A report from the production of Supergirl describes competing edits of the same movie – an echo of Suicide Squad’s multiple cuts. When James Gunn co-founded DC Studios with Peter Safran in 2022, the Guardians Of The Galaxy writer-director pledged that the company’s slate of movies wouldn’t go into production without finished scripts. This was ... Supergirl | Behind-the-scenes report of competing edits sounds like Suicide Squad history repeating
A report from the production of Supergirl describes competing edits of the same movie – an echo of Suicide Squad’s multiple cuts.
When James Gunn co-founded DC Studios with Peter Safran in 2022, the Guardians Of The Galaxy writer-director pledged that the company’s slate of movies wouldn’t go into production without finished scripts. This was the reason, he said, that so many superhero films can fall short of expectations.
Evidence of this hard line in the sand emerged last year, when Gunn said that an unspecified DC Universe movie had been “killed” because it “was not going to be good.”
The sheer complexity of expensive studio movies still means that there can still be complications behind the scenes, however. As people both within the industry and outside it mull over exactly why Supergirl has struggled to connect with a mass audience, out comes a report from The Hollywood Reporter, which paints a portrait of creative tensions and competing edits behind the scenes.
Without rehashing that piece in detail, THR’s sources suggest that Gunn and director Craig Gillespie had differences of opinion over how, exactly, Supergirl’s story should be told. There’s not necessarily anything remarkable there.
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The problem appeared to arise when Supergirl was shown to preview audiences, and reactions were middling rather than ecstatic. DC Studios then responded by crafting its own cut, with new scenes written and shot around the middle of 2025. More than one editor took a pass at reworking the movie – there was Tatiana S Riegel, who worked with Gillespie in the past; then came Fred Raskin, a regular hire of James Gunn’s.
Eventually, two cuts emerged: Gillespie’s version, and one favoured by the studio, which was eleven minutes shorter. The studio version was preferred by test audiences, but only marginally; all the same, this was the cut that was put in cinemas this year.
It’s a remarkably similar scenario to the one that Suicide Squad found itself in the run up to its release in 2016. That film, written and directed by David Ayer, had an infamously difficult post-production in which its original editor left, and the studio, disquieted by Ayer’s dark 143 minute cut, ordered a new, less grim edit.
As with Supergirl, these two cuts – Ayers and the studio’s shorter, less disturbing one – were shown to test audiences. They weren’t overly thrilled by either. Extensive reshoots then took place, costing millions, and the film finally came out in August 2016.
Reviews were negative, and Ayer later tried to push for his cut of the film to be released (so far, he’s been unsuccessful).
Suicide Squad was part of the DC Extended Universe, which began with 2013’s Man Of Steel and had its share of highs and lows over the next decade. After Aquaman And The Lost Kingdom brought the era to a close in 2023, along came DC Studios and the DC Universe – a fresh slate of films kicked off by 2025’s Superman.
There may be new names and new executives at the top of these DC superhero movies, but the problems appear to remain the same. With studios investing tens of millions in these huge releases, the temptation to tinker with them becomes too great to ignore.
Now we’re left wondering – will we ever see Supergirl: The Gillespie Cut?
