The film was written and directed by James Gunn and stars Margot Robbie, Idris Elba, John Cena, Joel Kinnaman, Sylvester Stallone, Viola Davis, David Dastmalchian, Daniela Melchior, Michael Rooker, Jai Courtney, Peter Capaldi, Alice Braga, and Pete Davidson.

They are sent to the South American island nation of Corto Maltese to destroy all traces of the giant alien starfish Starro the Conqueror before it falls into the local government's control.

However, O'Connor left due to creative differences, and Gunn was hired to write and direct the film after being temporarily fired by Disney and Marvel Studios as director of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol.

Intelligence officer Amanda Waller assembles two Task Force X teams, colloquially known as the "Suicide Squad", which consists of Belle Reve penitentiary inmates who agree to carry out missions in exchange for commuted sentences.

The teams are sent to the South American island nation of Corto Maltese after an anti-American regime overthrows its government, and are tasked with destroying the Nazi-era laboratory Jötunheim, which houses the secret experiment "Project Starfish".

Elsewhere, the second team - led by assassin Bloodsport, who Waller blackmailed in exchange for not sending his estranged daughter Tyla to prison, and consisting of Peacemaker, King Shark, Polka-Dot Man, Ratcatcher 2, and her pet rat Sebastian - enters the country undetected.

Flag and Ratcatcher 2 enter the Thinker's laboratory and find Starro the Conqueror, a giant starfish–like alien that creates smaller versions of itself to kill people and control their bodies.

[11][47] Also appearing in the film are Juan Diego Botto as President General Silvio Luna, the dictator of Corto Maltese who proposes marriage to Harley Quinn;[39] Joaquín Cosío as Major General Mateo Suárez of Corto Maltese;[39] Storm Reid as Bloodsport's daughter Tyla;[23] Julio Ruiz as Milton, an associate of Task Force X;[48][49] Lynne Ashe as Polka-Dot Man's Mom;[28] and Taika Waititi as Ratcatcher 2's father, the original Ratcatcher.

[50] John Ostrander, creator of the 1980s Suicide Squad team that influenced the film, makes a cameo appearance as Dr. Fitzgibbon,[23][51] while Stephen Blackehart has a small role as the pilot Briscoe,[52] and both Lloyd Kaufman and Gunn's Guardians of the Galaxy Vol.

3 (2023) in July 2018 when conservative commentators, such as Mike Cernovich, circulated controversial Twitter posts he made involving rape, pedophilia, AIDS, the Holocaust, bestiality and 9/11.

He discussed his new DCEU commitment with Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige, who encouraged him to "make a great movie" and agreed to delay production on Guardians until Gunn had completed work on the Suicide Squad sequel.

[90] Characters that were considered but ultimately rejected include Sportsmaster,[97] Dogwelder,[98] Bat-Mite,[23] Livewire, Punch and Jewelee, Black Spider, Deathstroke, Man-Bat, Plastique, Chemo, KGBeast, Solomon Grundy, Rainbow Creature, Gunhawk, Knockout, Killer Frost, Mr.

[126] Peter Capaldi joined the cast in early September, when Pete Davidson was in talks to make a cameo appearance during a break from his work on Saturday Night Live.

[126] Gunn later announced the film's full main cast and characters: Dastmalchian as Polka-Dot Man, Cena as Peacemaker, Courtney as Captain Boomerang, Joaquín Cosío as Mateo Suarez, Fillion as T.D.K., Kinnaman as Rick Flag, Mayling Ng as Mongal, Borg as Javelin, his brother Sean Gunn as Weasel, Juan Diego Botto as Silvio Luna, Reid as Tyla, Davidson as Blackguard, Waititi as the first Ratcatcher, Alice Braga as Sol Soria, Agee, Tinashe Kajese as Flo Crawley, Melchior as Ratcatcher 2, Capaldi as Thinker, Julio Ruiz as Milton, Jennifer Holland as Emilia Harcourt, Davis as Waller, Elba as Bloodsport, Robbie as Quinn, and Rooker as Savant.

[160] A panel for the film was held during Comic Con Experience's digital event CCXP Worlds on December 6, with James Gunn and members of the cast in attendance.

Jennifer Ouellette at Ars Technica noted that the new trailer had a darker, more ominous tone than the red band version, without the jokes and King Shark scenes and with added character beats.

[173] Internet technology company Akamai reported, based on global unlicensed streaming and torrent data, that The Suicide Squad was the sixth most pirated film between January and September 2021.

[195] According to Whip Media, who track viewership data for the 19 million worldwide users of their TV Time app, The Suicide Squad was the seventh-most-streamed-film of 2021 and the most-streamed-project of the year for HBO Max.

The site's critical consensus reads, "Enlivened by writer-director James Gunn's singularly skewed vision, The Suicide Squad marks a funny, fast-paced rebound that plays to the source material's violent, anarchic strengths.

Club, Katie Rife gave the film a "B+" grade and said, "Now that superhero movies have gone from disreputable entertainment for children to global events ushered in with awed reverence, it was time for someone to come along and pop the balloon.

[205] Entertainment Weekly's Leah Greenblatt gave the film a C+ grade and wrote: "The script, accordingly, herks and jerks along with a sort of forced-festive glee, its mounting body count buffeted by goofball banter and pounding soundtrack cues.

[207] Some critics have interpreted The Suicide Squad as a critique and even a parody of American foreign policy and noted some anti-imperialist themes, which was arguably done in greater extent than the film's predecessor.

Noah Berlatsky of Foreign Policy compares the rationale of the Suicide Squad's intervention in the Corto Maltese civil war to the 2003 invasion of Iraq on the grounds of an anti-American regime purportedly gaining access to and weaponizing a destructive force such as Starro.

[227] DC Films president Walter Hamada said a month later that they had plans for more projects with Gunn,[158] and Safran said there was potential for more spin-offs based on Suicide Squad members such as Ratcatcher and Bloodsport if a filmmaker had a unique vision for them.

[31] In June 2022, Gunn said there had been discussions about a sequel to The Suicide Squad and he was considering it for his next feature film but his focus was on television for the foreseeable future following his positive experience making Peacemaker.

[239] Following the assumption of their new posts in November, the pair began devising an eight-to-ten year plan for a new interconnected DC Universe (DCU) franchise that would succeed and "soft reboot" the outgoing DCEU following the release of Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom in December 2023.

[247] The series was positioned to be the first installment of Gunn and Safran's DCU, acting as an "apertif" to the franchise prior to the release of the film Superman (2025) which was regarded as the "true beginning" of the story.

director Amanda Waller for her involvement in creating the Suicide Squad, she was barred from exploiting any other human inmates at Belle Reve for her black ops missions, leading her to devise a team composed exclusively of monsters and other inhuman subjects.

[251][252] Numerous cast members from The Suicide Squad and Peacemaker also appear in the series, with Viola Davis and Steve Agee respectively reprising their roles as Amanda Waller and A.R.G.U.S.

Davis was in negotiations to reprise her role and also executive produce the series, which was expected to build off Waller's appearances in Peacemaker which publicly revealed her work with the Suicide Squad.