Unless something drastic changes in the near future, Henry Cavill’s tenure as the DCEU’s Superman is going to go down as one of the biggest wasted opportunities in the history of the comic book genre.
The actor has a huge legion of fans desperate for him to return, and the success of Netflix’s The Witcher has made him more popular than ever, but Warner Bros. either don’t know what to do with him, or don’t have much interest in having him suit up as the Big Blue Boy Scout again.
To put things into perspective, Cavill was announced to be headlining Zack Snyder’s Man of Steel way back in January 2011, and he’s made a mere three outings under the costume in the decade and change since, while he hasn’t stepped foot onto a DC Films set since Joss Whedon’s Justice League reshoots wrapped in the summer of 2017.
He retains a huge amount of support, but an interesting debate has erupted on social media, with fans arguing over whether or not the 39 year-old is too old to make a full-fledged comeback as Superman.
It’s a fairly ridiculous argument in theory, when he’s still one of the younger actors attached to play a marquee superhero. Robert Downey Jr. was older when he first kitted himself out as Iron Man, while Ryan Reynolds turns 46 this year and there’s still no sign of Deadpool 3 coming close to entering production.
Then again, it would appear new CEO David Zaslav has the future in mind, so maybe the new boss will want to skew younger when Superman flies again.