Warner Bros. leapt at the chance to hire James Gunn for a DC movie after he was let go by Disney. Gunn has become one of the most prolific filmmakers in the past few years, due in no small part to him making the obscure characters and concepts of Guardians of the Galaxy into a mainstream hit. Gunn has already successfully directed two films in the franchise, and pre-production on Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 is underway.
In 2018, Gunn was fired by Disney due to offensive past tweets. The firing was controversial among many, including the cast of Guardians of the Galaxy who publicly showed their support for Gunn with an open letter. In 2019, Disney would rehire Gunn to helm Guardians of the Galaxy 3, but the film would have to wait because by that point Gunn had already signed a deal to direct The Suicide Squad for Warner Bros. Now, it appears the studio was interested in hiring Gunn very early on.
In an interview with Total Film, Gunn revealed Warner Bros. called him just days after the firing by Disney. The call was to discuss Superman and other things. Warner Bros. was so eager to get into business with Gunn, they offered him whatever property he wanted. After considering a few projects, Gunn landed on The Suicide Squad. The director said:
Warner came a-calling pretty immediately upon the news. I think everything kind of went down [with Disney] on like a Friday, and I think by Monday, Warners were trying to get a hold of me to talk to me about Superman and a bunch of other stuff. But it took me a little while to decide what I was going to do – I really just needed to take care of myself from an emotional and spiritual place. Before agreeing to anything, I took the three ideas that excited me the most. Two were actually DC projects, and then the other one was an original idea. For about a month, every other day I worked on one of those projects, trying to see where the ideas would go. The Suicide Squad really did seem the thing that excited me the most. That’s when I went and told DC – because they’d offered me basically anything [I wanted to make] – that the one I wanted to do was The Suicide Squad.
Gunn coming aboard The Suicide Squad was what the studio needed to get the sequel moving. Several directors were considered for the project before he was hired. At one point, Jaume Collet-Serra (who is now directing Black Adam) was seen as a frontrunner but opted to helm Jungle Cruise for Disney instead. Then, The Accountant director Gavin O'Connor signed on to direct Suicide Squad 2 but would eventually leave the project, reportedly because of how similar his pitch was to Birds of Prey, which was moving ahead at Warner Bros.
Interestingly, Gunn is one of many filmmakers Warner Bros. has approached fairly soon after work with Disney. The studio hired Patty Jenkins to direct Wonder Woman after she had previously exited Marvel Studios' Thor: The Dark World over creative differences. J.J. Abrams, who directed two Star Wars movies for Lucasfilm, signed a deal with WarnerMedia, where he is now producing a new Superman film and Justice League Dark series for HBO Max. Warner Bros. has often been seen as a more filmmaker-friendly studio, harboring long working relationships with talent like Clint Eastwood and Ben Affleck. It's also made a practice of recognizing talent Disney was willing to let go of, albeit temporarily in Gunn's case. All told, it makes sense Warner Bros. wasted no time in calling someone of James Gunn's caliber when he suddenly became available. Hopefully, both of the director's upcoming projects are successful, leading to further partnerships with both Disney and Warner Bros.
Source: Total Film
