Henry Cavill, star of Showtime’s The Tudors, will wear the “S” in the latest superhero update
Warner Bros. announced today that Henry Cavill, star of Showtime’s Henry VIII drama ‘The Tudors’ has been pegged as the next Superman in the new Zack Snyder directed incarnation of the “Man of Steel.” Cavill, the 27-year-old Brit who is best known for his work in period pieces, was chosen over a list of up-and-coming actors to don the cape and play both Superman, and his bookish alter ego, Clark Kent.
After it was reported last October that Snyder would helm the new project, and that Christopher Nolan would produce, The Hollywood Reporter is saying Nolan sat down with the studio in December to mull over possible names, including Matthew Goode, The Social Network’s Armie Hammer, ‘True Blood’ actor Joe Manganiello, and Colin O’Donaghue, the Irish actor who is currently starring alongside Anthony Hopkins in the priestly thriller The Rite. Front runner honors were given to Goode, another Englishman, based on his previous work with Snyder on the Watchmen adaptation, but as of today Cavill is in, and everybody else is out.
Now, how does this news bode for the struggling franchise? Bryan Singer’s Superman Returns also went with a relative unknown in Brandon Routh, which we actually thought was a good choice, however, Singer had no clue what he was doing, and the movie just ending up being, well…..boring. News of Snyder and Nolan being attached to this one is fantastic, based on their already well-established success in the world of comic book adaptations, but looking at their previous work (300, Watchmen, the new Batman franchise), they’re all dark in tone, and paints our superheroes as heroic, but flawed. Superman is classically the world’s most perfect example of ‘man,’ so it’ll be interesting to see how the director and producer will flesh this one out. That, and the fact that a roundup of Brits were interviewed (and one cast) for America’s favorite protector, leads us to think we might be in for a different kind of superhero than we’re used to. We’ll just have to wait for the screen shots to start rolling in, but in the meantime, Snyder has Sucker Punch coming out this March, which may or may not give us clues as to what the next Lois Lane might look like…
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