At first I was like: "Ben Affleck as Batman? That's weird."
Because over the last few years he seems to have been making a concerted effort to transition from actor-very-few-people-take-seriously to director-that-lots-of-people-take-seriously. He's not the last person I would expect to jump into spandex for a high-profile popcorn movie role. That would be this guy:
But still, Affleck definitely doesn't fit the comic book movie casting rubric, a.k.a. an actor who's gained some attention for TV work
and/or a supporting
or guest role
in a popular film, but hasn't yet landed the lead in a major movie. Oh, and they're probably Australian or British.
The benefit of choosing a relative unknown is that the audience will have very few preconceived notions about the actor. Nobody really knew who Chris Hemsworth was before he was chosen, and now when they look at him, they see Thor. Ditto Henry Cavill and Superman. When people see Ben Affleck, they see... well, they see Ben Affleck. Or, judging by the Twitter response to his casting, they see:
The thing is, fucked up as WB/DC has been in regards to their superhero movies (y u no Wonder Woman?), they're not completely stupid. They knew the fan backlash would happen. They knew people would start screaming "Daredevil!" and "Gigli!"Weird as it may seem, the fact that Affleck is a counterintuitive choice makes me think there must be something about him, something about his approach to Batman, that made the casting people go
And look, I gave Zack Snyder a lot of shit for Man of Steel (review here). I stand by all of it. But the casting was not one of that movie's problems. From Cavill to Amy Adams to Michael Shannon to, in other movies, Jackie Earle Haley, Patrick Wilson, and Lena Headey, dude (usually) knows talent when he sees it. He just doesn't tend to do much with it.
A common argument against Affleck's casting is that he pretty much only plays variations of himself. And yeah, that's valid. When I look at him, I see Bruce Wayne, but I don't see Batman at all.
But let's give the dude a shot. We're so used to seeing Christopher Nolan/Christian Bale's Batman, who's so intense and... well...
...that it's been easy for me, for one, to lose track of Batman as an occasional billionaire playboy who dresses up in black latex to sneak around at night fighting crime. Not that I'm saying Snyder will go all Tim Burton caricature-esque for his version, or even that he should. What I am saying is that we just don't know what his approach to the character will be. Affleck might be perfect for it. Let's wait and see, at least until the first trailer. For all we know we could be like:
And anyway, speaking personally, Batman vs Superman or Man of Steel 2 or whatever it ends up being called is a Zack Snyder movie, so I probably won't like it anyway.
But when I do inevitably dislike it, I'm going to go out on a limb and say it won't be because of Affleck. Dude might not have the best range, but he's still a good actor.
So screw it. Now that I've moved from
to
let's have a dance party
Because over the last few years he seems to have been making a concerted effort to transition from actor-very-few-people-take-seriously to director-that-lots-of-people-take-seriously. He's not the last person I would expect to jump into spandex for a high-profile popcorn movie role. That would be this guy:
But still, Affleck definitely doesn't fit the comic book movie casting rubric, a.k.a. an actor who's gained some attention for TV work
and/or a supporting
or guest role
in a popular film, but hasn't yet landed the lead in a major movie. Oh, and they're probably Australian or British.
The benefit of choosing a relative unknown is that the audience will have very few preconceived notions about the actor. Nobody really knew who Chris Hemsworth was before he was chosen, and now when they look at him, they see Thor. Ditto Henry Cavill and Superman. When people see Ben Affleck, they see... well, they see Ben Affleck. Or, judging by the Twitter response to his casting, they see:
The thing is, fucked up as WB/DC has been in regards to their superhero movies (y u no Wonder Woman?), they're not completely stupid. They knew the fan backlash would happen. They knew people would start screaming "Daredevil!" and "Gigli!"Weird as it may seem, the fact that Affleck is a counterintuitive choice makes me think there must be something about him, something about his approach to Batman, that made the casting people go
And look, I gave Zack Snyder a lot of shit for Man of Steel (review here). I stand by all of it. But the casting was not one of that movie's problems. From Cavill to Amy Adams to Michael Shannon to, in other movies, Jackie Earle Haley, Patrick Wilson, and Lena Headey, dude (usually) knows talent when he sees it. He just doesn't tend to do much with it.
A common argument against Affleck's casting is that he pretty much only plays variations of himself. And yeah, that's valid. When I look at him, I see Bruce Wayne, but I don't see Batman at all.
But let's give the dude a shot. We're so used to seeing Christopher Nolan/Christian Bale's Batman, who's so intense and... well...
...that it's been easy for me, for one, to lose track of Batman as an occasional billionaire playboy who dresses up in black latex to sneak around at night fighting crime. Not that I'm saying Snyder will go all Tim Burton caricature-esque for his version, or even that he should. What I am saying is that we just don't know what his approach to the character will be. Affleck might be perfect for it. Let's wait and see, at least until the first trailer. For all we know we could be like:
And anyway, speaking personally, Batman vs Superman or Man of Steel 2 or whatever it ends up being called is a Zack Snyder movie, so I probably won't like it anyway.
But when I do inevitably dislike it, I'm going to go out on a limb and say it won't be because of Affleck. Dude might not have the best range, but he's still a good actor.
So screw it. Now that I've moved from
to
let's have a dance party
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