Having already confirmed what everyone knew by admitting there’s going to be no shortage of Marvel Cinematic Universe collaborators joining him in making the jump over to the DCU, we can expect the next decade of film and television projects to be loaded up with the James Gunn‘s nearest and dearest.
In a cruel twist of fate, though, an actor who’s been a close friend of Gunn’s for well over a decade ended up being rejected for a DC role in a project that was ditched by Warner Bros. and sold off to a rival company. Michael Rosenbaum was recently – and very briefly – seen returning as Martinex in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, but not even his connections to the boss could land him the title role in animated series Batman: Caped Crusader, as he revealed on his Inside of You podcast.
“We had another audition, remember? The Batman series… It was J.J. Abrams and Bruce Timm who created Justice League: Unlimited. It got just axed, but I remember going for a callback with him and everybody. And you know, I think my Batman was really good. I think they were really happy with Batman, but the Bruce Wayne, I don’t think they were happy with. I could tell.”
As well as playing Lex Luthor for seven seasons of Smallville, Rosenbaum is also a regular contributor to the DC Animated Universe, but not even those comic book credentials could secure him the part of the Dark Knight in the show that was ultimately shipped off to Prime Video instead.
That being said, you’d be foolish to bet against him popping up in live-action given his strong ties to the current co-CEO.