4) Prometheus
How to play an android that wants to be human? That’s the challenge Fassbender faced when he took the part of Prometheus‘ David, a machine that thinks (and schemes) like a person, but is fundamentally a piece of high-tech equipment. It’s a part Fassbender went out of his way to prepare for – he learned to move like Greg Louganis, and act like Bowie, Bogarde, and O’Toole – and it resulted in one of his most paradoxically alive and vibrant performances.
What’s so brilliant about Fassbender’s interpretation of David is how he brings a vanity, sadism, and Machiavellian craftiness to a part that isn’t even defined particularly clearly on the page. Only rarely are actors praised for impressing in sci-fi movies, but critics went out of their way to laud Fassbender in Prometheus; maybe it’s because he walked away with this one, still managing to stand out amidst all the film’s big ideas and extraterrestrial mayhem.