Suicide Squad: Joker Featurette Released

Warner Brothers and DC Films have released a new Joker-centric featurette in promotion of this weekend's release of Suicide Squad.

"As soon as I heard the word 'Joker' I knew that I was going to have to dive really deep and go to a place I had never gone before," Joker actor Jared Leto explains before adding, "He's an iconic legend."

"Joker is the best known villain in western fiction," says Suicide Squad director David Ayer. "The trick was to respect the legacy of the character yet, at the same time, reinvent him. Jared pulled that high wire act off."

Leto takes on the Joker role for the first time since the much acclaimed performance by Heath Ledger in 2008's The Dark Knight. So far, critic reviews mostly appreciate Leto's performance, though not the film as a whole. Many claim that Leto's Joker was underutilized and more of the character would have been a welcome addition to the film.

It feels good to be bad…Assemble a team of the world's most dangerous, incarcerated Super Villains, provide them with the most powerful arsenal at the government's disposal, and send them off on a mission to defeat an enigmatic, insuperable entity. U.S. intelligence officer Amanda Waller has determined only a secretly convened group of disparate, despicable individuals with next to nothing to lose will do. However, once they realize they weren't picked to succeed but chosen for their patent culpability when they inevitably fail, will the Suicide Squad resolve to die trying, or decide it's every man for himself?

Suicide Squad hits theaters August 5, 2016.