After James Gunn’s confirmation that The Suicide Squad and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 are still on track for their respective 2021 and 2022 releases, the director took to Instagram to host another Q&A session with his fans where he went on to answer questions about his upcoming DC and MCU films. When asked about The Suicide Squad‘s timeline within the DCEU, Gunn has revealed that Warner Bros.’ highly-anticipated film will be taking place following the events of Cathy Yan’s Birds of Prey, which had a poor performance at the box office despite receiving positive reviews.
Gunn has also addressed a fan’s question about the possibility of him doing a fourth Guardians movie following the highly-anticipated threequel in 2022. He has revealed that he has always intended the franchise to only be a trilogy as he confirms that there are indeed no plans for a Vol. 4. In addition, he has also teased that there will be another character death in the upcoming third installment.
“I absolutely never said I wouldn’t do a Vol. 2, as I planned to do a trilogy from the beginning if the first one worked,” Gunn said (via Comic Book Movie).“I have no plans to do a [fourth].”
If the Guardians of the Galaxy would really end as a trilogy, this is a very common thing within the MCU as the Iron Man and Captain America films have also ended their franchise in the same way. However, Taika Waititi’s upcoming Thor: Love and Thunder will be the first MCU franchise that will go on beyond three films.
During the same Q&A session on Instagram live, the director has also expressed his love for Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn when a fan asked him to choose between The Joker or Harley. He also shared that Harley Quinn is his favorite comic character to write, teasing that the fan-favorite villain will have insane actions and dialogue.
“Oh, I love the Joker, but Harley is one of my favourite characters I’ve ever written,” Gunn said.“In fact, she’s probably my favourite comic character whose personality was well-defined before I wrote her for the screen. She’s an incredible companion to have while writing her insane actions and dialogue. Did I say I LOVED her?”
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The Suicide Squad cast includes: David Dastmalchian, John Cena, Jai Courtney, Joaquín Cosío, Nathan Fillion, Joel Kinnaman, Maylin Ng, Flula Borg, Sean Gunn, Juan Deigo Botto, Storm Reid, Pete Davidson, Taika Waititi, Alice Brage, Steve Agee, Tinashe Kajese, Daniela Melchior, Peter Capaldi, Julio Ruiz, Jennifer Holland, Viola Davis, Idris Elba, Margot Robbie, and Michael Rooker.
Davis, Robbie, Courtney, and Kinnaman will all play the same roles they had in the 2016 film, reprising as Amanda Waller, Harley Quinn, Captain Boomerang, and Rick Flag, respectively. The cast is also stacked with other James Gunn alums like David Dastmalchian, Nathan Fillion, Sean Gunn, Steve Agee, and Michael Rooker, plus fellow Marvel creatives like Taika Waititi. The movie is written and directed by Gunn. Chuck Roven and Peter Safran will serve as producers. Nik Korda is executive producing the movie.
The Suicide Squad will hit theaters on August 6, 2021.
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The first Guardians of the Galaxy was the surprise hit of the second phase in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, grossing nearly $775 million at the box office and earning widespread critical acclaim for its abundance of humor, emotional story and Gunn’s direction, in addition to its soundtrack becoming the first album of its genre consisting of previously released songs to top the Billboard 200 chart and having sold over 2.5 million copies in 2014 alone. The second film hit theaters three years later and prove to be a near equal success to its predecessor, grossing over $800 million at the box office and earning more acclaim from critics and audiences who continued to praise the performances, direction, soundtrack and story while some criticized a feeling of familiarity in some of the film’s humor.
The space-traveling team was most recently seen in the box-office breaking Avengers: Endgame and while their next solo adventure doesn’t have a release date, Gunn’s completion of the script last year and with a production set for next year should see the film hit theaters sometime in 2022.
