By Creative Media Times

Jaume Collet-Serra, who scored a hit last summer after directing the Blake Lively film The Shallows, has emerged as frontrunner to helm Warner Bros’ Suicide Squad 2, Deadline reports.

The past few months, it seemed that the studio was pursuing a few big names to helm the sequel, including Mel Gibson and David S. Goyer. So Collet-Serra is a bit of surprising choice. “The Shallows”, however, proved to be a profitable hit last summer, grossing $119 million worldwide on a modest $17 million budget, and was generally well received by critics.

Stepping aside is David Ayer, who wrote and directed the original film. Although the DCEU’s antihero film was panned by critics last year, “Squad” was a global success, grossing $745,600,054 million worldwide. This left little doubt about the sequel being green lit, and as well as a spin-off based on fan favorite Harley Quinn, tentatively “Gotham City Sirens”, with Margot Robbie reprising her role and which David Ayer set to direct.

The Spanish film director has been busy; he recently helmed “The Commuter” starring Liam Neeson, an action thriller set for release early next year. Neeson and the director are frequent collaborators, having previously worked together on action thrillers “Unknown” (2011), “Non-Stop” (2014) and “Run All Night” (2015).

Suicide Squad sequel currently have no official release date.