Jared Leto's Joker Performance Was "Ripped Out" of Suicide Squad, Says Director

With the announcement of the upcoming Zack Snyder's Justice League for HBO Max, DC fans have fulfilled their goal of getting Warner Bros. to release the Snyder Cut. As a result, attention has now been given to other entries in the DC Extended Universe, in the hopes that they may receive the same treatment.

This has been particularly seen with Suicide Squad , whose director, David Ayer, has been quite vocal on Twitter regarding the film's rocky road to release. Ayer has commented on how the film's direction was influenced by the box office success of Deadpool and the critical failure of Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice , resulting in the end product adopting a more comedic tone.

Ayer has taken to Twitter once again to discuss Suicide Squad further, focusing specifically on Jared Leto's performance as The Joker...

NEWS

David Ayer responded to a fan page campaigning to '#ReleaseTheAyerCut' on Twitter. In this tweet, Ayer commented on how Jared Leto's performance as The Joker was discarded from the final theatrical release of Suicide Squad :

WHAT THIS MEANS

A lot of the marketing for Suicide Squad implied that The Joker would have a substantial role relating to his relationship with Harley Quinn in the film. However, Leto's Joker had little chance to shine, having an incredibly limited impact on the overall narrative of Suicide Squad . Thus, Ayer's comment that "no one has seen [Leto's] performance" reinforces the idea that much of The Joker's subplot was cut from the film.

Ayer's continuous discussion of Suicide Squad 's production could point to two different possibilities. Ayer may be hoping to replicate the same circumstances as Zack Snyder in order to publicize his interest in returning to retool the film and receive his own 'Ayer Cut'. Alternatively, it could be speculated that Ayer is actually gearing up for an announcement of his own cut of Suicide Squad , and is sowing the seeds for DC fans to get excited.

Similarly to Justice League , it is widely known that Suicide Squad had a fair bit of studio interference from Warner Bros. Therefore, if there is enough demand for it, perhaps DC fans will be treated to a release of the Ayer Cut that reflects the director's original creative intentions for the project.