Next year, Guardians of the Galaxy helmer James Gunn is shifting his talents to DC for a reimagination of The Suicide Squad. It will maintain some pieces of David Ayer’s original Suicide Squad movie (namely, Margot Robbie as Harley Quinn), but filter the comic characters through a new lens. And Gunn is bringing some of his favorite collaborators along, including Nathan Fillion.
Fillion teamed with James Gunn back in 2006’s horror comedy Slither, and the director tapped the Firefly standout for a role in the supervillain ensemble movie. Fans, for some reason, jumped to the conclusion that Fillion was going to be playing a character named Arm Fall Off Boy, but that’s not the case. During a recent appearance on SiriusXM, Fillion was asked about that rampant fan speculation, and he elaborated:
That was never a comic I really dived into, so I didn't really know who that was that they were talking about, and it certainly wasn't the name I was reading in the script. So, I just said, 'Yeah, yeah, go for it. Whatever you guys think is great, so long as you're not asking—' It's so secret. It's so super, duper secret.
Nathan Fillion was more than happy to allow DC fans to take that rumor and run with it, because as he points out, that was not the name of the character he was playing, according to the script in his hands. However, in the same interview, Fillion adds that you get to see only a small portion of the screenplay, and most everything it blacked out, in some way, shape or form, so he has very little to share even if he could!
And he really doesn’t want to. Nathan Fillion went on to admit that he’s a terrible liar, and if DC fans cornered him at a party or on the street, he’d eventually crack under their passionate line of inquiry. He said:
I start to sweat a little bit when people start getting close to what I would consider something that’s actually accurate. I’m the worst liar.
Now you know, folks. If you run into Nathan Fillion, start peppering him with the names of Suicide Squad characters, and see if he cracks.
The Suicide Squad comes out next year, and is expected to be a standalone adventure for the members of the team. We don’t know what they are going after in the movie, but the cast is star-studded. In addition to Margot Robbie and Nathan Fillion, James Gunn is bringing Viola Davis, Joel Kinnaman and Jai Courtney back into the fold, joined by John Cena, Idris Elba, David Dastmalchian, Taika Waititi, Pete Davidson, Peter Capaldi and more.
It’s going to be a show. See it in theaters when it drops on August 6, 2021.
