‘Suicide Squad’ Director Reveals A Lot More About Joker’s Twisted, Edgy Backstory

Suicide Squad director David Ayer spoke with Empire, who compiled their long interview into “17 things we learnt from David Ayer.” It was filled with spoilers and new little details, but we’re going to focus on the stuff about Jared Leto, the living embodiment of the HAM horn because daaaaaamn he’s edgy. So edgy that Ayer cut a bunch of his scenes because they were just too insane (according to Leto) or because they weren’t important to the main story (according to Margot Robbie).

Ayer cleared up some things about the Joker, like how he got those metal teeth, why he tattooed “damaged” on his forehead (other than because he’s just so edgy and it’s not a phase, mom!), and who really killed Robin (there’s been some confusion about whether Harley Quinn did it or if she was an accomplice).

“Joker killed Robin and Batman basically smashes his teeth out and locks him up in Arkham Asylum. It’s in the asylum where Joker would have done the ‘damaged’ tattoo as a message to Batman saying, ‘You’ve damaged me. I was so beautiful before and now you’ve destroyed my face.’ That’s where the grill comes from.”

Damn, why are people always wanting to destroy something beautiful?

Also, did you know Suicide Squad is an anarchic punk rock art movie? Well, it is! And it’s dark. So dark.

“The film is really the journey of the soul. I know this is going to provoke incredible howls of outrage, but it’s really this anarchic punk rock art movie. June Moone goes into this cave where she becomes possessed by this alter-ego that’s hypersexual and primitive and destructive and vengeful. Everybody who has to take her down experiences their own sort of ‘dark night of the soul’ as Enchantress offers up this fantasy reality where she can provide them with a false nirvana, false happiness. The film, in a lot of ways, is really about the splitting of the personality and addiction, and the dark side of the soul.”

(Via Empire)

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