Given the recent chaos that has ensued at DC, it has become clear that it is not just the superhero, but also the director behind it, that becomes a driving factor in the movie’s success. By this calculation, Suicide Squad, by the newly crowned blockbuster director, David Ayer. But the prediction couldn’t have been any more off.

Ayer released Suicide Squad in 2016. But not before the theaters had already seen Ryan Reynolds‘ Deadpool and Batman vs. Superman, which, as per the Suicide Squad director, greatly altered his movie.

David Ayer reveals how Ryan Reynolds’ Deadpool altered his movie plot entirely

When he booked Will Smith, Margot Robbie, Jared Leto, and even Viola Davis for his mutant thriller, audience expectations touched the sky, which was already pretty high for superhero movies in 2016 owing to the courtesy of Deadpool and Batman vs. Superman. But high expectations are not only what Suicide Squad‘s predecessors altered. According to Ayer’s revelation to Deadline, the box office trends of 2016 turned his dark and deadly Suicide Squad into “a f*cking comedy.”

Ayer believes that the bombastic success of Ryan Reynolds’ hilariously unhinged meta-movie left everyone thinking that inserting one punchline per minute is the only way to attain blockbuster success.

This was further cemented as Zack Snyder’s attempt at dark and soulful with Batman vs. Superman: Dawn of Justice did not manage to strike a chord with the audience. At least, back then. His comparison of Suicide Squad with Deadpool and Batman vs. Superman is just one of the many profound realizations that the filmmaker has had since its average run.

Suicide Squad still haunts the Fury director

David Ayer’s 2016 movie for all its stars garnered a worldwide box office collection of $168,717,425, and even fewer stars. For Ayer Suicide Squad could not come at a worse time. Had the movie done well, it would have made him a director to look out for. But it is not much what the movie did to him but what he ultimately turned the movie into that still comes back to haunt him.

With a gang of misfits at the helm of affairs, we cannot blame Ayer for associating Guardians of the Galaxy-esque aspirations for Suicide Squad. Perhaps, he can give it a shot again with James Gunn, given how the director himself seems to like the idea.

Do you think Suicide Squad is a comedy more than a dark thriller? Let us know in the comments below.