Before we all went on our merry way on Friday we were busy discussing the mostly negative feedback targeted at poor Ben Affleck for his casting in the sequel for Man of Steel. (He's going to be Batman, for those of you who've been residing under a nice cosy rock.)
While most of us were all like 'dafuuuuuq?' and 'he's a way better filmmaker than an actor and he should just accept it and move on' and 'for real? The guy who starred in Gigli? He's Batman, HE'S Batman?', other (nicer) people decided to give him the BENefit of the doubt (*claps at her own attempted joke*) and the likes of Joss Whedon expressed their genuine excitement at the news on Twitter.
"Affleck'll crush it. He's got the chops, he's got the chin -- just needs the material. Affleck & Cavill toe to toe -- I'm in" said the Avengers 2 helmer.
He has a point, if the material's there then Ben could well be the man for the job. He certainly won't be outshined by Henry Cavill; yeah, he's hot, but he's a little plank-like.
In similar news, we've learned today that the Oscar winning Affleck has decided to pull out of his next two directorial outings, Tell No One, and The Stand, which is a bit crap for fans of his recent work. Tell No One was fantastic the first time round (the French one), and with Argo, The Town and Gone Baby Gone all equally as enjoyable and impressive, we're quite sure he'd have struck gold again with what's already a compelling story.
Was winning the Oscar enough for Ben? Will his desire to direct wane now that he's achieved what most people strive towards, their whole lives, and return to acting in a big way to redeem himself fully so that we'd never ever refer to Gigli again? Perhaps.
Rumour has it he's signed on not only to do Batman once but for several movies (as well directing the much discussed Justice League movie).
One thing's for sure, Ben and his chin are certainly worth following and surprisingly unpredictable.
