Long before Suicide Squad debuted in theaters, confidence was high in the Warner Bros. camp as the studio quietly assembled plans for a sequel, not to mention that Harley Quinn-fronted spinoff.
Those plans took a major blow days before David Ayer’s anti-hero feature arrived, though, when early reviews painted Suicide Squad as a calamitous mess and, perhaps most disappointing of all, a wasted opportunity. But the box office numbers said otherwise and after pulling in a whopping $745 million, Suicide Squad 2 is now brewing in post-production.
Already, we know that Jared Leto, Margot Robbie and Will Smith are all back on board to reprise their respective roles – Joker, Harley Quinn and Deadshot – and it seems they’ll be joined by a few more familiar faces as well: Captain Boomerang, Rick Flag and Diablo. Yes, you read that last one right. Diablo will be back for the sequel. Or at least, it sure looks like he will.
Taking to Instagram earlier today, Joel Kinnaman (Flag) shared the below photo, which came accompanied with the caption, “Brendan whipping us back into shape. Jay puked.” Seen alongside the actor are both Jai Courtney (Boomerang) and Jay Hernandez, who plays Diablo. Granted, that doesn’t necessarily 100% confirm that he’ll be in Suicide Squad 2, but it does seem very likely.
It’s important to remember, too, that Hernandez has teased a return in the past, despite his character’s death in the first film, and it’d certainly be great to see more of him. After all, Diablo was one of the unexpected highlights in what was, by all accounts, a fairly mediocre movie.Â
Let’s be honest, no one was expecting such a low-grade villain from the comics to be one of Suicide Squad‘s best characters, but Jay Hernandez offers a great performance as the tragic hero who can’t control his pyrotechnic powers. He even got a heroic sacrifice where he goes against Enchantress’ monstrous brother and reveals himself to be a big fire demon. Wait, what?
Yes, even comic book fans weren’t be able to explain this one, as the character doesn’t possess such an ability in the source material. As he can go toe to toe with Incubus though, we can assume that El Diablo’s true form is another ancient entity, like the Enchantress family, which means he very well could still be alive.
Chalk that up as speculation for now, as Warner Bros. has yet to make any kind of official announcement, but all the signs certainly point to us seeing more of Diablo in Suicide Squad 2 – wouldn’t you say?
