'Suicide Squad 2' Is A Big Priority At Warner Bros. According To Joel Kinnaman

In spite of being pilloried by critics, Suicide Squad earned a mint at the box office and familiarized moviegoing audiences with a half-dozen DC characters they likely had never heard of before. In spite of that, and the massive success of Wonder Woman, the project's status has been in question on and off basically since it was announced.

Franchise star Joel Kinnaman is here to tell you it's still very much a priority at Warner Bros. Pictures.

"I just know that they are working intensely on it," Kinnaman told Collider, indicating that he did not know when they would start filming. "I know it's a big priority at Warner Bros., but it's an equally big priority to get it right. We all felt that we had lightning in a bottle, in a way, and it partly got away from us, a little bit. It's really important to harness everything that was great about it, and then fix what didn't really work. So, I know they're working on it, and we'll see. I'm very excited to read something, but I don't have any new information."

Kinnaman is currently starring in Altered Carbon, a dystopian sci-fi series on Netflix which also features (among others) Riverdale actress Hayley Law. During interviews in support of the new series, the actor has acknowledged that Suicide Squad was not 100% the movie they set out to make, but that he has confidence the sequel can draw from the first movie's strengths and move forward.

DC Films in general has had a bit of an upheaval; after Batman v Superman -- which was nominally a box office disappointment but still made so much money that Warner was able to largely spin it in a positive way -- the implosion of Justice League at the box office has left some bodies in its wake. Warner has twice reshuffled its DC management team in the time since Suicide Squad was released theatrically, and with those changes have come rumors that projects in development are either dead, delayed, or changed.

Meanwhile, Warner has continued to aggressively develop DC properties for both television and film, with so many movie projects reportedly in the early stages of development that it is difficult to believe that all of them would ever make it to the point of being a finished film to begin with.

Suicide Squad 2 will be directed by Gavin O'Connor (The Accountant), while David Ayer (Bright), who handled the first movie, is working on a spinoff that will put the spotlight more firmly on Margot Robbie's Harley Quinn.

Suicide Squad 2 is reportedly going to begin production this fall. Along with Kinnaman, Will Smith, Margot Robbie and Jared Leto are all returning.