James Gunn Interview: The Suicide Squad

The Suicide Squad revamps the story of DC’s team of anti-heroes from their previous outing in 2016. The movie is coming to theaters and HBO Max on August 5 where it will be streaming for a month. While fan favorites like Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie), Amanda Waller (Viola Davis), and Rick Flag (Joel Kinnaman) are poised to return, most of the crew is made of new faces this time around. 

They’re under the guidance of a new director too, as Guardians of the Galaxy’s James Gunn puts his own spin on DC Comics’ most wanted. The filmmaker spoke to Screen Rant about his unique approach to the material and shared which character he connected to the most.

Screen Rant: When writing the film was there any character that jumped out at you and surprised you during the writing phase?

James Gunn: Definitely. I definitely was surprised, I think, by a number of characters. But Ratcatcher II [Daniela Melchior] was one of them. I started to fall in love with this character – not in a romantic sense, but she’s just got so much heart and so much wonderfulness about her as a human being. 

Even though she’s as flawed as anybody else in a way – she’s very lazy, and she sleeps all the time – she’s just got this wonderful heart and kindness about her that made me just love her so much as a character.

How do you approach The Suicide Squad compared to something like Guardians of the Galaxy? Is there a different approach with something like that?

James Gunn: I think my approach is very different for every movie. My approach to Guardians 1 versus Guardians 2 versus Guardians 3 is very different. So, definitely, my approach to Suicide Squad is different. 

With Suicide Squad, I’m speaking to an older audience. Instantly, the language you’re speaking is different. It’s almost like, when you’re talking to a great group of kids and old people, you don’t say, “F***.” But when I come to you, and you and I are hanging out, I’m not gonna notice that I’m saying it. The Suicide Squad is that – we don’t hold back in that way. It’s two adults talking to each other, so that is very different. 

But also I think the elements of danger are very different. I think that the characters could really die at any time. And that actually makes it more fun to write as a writer in a way because you don’t know what’s going to happen. Anything could happen, and I could change my mind at any time and do a different keystroke – and all of a sudden somebody’s dead. I’m Amanda Waller, man. That’s one of the hard things: I had to deal with how I’m Amanda Waller. I’m the one who’s setting up the bombs in their heads. Maybe the bomb is a shark ripping you in half.

You mentioned before that you had your choice of DC projects when you jumped on to direct The Suicide Squad. Is there another corner of DC that you’d like to explore next? 

James Gunn: Yes. 

Fair enough. Any hints?

James Gunn: No. It’s not what anybody would expect, I’ll tell you that much. 

This film has a huge roster. What does the different combination of characters add to the film?

James Gunn: I think they’re a very disparate group of individuals. All they have in common are really broken childhoods and not really being good at connecting with other human beings. But other than that, they are totally different. 

I almost want them to seem like they come from different movies and TV shows, and then they show up in this movie together as if we’ve been building this universe for 20 years with a Peacemaker TV show and a Bloodsport movie and a Ratcatcher Saw-type series. And then we’re bringing them together into this show. 

I wanted to give that feeling that there’s this rich history of weird super villains and a magical realist feeling of a world in which they’ve seen a man fly. They’ve seen an alien dude fly around and zap people with his eyeballs, so seeing a shark walk down the street is weird. You’re going to look, but you’re not going to faint, because that sometimes happens in this world of DC. So, it was really fun playing with all that.

Kamen Rider at Bandai is trying to make its way to the US market here. Do you think there’s an audience for Kamen Rider?

James Gunn: Yeah, absolutely. I think that there’s something innately beautiful and magical about Kamen Rider, so I think that people could definitely be into that if it was presented to them in the right way.

One of the great things about streaming services today is that people are able to see TV shows and things from other cultures. I had to work really hard as a young man; I had to go down and buy bootleg Hong Kong videotapes. I did this for years and years. I had a collection of hundreds of Hong Kong movies that were never released in the United States. I had them on videotape, and that’s where I learned how to make movies – from those things. 

Being able to get more easy access to movies from other cultures is a great thing for the world because it helps you understand other cultures. But it also allows you to appreciate things that just haven’t grown. 

One of the great things about Asian cinema in general – not just Japanese cinema, or Hong Kong, or South Korea – is that they embraced multiple genres at one time. Here in the United States, things get very much like, “This is an action movie,” or “This is a romantic comedy,” or “This is whatever.” But those movies, they do embrace way more. The Suicide Squad is the descendant of those films as much as it is of my own culture.

The Suicide Squad premieres on August 6 in theaters and streaming on HBO Max.