The SnyderVerse has fallen, a new DC Universe is coming, and the imminent release of Aquaman And The Lost Kingdom closes the door on one of the strangest fiascos in modern Hollywood history. And yet, it’s not over. There’s still a little matter of the Ayer Cut.
Director David Ayer, who directed the misbegotten supervillain team-up Suicide Squad, released in 2016, is still trying to get his director’s cut before fans. Earlier this year, he tweeted that DC Studios head James Gunn assured him that his cut of the film “would have its time to be shared.” Yet, with the ongoing crisis on infinite cinematic universes, finding the perfect time to remind audiences about the Joker’s “Damaged” tattoo has been complicated.
In a recent interview with Total Film, Ayer remains “hopeful” that his film will see the light of day. However, he also isn’t ignoring the reality of the “immense political headwind against it.” Not to get all JFK assassination about it, but Ayer sees the film’s status as something of a conspiracy, alleging “there are a lot of people that are invested in certain narratives that don’t want it to see the light of day.” If Ayer’s cut were released, the “narrative” of Suicide Squad “blows up” because the world would see “the cowardliness and the whole just general shittiness of how the film’s been treated, and how the actors have had this great work that they’d done taken away.”
Who Ayer is talking about is beyond us because Warner Bros. is a different den of vipers than in 2016. However, it wouldn’t be hard to see how re-releasing Suicide Squad is a danger to the new DCU James Gunn is crafting. Nevertheless, Ayer maintains hope, telling Total Film that “something’s going to happen.”
“The truth always comes out,” he said, channeling Vanderpump Rules’ Kristen Doute. “It always comes out.”
It’s hard not to feel for Ayer on some level. For the last decade, Suicide Squad has been a punchline for writers like this one. As he put it in August, the director is aware of a “group of people that have fun mocking the film,” which must be tough because making movies is hard. His position is that he got royally screwed and humiliated by the released version. But to be fair to those who have fun mocking the film, there is a scene where the Joker pushes Harley Quinn into a vat of white viscous goo, which one has to assume will be in both cuts.
On the other hand, just throw the thing on Max already and let David Ayer move on with his life.