyone not being controlled will have an A.I. take over. It will be set in the open world of Metropolis, which you will be able to explore in a variety of ways.

With there being four main characters, each one has its own spin on how they will play. At the core, it appears that the basics of gameplay will be an expanded version of what we got with the Arkham series. We see tons of flashy attacks, grapples, and special moves unique to each character, as well as a more robust system of ranged options and different modes of traversal.

King Shark, for example, can make giant leaps, sprint straight up walls somewhat like The Hulk or Spider-Man, and has hand-to-hand strikes, grabs, a pair of hook weapons, plus a mini-gun for ranged attacks. Deadshot, on the other hand, moves around via his jetpack, fires with automatic and explosive weapons, and can get slightly up close with his gauntlet guns. We don’t know if the rhythmic-based combat that made the Arkham games so satisfying will return, or if it will be more of a traditional third-person action game.

The structure of the game, outside of it being an open world, also remains a question mark. We hope that it would allow players to pick and choose which member of the Justice League we wanted to pursue, though probably keeping Superman locked off until last, and maybe even accidentally running into a member when we weren’t expecting it. Reclaiming the city from Brainiac’s control is another system we highly suspect. Liberating areas from the strange fodder creatures we see and weakening his grip on the city may play a role in freeing the League from his control.

Nothing has been shown or mentioned about any RPG systems either, but it feels like something Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League will incorporate in some way. Similar to how you could upgrade Batman with new gadgets and moves, we would love some way to make our members of the Squad evolve over the course of playing.

Multiplayer

Yes, Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League is built to be a single-player and co-op experience. This is a first for Rocksteady but makes sense given the team-based nature of the game. You can play with up to three of your friends together, each taking a different member into battle. What we don’t know is how they will handle progression. This has been tricky for developers as of late so we just hope that it isn’t another situation where only the host player makes or keeps progress, but we will have to wait on the specifics on this one.

DLC

No DLC plans have been made, but Rocksteady games, especially Arkham Knight, have been packed with DLC content. They tend to combine adding story-based additions, even focusing on brand new characters like Catwoman, as well as more gameplay-centered ones like challenge missions. Both of these feel right at home in Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League. Personally, aside from basic challenge-type stuff, adding in another member of the Justice League to hunt down would be a great way to add to this game post-launch, if not another member of the Suicide Squad itself.

We’re still fuzzy on just how far away Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League is from release, so no pre-order options are up as of yet. There’s little doubt in our minds that this game will come in a variety of editions when it is finally given a release date, at which point we’ll run through all those versions so you can pick the best one for you.

Editors’ Recommendations

SNEAK PEEK: Preview of DC Comics’ SUICIDE SQUAD: KING SHARK #5 (On Sale 1/18!)

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In the aftermath of tragedy, King Shark is on a roll, taking down fools left and right on his way toward victory in the Wild Games! The only thing that stands between humanity and total shark domination is the Defacer! Can she take one for the team and stab the only friend she has left in the back?

(W) Tim Seeley (A) Scott Kolins (C) John Kalisz (L) Wes Abbott

SRP: $3.99

SNEAK PEEK: Preview of DC Comics’ SUICIDE SQUAD: KING SHARK #5 (On Sale 1/18!) Sending User Review 0 ( 0 votes)

The Suicide Squad’s Pete Davidson cast in new horror thriller

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The Suicide Squad actor Pete Davidson’s next movie will take him inside a sinister retirement home.

Best known as a regular cast member on Saturday Night Live, Deadline reports that Davidson will lead director James DeMonaco’s (The Purge) new horror thriller The Home.

He will play a “troubled man” named Max, whose new job looking after elderly residents spawns a few dark surprises when he takes a peep along the forbidden fourth floor.

NBC Universal

Related: Pete Davidson on the ‘closure’ The King of Staten Island gave him

With cameras set to start rolling before the month is out, producer Bill Block teased: “We’re excited to be backing DeMonaco’s brilliant vision.

“James’ The Purge horror franchise has grossed over $450 million at the worldwide box office. With his masterful storytelling abilities and Pete’s versatility as an actor, this film will put audiences everywhere on the edge of their seats.”

Worlds of DC followers will remember Davidson’s brief turn in last year’s aforementioned soft reboot of The Suicide Squad, from the chaotic mind of James Gunn, where he brought Blackguard to life.

NBC Getty Images

Elsewhere, Davidson is teaming up with The Big Bang Theory and The Flight Attendant star Kaley Cuoco for a romcom called Meet Cute.

The film sees Cuoco’s character discovering a time travel machine in a nail salon, which she uses to repeatedly try and fix elements of a date she went on the night before.

Davidson is also due to appear in another horror film called Bodies Bodies Bodies alongside Dear Evan Hansen’s Amandla Stenberg, Borat Subsequent Moviefilm’s Maria Bakalova and MCU star Lee Pace.

The movie has been written by Kristen Roupenian, best known for her viral New Yorker short story Cat Person.

The Suicide Squad is out now on and . Peacemaker streams on in the US.