Scratch Christian Bale for the moment. It’s Javier Bardem who has been offered Roland Deschain’s guns, according to Deadline Hollywood Daily.
Bardem has not accepted the role (we have to stress that), but DHD says “there’s a high level of enthusiasm that they’ve got their cowboy.” So unless things really break down in negotiations, it’s likely to be Bardem.
Well, they did say we’d know within the week. One point to Universal!
I’m disappointed it wasn’t Viggo Mortensen, but I like Bardem a lot. I have no doubt he’ll be a fantastic Roland, even if he’s never, ever who I saw as the gunslinger,but perhaps that’s best. It helps define the book and the film/tv series as it’s own thing. It’s going to be pretty exciting to see Bardem in a sweeping genre epic as opposed to his usual dramatic and stern stuff.
You know who I always imagined as Roland when I read through the books a few years ago? Edward Norton. Sounds crazy, I know but….imagine it.
Bardem’ll be fine though. I would’ve preferred Viggo too. But this will almost certainly be a disaster, so who cares?
Hmmm. I never read Roland with a Spainish accent when I was addicted to the books. I’d much prefer Viggo in the role. Still, it’s a shame that Clint Eastwood isn’t thirty years younger.
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Roland is described often as having washed-out blue eyes, not brown. And he was supposed to be more like Clint Eastwood than anyone. Mortensen should be it, but I’d go for Bale over Bardem.
…But who knows? I’ll hope for the best and see what happens.
Eye color? Well, let’s hope that the Hollywood fx companies can marshall their forces and come up with some radical new technology that will allow them to digitally alter Bardem’s eye color. Or buy him a pair of colored contact lenses.
Wolverine was also supposed to be 5’3 and not 6 plus but that worked out just fine. Bardem is a quality actor so we know at least his role will be worth watching in this.
To be fair, a lot of people still don’t feel they’ve gotten a real representation of Wolverine on screen as much as a really pissed off Logan.
I’m not sure it matters much – the first four books would make for potentially great movies (the trek across the desert, traveling through Lud, and Wizards and Glass in its entirety). But, Howard’s films always come off as competently made but very flat, he seems like an odd choice for the series. And, the bigger overall problem is that you’re dealing with a series that starts off strongly and finishes poorly. After King was hit by the van I think he panicked to finish the series – the drop off from Wizards and Glass to Wolves of the Calla is stunning (nothing actually happens to advance the story in Calla, and the ending with the Dr. Doom robot attack is definitely the nail in the coffin for the entire series).