The Suicide Squad Composer Would Love to Do Another Superhero Movie

DC fans have been breaking down a lot of elements of The Suicide Squad, after the James Gunn film finally made its debut in theaters and on HBO Max over the weekend. Among the aspects of the film that have gotten praise is its one-of-a-kind score, which is provided by composer and musician John Murphy. While Murphy has previously worked on noteworthy projects such as Kick-Ass and Sunshine, The Suicide Squad marks his biggest foray yet into genre blockbusters — and it’s safe to say that he made quite an impression. In a recent interview with ComicBook.com, Murphy was asked if he would be willing to work on another superhero film following The Suicide Squad, and his answer was an emphatic yes.

“Yeah, I’d love to,” Murphy revealed in our interview, which you can check out above. “I’d never really done a superhero film before. I mean, we’d done Kick-Ass, but that was kind of, in a way, a piss-take of superhero films. It was, by definition, someone trying to be a superhero, so that was very ironic and black humor. I kind of dipped my toe in a little bit, but I think having done one now, I feel like I’ve got the chops now, finally. I would love to do it, because when you do something with that scale, you feel lifted by it. You want to get in earlier, you want to work later. Because you feel that wonderful scale of like, “This is big movie sh-t. It’s fantastic. So, yeah, I would absolutely. I mean, I’d do anything with James. I’d do a home movie if he wanted me. But yeah, that genre, now I’ve done it, I would absolutely do [again]. And I’d be a bit wiser for it too, I think.”

Murphy also spoke about the process of specifically working with Gunn, revealing that their shared backgrounds in the punk rock scene led to a strong collaboration.

“It was very comfortable and very easy and right from day one,” Murphy explained. “It was a real collaboration. He trusted me to come up with whatever ideas I wanted to come up with, and he said, ‘Just go with your gut. Throw them at me, and then we go to work.’ And that was kind of how it was. There was no big rule book from him or no big scheme. It was just, ‘Give me your best shot, and then we’ll work from there.’ And so that’s how it was. And I was worried that I wouldn’t be able to have a dialogue with him, because of the whole COVID thing and he was busy. But whatever I sent to him, I’d get a response within twenty minutes. Sometimes, he’d be shooting and I was literally thinking, ‘Hasn’t he got better things to do right now than [answer me?]’ And he was like, ‘Great. Love that one. Not that one. Let’s do that one, but make the end bigger.’ It was like this really kind of fluid, exciting, collaborative process. And knowing that he understands music, and knowing that he knows his films so well, he was like the kind of guardrail. So it made it easier for me to just send them some crazy that I thought, “No director’s going to go for.” But he was like, ‘Yeah, that’s good, but let’s put it in that scene.’ So it just let me run riot a bit, because I knew he would always pull it in and he would see the bigger picture. It was great.”

“I mean, I’ve got to be honest. He was dreamy to work with,” Murphy continued. “Loads of fun. He’s a really cool, funny guy, and it really was an eye-opener that you can sort of have this much fun writing music for a movie. Because sometimes it’s just hard work, but it was great. I can’t say too many cool things about James.”

The Suicide Squad is now available both in theaters and on HBO Max.