James Gunn’s Suicide Squad followup/relaunch, The Suicide Squad, currently carries an August 2021 release date, and with the amount of reshuffling that’s reportedly going down, time might grow tight for the surely CGI-laden project. Most recently, we heard that Gunn was dropping the Deadshot role (and it was a substantial one) with Idris Elba being shuffled to a new, unknown part. There will be a lineup of mostly new villains, and Variety is now reporting that John Cena is circling the project, maybe while chanting, “You can’t see me”? Too far.
Actually, there’s no official word on which character Cena might play. Collider is pulling for King Shark, the murderous humanoid shark who helped the squad take out the Silicon Dragons in the comics. Journalist Glenn Rubenstein pointed out on Twitter that Cena might be ideal to play Major Disaster, who joined the squad in confronting terrorists near Iceland. Speculation on that note shall likely continue, but here’s the relevant part of the Variety report:
Sources tell Variety that Cena is in talks to join Idris Elba and Margot Robbie in Warner Bros.’ follow-up to 2016’s Suicide Squad … It’s currently unknown who Cena and Elba will be playing … Warner Bros. had no comment.
Also intriguingly, Collider previously reported that Gunn would also like to cast Dave Bautista (who campaigned on Twitter for a role, though we don’t know how serious he was), which would present an interesting WWE dual angle within the production. That casting would make sense, given that Bautista was one of Gunn’s most vocal supporters after he was fired (and later rehired) from Guardians of the Galaxy 3, but we’ll have to wait for official news on that casting possibility. We do know that Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn will return, as will Jai Courtney’s Captain Boomerang, but otherwise, things truly appear to be influx with the overall character lineup. There’s also been no confirmation of Rick Flag’s return, and Joel Kinnaman is staying vague on inquiries for now.
The Suicide Squad will arrive in theaters on August 6, 2021.
(Via Variety)