Despite the original Suicide Squad being a massive box office success, it was a critical failure and definitely struggled in the story department. Now, with David Ayer nowhere to be found on the upcoming sequel, James Gunn looks to take the second movie in a new direction with a lot of new characters, a better story, and something that may more closely resemble its source material. Obviously Gunn has proven himself with the Guardians of the Galaxy movies and is attempting to do the same for Suicide Squad. Jai Courtney recently commented and said the upcoming movie is a breakaway and will move away from what we saw from Ayer's release which was toiled with relentlessly by studio heads at Warner Bros.. There have been some minor rumblings of a director's cut of Suicide Squad but nothing has been set in stone quite yet.
Courtney said (when speaking with Collider) that part two is a type of reset for the franchise and is not a "strict sequel" which quite obviously means that Gunn is attempting to refuel and reboot the premise behind the Suicide Squad:
"It’s a big-a-- movie again, as was the first. It’s cool to see a bunch of new characters and characters [Gunn] plucked from the depths of the canon, which is cool and just kind of different and interesting. James like creatures and monsters and things as well. I felt like there was an injection of that kind of stuff with this take on it. It’s very funny. It’s what you’ve come to expect from this kind of film. People are going to have a great time with it. it’s sad to see some of my cast mates not involved, but I’m so thrilled to welcome a whole bunch more in. And I think it frees up the direction this franchise can take. It cracked things open in a way that we now won’t know what to expect from the next time. That’s cool for something like Suicide Squad. It’s not necessarily even a strict sequel, is the truth. It’s different, man, but people are gonna have a ball with it. I hope it’s massively successful."
-CG