Suicide Squad: Killer Croc is 'one of the baddest criminals', says Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje

David Ayer-directed Suicide Squad will see a number of dangerous villains who will be fighting to save the world. One of the worst criminals to join the squad will be Killer Croc, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, who plays the role, has said.

Killer Croc will be a "fully-fledged criminal" when the film begins, Akinnuoye-Agbaje said. In the movie, the criminal, like most of the squad's members, could have their own backstories to tell in relation to Ben Affleck's Dark Knight.

"At the time you meet him in this film, he's a fully-fledged criminal," the actor told ComingSoon. "He's really one of the baddest criminals known to be roaming in Gotham, hence his lockup in Arkham. He's tangled with the Batman and here he is amongst these other foes. He's very much a formidable force at the time that you meet him."

Talking about how he prepared for the role, he said he did a great deal of research and also watched Batman: The Animated Series. Akinnuoye-Agbaje explained that it took about five hours for a team of special effects make-up artists to get things right and transform himself into the scaly criminal.

"I looked at all of it," he said. "I went back to the young Waylon Jones. The animated series. I had my own take, too. I researched cannibalism. I actually went out and watched real crocodiles, too. We incorporated some of the real life fight techniques that crocodiles do when they kill their prey. The death roll."

"The head and shoulders are prosthetic that were glued onto my face and then the body down was painted," Akinnuoye-Agbaje explains. "It took about five hours to do, but it was something that was a challenge that I was up for because I wanted to set a new standard for what can be done with prosthetics. We could have easily CGI'd this, but David [Ayer] was insistent on their being an actor to bring out the soul of the character. It gave me an opportunity to show what I could do with prosthetics."

The movie opens in US theatres on 3 August.