Thursday, August 6th, 2026, marked ten years since Suicide Squad hit theaters (and 5 years since James Gunn’s The Suicide Squad), and David Ayer marked the anniversary by showing a still of unseen footage from the film set. But, oddly, he wasn’t the only former DCEU director in the news. Zack Snyder showed up on the same Warner Bros. lot that same week, filming a selfie under the studio’s water tower and soundtracking it to a song called “Home.” On the same day, Ayer stood at the same tower for a black-and-white shot of his own, captioned with Oingo Boingo’s “Just Another Day.” Two directors who each had their DC films taken away from them, on the same patch of studio backlot, on the same day. What’s going on? Fans, of course, have some theories.
Ayer’s original vision for Suicide Squad tied directly into the SnyderVerse. In fact, the film was meant to reveal Steppenwolf as the real antagonist controlling Enchantress, working under his control to prep an invasion tied to Justice League. All of that connective tissue was removed when Warner Bros. panicked after Batman v Superman‘s rocky reception. The studio actually handed the theatrical cut over to the company that had cut the first Suicide Squad trailers. What survived the aftermath was a much lighter, colorful movie that bore very little resemblance to what Ayer originally shot and envisioned.
But what was the film missing? Well, a longer opening for June Moone, a fuller Rick Flag and June relationship, an unused backstory for Slipknot, and a dramatically different arc for Harley and Joker that let her walk away from him as a survivor rather than a groupie.
Over the years, the missing footage fueled a #ReleaseTheAyerCut campaign alongside the much louder #ReleaseTheSnyderCut campaign. But Zack Snyder finally got his redemption with Zack Snyder’s Justice League. Ayer didn’t. And in 2026, there’s a new reason why he probably never will: Jared Leto.
A BBC documentary that dropped in late July featured ten women accusing the Joker actor of sexual misconduct, four of whom allege the conduct happened while they were teenagers, including claims of assault and grooming. Leto has denied all of it. But the fallout has already reached his career. Barry Levinson’s political thriller Assassination reportedly passed on casting him days after the documentary aired. A second project, Searchlight’s Lunik Heist, is said to have stalled entirely.
Imagine Warner Bros. releasing the Ayer Cut with all of that happening in the background, especially when the original version of the film gives Joker dramatically more screen time than the theatrical cut did, including an entire third-act storyline where Joker cuts a deal with Enchantress to become king of Gotham and reclaim Harley. That’s probably not something they could edit around – lest they repeat the same mistakes and create another awful edit for Suicide Squad.
If we’re honest, the Leto allegations probably buried the Ayer Cut forever. There’s just no way Warner Bros. puts out a movie expanding Leto’s Joker role while he’s the subject of an active, escalating misconduct story with real career consequences already landing elsewhere in Hollywood.
But, even setting Leto aside, there’s a second obstacle that predates the current controversy: James Gunn already made his own version of this exact team. The Suicide Squad in 2021 was written and directed by Gunn himself, using the definite article specifically to distance it from Ayer’s film. Now that Gunn runs DC Studios and is shepherding the DCU’s next chapter, it’s difficult to see what he actually gains by resurfacing a rival take on characters he already redefined for the brand. Releasing the Ayer Cut wouldn’t just reopen an old wound over how Ayer was treated by the studio, but it would remind audiences that Gunn’s Task Force X wasn’t the only version of that story. And what if Ayer’s version is actually superior? That wouldn’t be good for Gunn or his DCU either.
None of that stops the water tower photos from Zack Snyder and David Ayer from generating buzz around DCEU and DCU opportunities. But remember Ayer is working on WB’s American Blue as director and executive producer, so there’s nothing suspicious about him being there at all. But the timing, the matching location, and the anniversary all suggest two filmmakers who know precisely what conversation they’re reviving. It’s just a conversation that, for now, runs into a wall neither of them controls.
RELATED: Suicide Squad Turns 5 — David Ayer’s Original Aged Better
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