Home Entertainment David Ayer discusses the role of Batman in SUICIDE SQUAD film

David Ayer discusses the role of Batman in SUICIDE SQUAD film

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Suicide Squad is continuing to look like an incredibly promising and fun film that will certainly add a different perspective to not only the DC Comic Universe, but super-hero movies in general. The focus on villains, or anti-heroes, is a different take and one which I think will make it a real fun stand-out in the genre.

And while the focus of the film will remain firmly on its oddball set of villains, we also know that there will be a presence of a true superhero in the film: none other than the Dark Knight himself – Darryn Batman. This shouldn’t really be too much of a surprise considering that he sent most of these villains to Arkham in the first place. However, it does beg the question as to what role he will have in the film and how will the film perceive his character, considering that to the Suicide Squad, he is their enemy and shouldn’t be working with them.

Director David Ayer though has really put in a lot of thought in the film and all these subplots. Especially when you consider that including Batman into the film was not a mandate from Warner Bros, but what he wanted (as revealed by Collider.com):

Look, you apply at a job for a DC Comic movie and it’s like, ‘Come on, let me get the toys, please. Let me get the cool stuff.’ I begged for that. That was really, really something I wanted. There’s a lot of information out there, a lot of false information about how these characters play into the A plot. It’s an incredibly complex story with flashbacks and different convergent storylines and things like that.

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As for how Batman fits into the story of Suicide Squad, Ayer revealed that the film offers a unique opportunity in portraying the Dark Knight from an entirely different point of view. One which I’m quite excited about:

All the Batman movies have been from Batman’s point of view. He’s the good guy. He’s the hero of his own movie in all the movies we’ve seen. If you look at what Bruce Wayne has done in creating the Batman persona, his idea was to terrorize criminals. It’s sort of psychological warfare against criminals. This wraith that comes in the night and attacks and pulls criminals from society. For the first time, we’re seeing Batman from the point of view of the criminals and he’s freaking scary.

So while Batman will not form a huge focus of the film, he will be present, but the focus will be different. We will finally get to see what makes these bad guys tick and why they hate him so much…

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He also sat down with Comic Book Resources to open about how he is planning to showcase the main characters and his portrait for the film:

In discussion the role of Will Smith’s Deadshot and whether we should see him as an anti-hero or a supervillain, he had the following to say:

Probably a supervillain. He’s a bad guy. They are all bad guys, that’s the beauty of this. That’s the fun of the genre. I think Will is incredibly versatile and can handle any kind of role you throw at him. It’s funny because none of the normal words apply. When you say, “He’s the father figure of the team,” it’s like herding cats. They don’t care.

It’s certainly going to set the tone for the film, ensuring that the characters are still portrayed as bad guys, yet somehow you still need to root for them. Something which Ayer’s had a lot of fun working with:

You are talking to the guy who wrote “Training Day.” For me, it’s not going too far. It’s very easy to go too far. At the end of the day, they are people with lives. They are people who have made bad decisions. You get into the question of, “Are you your worst day? Are you your worst act that you’ve ever committed? And should that define you? When you are defined in that way, is it immutable? Can you change? Can you learn? Can you grow?” A lot of this is about people that have been defined in an incredibly negative way and have absorbed and are maybe discovering that they are not so bad after all.

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Now the DC Comic Universe is quite rich and very diverse. He got to also discuss the comics that influenced his decisions the most in making this film and what can we possibly expected from the film based on that:

You almost have to go back to the beginnings and look at Batman and look at the origins of Superman and start there and work your way through the canon and how it’s evolved as society has changed. Certain elements haven’t changed and certain elements have. The revolution going into the ‘90s and the graphic novel and [Frank] Miller’s work – you sort of have to look at all that. For me, it was going into the original Suicide Squad, which was very interesting because it’s a product of the bipolar world. These guys were fighting the Russians. It was very 80’s and I’m a child of the ‘80s, so I totally understand where they were coming from. Then, you can really see how in today’s world – where the government sometimes engages in murky activities to solve problems and make us safe – you could sort of see something like this happening and how it would happen today.

Personally, I love the Miller tone of the comics and glad he is taking some inspiration from the earlier comics as well. However, there are a lot of characters that could’ve been considered for the movie. So, how did he determine which ones to focus on for the film:

Deadshot is a no-brainer because he’s just a core element of that team. I got Harley Quinn through the New 52 version, but then I really started going, “OK, what’s this character?” Then you get absorbed in her stand-alone things and then you get into her origins and her relationship with Joker. Defining that, it’s salt and pepper. You have to have one thought with the other.

It is a lot of fun to see Boomerang, who is sort of the most villainous of all these characters. This has been a blast creating this absolutely out-of-control force of nature with Jai [Courtney, who plays Boomerang]. In character paradigms, he’s evil-chaotic. It’s like building a family and you just look for who is going to be complementary to each other and this is a new venture and it’s a lot of characters to introduce. You’re looking for that team and that family with interlocking skills that will complement everybody else’s.

I think the best think to take away from all this news is that we are ever closer to the film’s release date – August 5th. It’s less than a month away now, it – and payday – couldn’t come soon enough.

Last Updated: July 13, 2016

2 Comments

  1. LegionZA

    July 13, 2016 at 15:19

    I just there is not too many sub-plots that major holes start appearing.

    Reply

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