Worthington Is Dan Dare

Variety confirmed last month that man-of-the-moment Sam Worthington has been cast as Dan Dare.

I call that a fail.

Dare is a British institution. Our answer to Buck Rogers or Flash Gordon, throughout much of the 1950s/1960s he was our most famous and popular comicbook character, and influenced many of the top writers and artists working today.

As i said in an earlier post on the subject, the character is more-or-less the stereotypical stiff-upper-lipped RAF officer type... the sort of character that would have been played by Michael Redgrave or Roger Moore or one of those guys back in the day, and should be played by the likes of Michael Fassbender or Ralph Fiennes today.

Sam Worthington is just wrong.

Also it's like casting an Australian as James Bond y'know?

And more importantly i have seen most of Worthington's movies, and it pains me to say that he seems to be totally lacking in charisma and/or personality. I mean he is like a walking prop or something.

And yet people keep casting the guy.

Meh.

Apparently the new movie will be based on the recent Virgin miniseries by Garth Ennis and Gary Erskine, which in itself is less than promising. I mean it was a nice little series with some gorgeous artwork, but it wasn't very representative of the character and seems like an odd choice on which to base a relaunch. It's a little bit like relaunching the Batman franchise and using the Dark Knight Returns as the foundation.

Anyway, between this and the casting and the fact that the new movie is being produced by the folks behind the awful Clash Of The Titans remake, i am not filled with confidence. Of course i could be wrong and this could turn out to be the bestest movie ever... but i won't hold my breath.

Which is a shame as i have wanted to see a Dan Dare movie since forever.