The Top 10 Worst Comic Book Casting Mistakes (Spike.com)

[[A]]

I preferred Gyllenhaal to Holmes.

Anyone with a brain would.

 

[Hound55]

I think they tried to make Rachel a little more "spunky" in TDK. But it failed. She just came off annoying.

Maggie is a great actress, it was just the character wasn't written that well IMO.

Agreed 100%... but I think a fair portion of why it failed was Maggie G's delivery of the lines.

 

[Hound55]

Anyone with a brain would.

I have a strong desire to upload the line:

Dawes: Look, give us the money and we'll talk about making a deal

looped 20-odd times onto youtube and chuck it up here... Fortunately for you I'm a lazy man... very lazy.

 

[El Payaso]

Delivery for one thing...

I don't know about you but her delivery of the line, in the interrogation of Lau:

Dawes: Look, give us the money and we'll talk about making a deal

Is the most cringeworthy delivered line in either Begins or TDK and the rest of her work isn't much better...

I must have seen that movie 6 or 7 times and everytime I hear that line I cringe at the delivery. Every. Single. Time. Not only is it the most cringeworthy line its probably the worst aspect, the most obvious flaw, in two quality movies.

Her dialogue with Bruce and Harvey, which is pretty much her only dialogue in the film, was woeful and it was sweet relief that the Joker's explosives offed Maggie G mid-sentence before it could further detract from her career...

Nobody's saying that Maggie was excellent.

But Katie Holmes' mere presence ruined the whole cast's level. Maggie was merely a weak spot.

 

[Hound55]

Personally I view things as the other way around... to the extent that nothing major sticks out in my mind in terms of what Katie Holmes did that REALLY bothered me in her role.

I could come up with a handful of really cringeworthy moments from Maggie G in TDK.

Yes, Katie Holmes mere name drops the reputation level of the entire cast down a peg or two... but the actual performance didn't particularly stand out in an overly negative way in my mind.

I also think she did ok with some more difficult dramatic lines than Maggie G had as well... and I say that as someone who FAR prefers Maggie Gyllanhal in general than Katie Holmes and her horrendous back catalogue which includes Mad Money, First Daughter and an incredibly unconvincing role in the horror/thriller Scientologists and My Marriage To Tom Cruise...

 

[Infinity9999x]

Reynolds and Murphy? Who the hell wrote this list?

 

[zeptron]

Geez what an idiot.

- Has this guy even read a Deadpool comic? Reynolds' performance was spot-on. It wasn't his fault Fox screwed it up by making him Barakapool.

- I do agree with Alba and Bosworth. Alba was only cast because she was an it-girl at the time. She was too young to play a scientist and definitely too young for Reed. She also only a couple months older Chris Evans. Same thing with Bosworth. She was only 22 when they filmed SR and she was playing someone who was in her 30s and the mother of a five year old. What was Singer thinking?

- Grammar as Beast? Regardless of what you thought of X3 his performance was excellent. His voice was perfect.

- I never really did like Dunst as MJ. If she already hadn't done three SM movies I would be up for a recast. But that'll probably just turn people off.

 

[gwynplaine]

Why isn't Jack Nicholson as the Joker in that list?
Great choice commercially, bad choice artistically IMO. But to each their own.

 

[Infinity9999x]

- Grammar as Beast? Regardless of what you thought of X3 his performance was excellent. His voice was perfect.

- I never really did like Dunst as MJ. If she already hadn't done three SM movies I would be up for a recast. But that'll probably just turn people off.

Agreed with Beast. And Dunst I'm more or less neutral on. Don't hate her, but don't love her. I certainly don't blame her for the horrible mess they made out of MJ's character, that the writing and direction, not her.

 

[BestGirl]

Why isn't Jack Nicholson as the Joker in that list?
Great choice commercially, bad choice artistically IMO. But to each their own.

Probably because he knocked it out of the park acting-wise. I will say that I can't understand the criteria for the list. Some of these people were genuinely poorly cast, but others just had parts that weren't written to the author's satisfaction.

 

[gwynplaine]

Probably because he knocked it out of the park acting-wise. I will say that I can't understand the criteria for the list. Some of these people were genuinely poorly cast, but others just had parts that weren't written to the author's satisfaction.

Fair enough, but when I look at the richness of his palette in movies like the passenger, cuckoo's nest, the shining, the last detail, 5 easy pieces, king of marvin gardens, carnal knowledge, Schmidt and many others, I thought he was a little one-note, but like I said to each their own and I respect everyone's opinion.

 

[VenomVsSpidey]

Why isn't Jack Nicholson as the Joker in that list?
Great choice commercially, bad choice artistically IMO. But to each their own.

I realize heath = joker, but damn..even to a guy like me...that's cold

 

[gwynplaine]

I realize heath = joker, but damn..even to a guy like me...that's cold

Lolt:.

 

[Ace of Knaves]

Ahhh man, Jack was awesome.

 

[[A]]

^ Jack was awesome! I always wondered what's that little stain in his neck..

Anyway, the thing is.. it was just the early beginning of comic book movies. I'm sure no one really cared about it as a genre--or took it seriously (especially Tim Burton). So Nicholson and others probably did it for the money (70% money, 30% fun) and just phoned it in (I think that's the right expression, heh). Still good, of course--but.. but..

 

[Ace of Knaves]

Yea it was basically just Jack...but on speed or something

 

[VenomVsSpidey]

Yea it was basically just Jack...but on speed or something

 

[Infinity9999x]

Yea it was basically just Jack...but on speed or something

Yeah, but hey, Jack on Speed probably isn't that different from the joker anyways.

 

[El Payaso]

Why isn't Jack Nicholson as the Joker in that list?

Probably because it's one of the best choices ever made.

Great choice commercially, bad choice artistically IMO. But to each their own.

Commercially was gold and artistically the man looks like the character and acts like the character.

^ Jack was awesome! I always wondered what's that little stain in his neck..

Jack's white make-up started staining the purple coat at one moment. Since there waas no time to get a new coat they decided to put purple paint over the white stain. The problem, was that Jack's neck got stained with the purple paint and even when they had more shots to choose from, the one that got into the film was considered the best.

 

[Heretic]

Jack was a horrible Joker in a bad film. I thought that when I first saw it in the theater, and still think it today.

Alba as Sue Storm, Garner as Elektra and Arnie as Mr Freeze all deserve to be there.

Murphy was great in his role and shouldn't be on the list. Reynolds shouldnt be blamed for his character being horrid.

Halle Berry should be banned from comic related films. I say kill Storm off in the first 5 minutes of the next film and move on.

Dunst as MJ was fine...but what ruined it was her public disgust for the franchise.This girl is firmly on the C-list in Hollywood, and is incapable of being in a successful movie not involving Peter Parker, yet she moans and complains every time they give her millions to do a job that funds her entire life. Fire her and replace her. I am convinced that Drag Me To Hell was a Mary Jane audition for it's lead actress.

 

[Ace of Knaves]

How was Jacks Joker horrible? How was Batman 89a bad film.

 

[VenomVsSpidey]

Probably because it's one of the best choices ever made.

Commercially was gold and artistically the man looks like the character and acts like the character.

Jack's white make-up started staining the purple coat at one moment. Since there waas no time to get a new coat they decided to put purple paint over the white stain. The problem, was that Jack's neck got stained with the purple paint and even when they had more shots to choose from, the one that got into the film was considered the best.

t:

 

[gwynplaine]

Probably because it's one of the best choices ever made.



Commercially was gold and artistically the man looks like the character and acts like the character.






Jack's white make-up started staining the purple coat at one moment. Since there waas no time to get a new coat they decided to put purple paint over the white stain. The problem, was that Jack's neck got stained with the purple paint and even when they had more shots to choose from, the one that got into the film was considered the best.

Not the way I see the character. But like I said before to each their own, I respect everyone's opinion and I don't want to start a polemic (specially with such a beloved performance, and cool and civil posters like the ones in this thread) .
That said, I thought Jack Torrance was a much better Joker than Jack Napier.

 

[El Payaso]

Not the way I see the character.

But it is the way character has been for decades in its most traditional sense.

Here Jack looks exactly the way Joker looked on his first apparition.

That said, I thought Jack Torrance was a much better Joker than Jack Napier.

Oh that was a very good approach, and Jack's Joker didn't lack of many Torrancisms. I'm sure that, 20 years later, they would have allowed him to go much further into the dark side the way blockbusters are today. Even so, for 1989, Jack's Joker was very violent and creepy for those days' allowed standards.

 

[gwynplaine]

But it is the way character has been for decades in its most traditional sense.

Here Jack looks exactly the way Joker looked on his first apparition.

Oh that was a very good approach, and Jack's Joker didn't lack of many Torrancisms. I'm sure that, 20 years later, they would have allowed him to go much further into the dark side the way blockbusters are today. Even so, for 1989, Jack's Joker was very violent and creepy for those days' allowed standards.

In the Joker's first two appearances, the character was based mostly on Conrad Veidt in "The Man who laughs" (my avy), he was skinny and really creepy and he was not smiling all the time. It's strange for me that someone would hire the greatest actor in the world (aka Jack Nicholson back then) and stick that horrible, restrictive make-up on his face, for me it's akin to getting the fastest runner in the world for a race and tying up one of his legs behind his back or something.
I believe that Jack (one of my favorite actors) was too old, too fat and a miscast ( once again, artistically, not commercially) and he was just doing Jack (Willem Dafoe, James Woods or Christopher Walken would have been a better fit imo), but I also agree that without B89, probably no TDK (my preferred take on the joker), so respect to Burton's film and your opinion.