Batman/Bruce Wayne Casting Thread

[IcedOver]

Regarding the whole race switch idea, Batman being white doesn't need to be justified by saying he's a WASP or old money or whatever (and predictably, those descriptors chosen for describing whites often have negative connotations). Batman's white, Peter Parker's white, Superman has white/European features, what have you. That needs to be respected. The idea of "just another white guy" being boring is offensive.

White characters don't exist to be replaced by non-whites either on the page or in live action. We've had enough instances of "swapping" to act as pacifiers in the mouths of screaming SJWs who don't even care about comics or their characters, and more on the way; it doesn't need to extend to some of the most popular and long-standing fictional characters of the past century. Would anyone suggest Ryan Gosling for Black Panther, Michael Keaton for Shaft, Will Ferrell for Mr. Miyagi, or John Travolta for Madea?

 

[Eddie Dean]

ot oh

 

[shauner111]

Well why not? (Sad face). If they plan on using him as a hired thug for flashy fight scenes working for an Eisenberg style villain then yeah I'll pass on him too. But Batman hasn't faced a true dark twin an inversion of who he is in his cinematic history. The closest was Bane and while Nolan and Hardy did a great job they never went all in on that angle. So if they pursue Deathstroke from THAT angle then I very much want him to be the main. Batman against someone as smart, resourceful and dangerous as he is but a someone as dedicated to being the best as Batman is except Slade is about taking lives while Batman is about saving them. They can even compare and contrast their effect on their families. Slade and Bruce are similar in how they treat people around them. So you get a detective film, action,Bat family and emotional crutch all in one film.

Because Deathstroke is not a Batman villain, he's played by a subpar actor, and there are better BATMAN villains (not DCEU crossover villains) that deserve to be in these new Reeves films more than Slade. He will have his shot with his own movie and a possible Suicide Squad or Justice League sequel as a part of the Legion of Doom.

It's time for a serious and accurate version of the Riddler and Penguin. Black Mask, whoever. Batman has been physically challenged enough in Rises from Bane, in BvS with Superman AND Doomsday, and in Justice League featuring physical confrontations with the likes of Aquaman (briefly), Superman (again) and then Steppenwolf (plus his parademons). Enough with the physical threats. It's time for a mental threat.

Buy Bye Deathstroke. Good riddance.

 

[Astro13Zombie]

https://www.google.com/amp/comicbook.com/dc/amp/2017/11/17/batman-jake-gyllenhaal-how-he-would-play/

 

[C Prometheus]

The stuff about Fincher makes me think we're getting Riddler as a main villain with some mob bosses sprinkled in on the side.

I dunno. We've seen Riddler in a movie before and the article mentions looking at villains we haven't gotten before in previous Batman movies.

Imagine a Fincher-esque Court of Owls type movie?

 

[David H.]

If Fincher did Riddler I’d hope he’d be more Robert Graysmith than Zodiac.

 

[Eddie Dean]

But Robert Graysmith is Batman!

 

[Sawyer]

TLDR; Gyllenhaal has been on standby for months, potentially as a leveraging tactic to get Affleck to commit. Ben's not coming back now, so Jake is the frontman.

He'll be playing the same Batman, surrounded by the same bat-universe cast we've seen on film already. No story to explain the recast it seems, they're just moving forward. Tone and lore will take a lot of influence from gritty crime noir, particularly Fincher's works.


...I didn't want any association with this shared universe, but I guess I can just overlook it.

Granted, I have yet to see JL, so I can't really speak with much authority on this, but at the moment, I'm somewhere in the middle. I don't want it removed from the shared universe, but I wouldn't mind it operating as if it was, if that makes any sense. Let all the films be Wonder Woman. With the exception of the email stuff, that movie was completely solo and with the eye completely fixed on that character and her corner of the universe.

For the love of God, stick with that. Isolate them from one another. Let the solos be solo. Ensure that they can work on their own, and even if they don't, at least you aren't also endangering half a dozen other properties along with it. And then when you've gained some sort of stability and found your groove, then you can start talking about letting GI Joe and Han Solo mingle together in the toy box. And only then.

No Justice League in the immediate future and certainly no Zack Snyder. Change the ****ing locks if you have to.

 

[Astro13Zombie]

Granted, I have yet to see JL, so I can't really speak with much authority on this, but at the moment, I'm somewhere in the middle. I don't want it removed from the shared universe, but I wouldn't mind it operating as if it was, if that makes any sense. Let all the films be Wonder Woman. With the exception of the email stuff, that movie was completely solo and with the eye completely fixed on that character and her corner of the universe.

For the love of God, stick with that. Isolate them from one another. Let the solos be solo. Ensure that they can work on their own, and even if they don't, at least you aren't also endangering half a dozen other properties along with it. And then when you've gained some sort of stability and found your groove, then you can start talking about letting GI Joe and Han Solo mingle together in the toy box. And only then.

No Justice League in the immediate future and certainly no Zack Snyder. Change the ****ing locks if you have to.

That’s definitely what it sounds like we’ll be getting with The Batman and I’m happy about it.

I can’t see any sort of forced shared universe thing happening in aquaman
either.

 

[terry78]

They'll eventually have to deal with darkseid but it can be on hiatus for a minute.

 

[shauner111]

I dunno. We've seen Riddler in a movie before and the article mentions looking at villains we haven't gotten before in previous Batman movies.

Imagine a Fincher-esque Court of Owls type movie?

It said new villains? Don't remember.

 

[Loden Greatstorm]

It's a casting speculation thread, Vision. That's all we're doing.

Hopefully we get some official word from WB soon.

 

[Web-Head]

Poor Jake

 

[Loden Greatstorm]

Poor Jake

Why poor Jake?

 

[Web-Head]

Why poor Jake?

He's my favorite actor and I don't want him in this cinematic universe. He'd make a tremendous Bruce Wayne though.

 

[THE WOLF]

Wes Bentley is another suggestion

 

[Loden Greatstorm]

He's my favorite actor and I don't want him in this cinematic universe. He'd make a tremendous Bruce Wayne though.

He would own the role. I hope it happens.

 

[Web-Head]

He would own the role. I hope it happens.

I'm not sure how I'd feel about it. I'm disappointed he wasn't able to play Peter Parker in Spider-Man 2 but I don't necessarily want him in a comic book role.

 

[Omegabat]

Because Deathstroke is not a Batman villain, he's played by a subpar actor, and there are better BATMAN villains (not DCEU crossover villains) that deserve to be in these new Reeves films more than Slade. He will have his shot with his own movie and a possible Suicide Squad or Justice League sequel as a part of the Legion of Doom.

It's time for a serious and accurate version of the Riddler and Penguin. Black Mask, whoever. Batman has been physically challenged enough in Rises from Bane, in BvS with Superman AND Doomsday, and in Justice League featuring physical confrontations with the likes of Aquaman (briefly), Superman (again) and then Steppenwolf (plus his parademons). Enough with the physical threats. It's time for a mental threat.

Buy Bye Deathstroke. Good riddance.

Well I cant deny the point about the actor but better villains like Black Mask,Penguin and Riddler ? Lol . Accuracy concerning Riddler and Penguin will always be an issue because both villains fall under the loser types. Its why Gotham's Penguin is a good looking pretty boy, its why Tom King had Riddler become a hunk in his latest story. You'd be hard pressed to find good "accurate" depictions of these characters in the modern era because writers are just flat out ashamed of these characters. An accurate Riddler is a weak unintimidating wimp who doesn't kill and Black Mask is a rubbish character outright and has been from day one. If you want Penguin and Riddler thats fine but DC has been abandoning everything that made these characters accurate for a while now.

Deathstroke isn't just a physical villain. Again if you go by accuracy then an accurate Deathstroke is smarter than Riddler and has more resources than Penguin and there will be fights and physical challenges in the film even without Deathstroke thats a given. So like I said he offers the complete package and I wouldn't say he's gone until we get a proper announcement.

 

[C Prometheus]

It said new villains? Don't remember.

Yup. Here's the relevant section.

My final question had to do with what they're hearing about the script, which is still currently in development. Here's what my source said of the current state of things:

"Reeves is going to do some stuff influenced in crime film and deep Batman mythos."

This seems to go hand-in-hand with what Reeves said a few months back, about his film being more of a noir, detective story. What's new and interesting is the idea of Reeves delving deep into the mythos. Up until now, the films have all tackled fairly mainstream villains: Joker, Bane, Ra's Al Ghul, Penguin, Scarecrow, Poison Ivy, Mister Freeze, Two-Face, and The Riddler. If Reeves is going deep, this could mean we get to finally meet cinematic versions of characters like Black Mask, Victor Zsasz, or Hush.

I've also been told by folks I trust that Reeves is looking at David Fincher films like Se7en, Zodiac, and The Game. He's really high on this idea of a gritty crime drama, with the World's Greatest Detective on the case.

http://www.elfanboy.com/blog/el-fan...tt-reeves-the-batman-starring-jake-gyllenhall

To be fair, the "new villains" bit seems to potentially be speculation from the author and the article also mentions the possibility of including Margot Robbie and Jared Leto as Harley and Joker to help establish that GyllenBat is still the same guy as Batfleck. So it's possible we see someone like Penguin or Riddler again.

 

[Loden Greatstorm]

I'm not sure how I'd feel about it. I'm disappointed he wasn't able to play Peter Parker in Spider-Man 2 but I don't necessarily want him in a comic book role.

Time shall tell.

 

[Aximili86]

To quote you Dude nails the "cold, driven, focused, lonely damaged guy" vibe though.
That's not All of Bruce Wayne though. What about compassionate? Warmth? I don't think Caviezel has much range and his VOICE is always the exact same monotone delivery. I would hate his casting way more than Affleck.

Ehh. Not to beat a dead horse here (as the Gyllenhaal stuff is sounding more and more legit, I'm sure there's 0% chance of a Caviezel casting here), but the "can't do compassionate" thing is a little weird. :P Take Person Of Interest as an example again, character's out there everyday inserting himself into people's lives so as to protect them from closeby, sticking up for the little guy, helping people out of personal binds. Seems pretty...compassionate/warm to me, haha.

The voice thing is fair though. Yeah, I haven't heard him do a gravelly Bale/Affleck style movie-Bats voice before. Might potentially work as more of a calmer Conroy type of vibe though, which'd be pretty new for the movies.

These newer reports on the Jake stuff are interesting though. That's probably the way to go, just rip off the band-aid quickly, don't even try to play up that this is Affleck's same guy (but don't go out of your way to nix/condemn that take either), just move on, don't say anything, Gyllenhaal's take just...is. It'll be weird for a first movie, but the general audience will get on board quickly if the new take is good. But trying to pass off a Jake take on the character as the same guy, having callbacks to BvS/Suicide Squad/JLA is going to be a mistake. Don't publically trash Affleck or the Snyder movies, but just...yeah, move on, life goes on, Jake's Bats now.

Honestly, just like Keaton to Kilmer to Clooney. They're supposed to be the same guy, but you can take it another way too if you want to separate the Burton/Shumacher movies, just keep on rollin' things forward without acknowledging jack about the switch. It is what it is.

 

[Sawyer]

Gyllenhaal would be a perfect Batman.


So watch WB go and cast Mark Wahlberg.

WB has their share of issues, but I don't think casting is one of them. Or at least it's not close to the top of the list.

 

[Greens]

They'll eventually have to deal with darkseid but it can be on hiatus for a minute.

Whedon went out of his way to remove almost every mention of Darkseid from JL. I don't think he's showing up soon.

 

[Tg11]

If Ben Affleck is done as Batman especially after Justice League and he is replaced then who could play the role of Bruce Wayne/Batman?

My top 5 choices:

1- Armie Hammer
2- Jake Gyllenhaal
3- Ryan Gosling
4- Jon Hamm
5- Luke Evans