I once ballsed up a politics paper at University by contrasting different political views of two different Chinese politicians without realising it was the same politician spelt differently. Now I do it for a living. It's such a lazy form of journalism, to take something someone said one day and then contrasting it with something they said a few years ago for giggles. But, you know, The Daily Show gets away with it, so why not.
Mark Millar in 2013:
can only see @RichardDreyfuss as the main antagonist in Jupiter's Legacy & I NEVER picture actors when I'm writing my books.
Mark Millar talking to GQ Robert Downing Jr playing Iron Man, 2010
I think other people could have done it too. Tom Cruise has got the manic craziness. You could see him as Tony Stark. Likewise Johnny Depp, who I had in mind when I was writing The Ultimates.
Also, JG Jones in 2008 talking Wanted.
Were the resemblances of Wesley and Fox to Eminem and Halle Berry intentional?
They were very intentional. I hope I don't get sued! Mark has the artist base his characters on actors. He pretends he's making a movie.
Of course, I got involved in that whole shenanigans. Millar also told GQ
"What happened was that some online gossip guy said, "Millar pretended to Universal that Eminem wanted to play the lead role, sold the movie and then it turned out it was all made up." Universal work with Eminem. They would know! What happened was the agent that I had at the time knew Eminem's agent and had said, "He's looking for a movie to do and he's expressed interest in Wanted." And that was it. But the story went out on the Sunday Times saying, "Eminem considering playing the lead in Wanted."
I think that gossip guy must have been me. Mind you a couple of years' previously to the GQ interview, Eminem's manager had said
"Some time in late '04 or maybe '05 it was brought to my attention that the main character in the comic book, Wesley Gibson, bears a striking resemblance to one of my prominent superstar clients. Shortly thereafter, we heard via my client's agents that the guy that created Wanted was running around Hollywood claiming that he had Eminem attached to play the lead in the film adaptation of the series. After being peeved at the manner in which this guy attempted to end-around Em's possible involvement in the film (really, you are just going to draw a character that looks exactly like him and just assume that's going to cause him to want to be in the movie?) we really didn't consider getting involved. That's just not the way we do business and we left it at that.
…Here is an article that pretty much gets the story right except for the director claiming that it was his choice to not cast Em. It actually just wasn't an option available to him.
That article? An IGN reworking of the Lying In The Gutters story that I believe Millar referred to.
It's just tired, lazy journalism on my part. Doesn't mean it can't be fun though. And it's also worth tipping the hat to Mark Millar who still has the ability to turn the media on a sixpence and should be lauded for it. We could do with a hundred of him.