Sure, writer/director James Gunn recently stated that one of his goals with The Suicide Squad was "to keep it alive, keep it visceral, and keep it real" — but let's not lose sight of the fact that he's also going to keep it playfully absurd. And a new IGN-premiered clip revealing Nathan Fillion's TDK drives that point home.
In the clip, the Suicide Squad is pinned down by a hail of gunfire on a beach. To attempt to get themselves out of the sticky situation TDK—aka The Detachable Kid—is deployed. Fillion's character proceeds to pop his arms off his body at the shoulder as if he was an action figure owned by a violent child. He then floats his arms over the soldiers shooting at his team and... starts mildly slapping their helmets and guns. Seeing this, Margot Robbie's Harley Quinn appropriately proclaims, "What the #$@&?!?"
It will hardly be the first time Fillion a completely ridiculous superhero for comedic effect, as anyone who's seen his portrayal of Captain Hammer in Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog or heard his various heroic voiceover roles (including Green Lantern on Robot Chicken) can confirm. Perhaps the casting of TDK was somewhat of a make-good from Gunn after he had to cut out Fillion's part in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2.
Alongside Daniela Melchoir's Ratcatcher 2, TDK is one of two original characters that Gunn created for this version of the Suicide Squad rather than pulling from DC Comics lore (though he does share abilities with the Legion of Super-Heroes reject Arm-Fall-Off-Boy). When we posted our character explainer that featured TDK, we had his death odds as "High." After watching the clip, we might want to bump that to "Extremely High" due to the complete non-threatening silliness on display. Would anyone be that shocked if he met an untimely demise mere seconds after this clip ends?
We'll have to wait till The Suicide Squad's August 6 release in theaters and on HBO Max to find out, but preemptive prayers up for TDK. Check out the clip below: