Home New SUICIDE SQUAD casting rumors include Karl Urban, Ed Harris, Jason Clarke and more!

New SUICIDE SQUAD casting rumors include Karl Urban, Ed Harris, Jason Clarke and more!

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To quote a popular song from Adele: RUUUUUMOURS! Today’s grapevine whisperings are all about Suicide Squad, Warner Bros\DC Comics’ upcoming supervillain team-up movie that looks to have more stars in it than an issue of Scope Magazine in the 1980’s. We’ve already seen that star studded cast – which boasts Will Smith as Deadshot, Jared Leto as The Joker, Margot Robbie as Harley Quinn, Jai Courtney as Captain Boomerang, Cara Develingne as Enchantress and Viola Davis as Amanda Waller – get a serious shakeup when Tom Hardy bailed on his role as good guy team leader Rick Flagg over apparent issues with the script. The role was offered to Jake Gyllenhaal, but he’s also turned it down, which leads to today’s bout of musical rumour chairs.

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According to both JoBlo and Latino Review‘s sources, Karl Urban’s (Dredd, Star Trek) name is apparently the latest addition to the list of actors that WB is looking at to replace Hardy. The fact that Urban is also rumoured to be up for the role of the main villain in WB’s Aquaman is apparently not a problem, as WB have commissioned three different scripts for that movie and his involvement will depend on which one they go with. If he is eligible for Suicide Squad, he would be joining the previously reported Joel Edgerton (Warrior, Exodus: Gods and Men) and Jon Bernthal (Fury, The Walking Dead), who may also be up for the role of Flagg. The rumour goes on to state that Ed Harris (The Abyss, The Truman Show) and Max Martini (Pacific Rim, Sabotage) are in contention for that character’s father, Rick Flagg Sr., a senior military man turned criminal who doesn’t get along with his more noble son. As we’ve seen both men play nearly exactly that character a few times now already, I’m fine with either choice.

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Recent rumours regarding the plot hinted at Lex Luthor’s involvement as the villain, but some new rumours proclaim that super-assassin Deathstroke – probably most famously played on TV’s Arrow at the moment by Manu Bennett – may actually be the main baddie in this film. What’s more, its alleged that Joe Manganiello (True Blood, Sabotage) and Jason Clarke (Zero Dark Thirty, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes) are vying for the role. Those are quite intriguing choices, seeing as they’re nearly polar opposites. Manganiello is not a terrible actor at all, but he’s more known for the fact that he’s a walking mountain of muscle who looks like he was designed to be in a video game, whereas Clarke boasts a much more “normal human” build but brings some serious acting chops to the table.

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The next bit of casting rumour taps Oscar winner Geoffrey Rush (Shine, Pirates of the Caribbean) to play Clifford DeVoe who is not a member of 1980’s RnB group Bell Biv DeVoe but rather a genius inventor and criminal known as The Thinker. And finally, it’s formerly been alleged that Gary Sinise (CSI:NY, Apollo 13) would be playing a character named General Eiling, but the new rumours claim that that is only half right as Sinise is actually in the running to play General Sam Lane. If that name sounds familiar, it’s because he’s the father of Superman’s plucky reporter squeeze Lois Lane. That’s certainly an interesting connection to WB’s other DC Comics films.

Speaking of which, the rumours do go on to describe the possible appearance of a certain Dark Knight, as well as the role of the Joker in the movie, but we’re now heading into potential spoiler territory, so I’ll let you read that at your own peril.

As for all the other casting rumours, my knee-jerk reaction is that it’s all rubbish. With so many recognizable stars, it reads more like a bout of speculative fan-casting than anything that the studio would actually pursue. The problem with that hypothesis though is that we said exactly the same thing when the “crazy” rumours initially started about Will Smith, Tom Hardy and co being up for the movie, and look how that turned out. That being said though, unless a bunch of these names mentioned are just glorified cameos – and why would you need Oscar winners for that? – then I would have to call bullcrap on most of them, as this cast now just seems way too large and ungainly for a movie like this.

Bonus tidbit: Both Max Martini and Joe Manganiello worked with writer/director David Ayer on Sabotage, while Jon Bernthal just starred in Ayer’s Fury, so they already have a working relationship making the chances of them joining the cast that much more likely.

Last Updated: January 29, 2015

3 Comments

  1. Some very interesting tidbits there… And some really cool possible cast choices – I can see a few of those really working.

    I quite like what I’ve heard about this movie so far. And I really hope DC can pull it off. Looking forward to hearing more as they continue casting and then once filming begins.

    Reply

  2. Captain JJ the crafter

    January 29, 2015 at 11:56

    If they get Deathstroke right I’ll be happy.

    Reply

  3. Brady miaau

    January 29, 2015 at 16:09

    I think Karl Urban is a tragically cast actor. I think he brings stage presence to movies and then ends up as Judge Re-Tread in yet another awful sodding movie.

    Reply

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