New BATMAN VS SUPERMAN rumours: Lex Luthor casting & description, Bruce Wayne's love interest, possible Arrow tie-in!

It seems that the rumour mill is a-turning today. We heard yesterday about how Lost actor Terry O’Quinn allegedly had a bald head in the race to play Superman’s nemesis, Lex Luthor, but today’s rumour takes that even further by giving us both a character and scene description. Plus, casting choices that could have serious ramifications for fans of a certain heartthrob archer.

These rumours come courtesy of ComicBookMovie, who haven’t exactly been the most accurate source when it comes to these things, so I’m just putting up this disclaimer that my manure-o-meter is dinging like crazy over here.

The rumour that’s triggering it the least is that Ben Affleck is set to read with various actresses this week to find Bruce Wayne’s love interest in the film. Apparently WB really want her to be an “African-American” woman, and that this will be a serious, long term commitment, as she even knows Bruce’s secret identity.

And before I hear spittle laden screams of affirmative acting casting, I have feeling that the character could perhaps be Jezebel Jet from Grant Morrison’s Batman run, which also helps to [COMIC BOOK SPOILER ALERT] lay the groundwork for her perhaps betraying Bruce eventually in the whole Black Glove saga.

Moving on to the bald villain side, according to these rumours, besides for Terry O’Quinn, The Following actor James Purefoy was apparently also on the list for Lex Luthor, however he “wanted absolutely nothing to do with it.”

Maybe he prefers the old “real estate scheme” Lex Luthor, because according to CBM, that is what this new Lex Luthor definitely won’t be. They claim that this version of the character will more closely resemble the alien hating one seen in Grant Morrison’s All Star Superman and that “Lex’s motivations will be rooted on his belief that Superman is not good for mankind.”

They say that this Lex will be “the pride of Metropolis. The people love him, he’s been helping out a lot. Even Lois thinks he’s a good guy initially. He is a very smart man and has a lot of charisma.” But on the sly, out of the public eye, he will also be dabbling in controversial “fringe science” involving Kryptonian tech.

They also give a short scene description, hinting at the mindset of this Lex.

In one particular scene, Lex will ask his LexCorp scientists if they can recreate Kryptonian armor. Lex says to them, “When the world realizes what he truly is, they will need someone to stand up to him.” When one of scientists ask if he is that someone, Lex replies, “Is there any other person who can?”

Now to be fair, none of these things are exactly curveball revelations when it comes to Lex Luthor – this has all been seen/done before in other mediums. However, the last bit of the rumour is a bit of a doozy.

Ever since CW’s Arrow hit it huge with fans (helped in no small amount by star Stephen Amell’s abdominal muscles), there have been calls for this new rebooted, more realistic version of Green Arrow to be included in the Warner Bros/DC movie fold. However it seems as if WB/DC wanted to create their own separate TV universe, as it was revealed that they would be introducing Grant Gustin as Barry Allen/The Flash as a character on the show, before he zipped off into his own spinoff series.

However, CBM’s sources are now claiming that depending on how well audiences receive Gustin as the scarlet speedster, he may just be showing up in Batman vs Superman as well. However, if that happens, he will just be seen as Barry Allen and not in his superhero identity, similarly the other heroes rumoured to appear, like Wonder Woman, will also just be in their civilian identity.

But whether Gustin is dressed in plain street clothes or a bright red leotard, if he does show up, it would firmly link the Arrow universe to that of the one established in Man of Steel.

Well, unless Flash is using his ol’ cosmic treadmill again to travel between universes by running faster than the speed of light and now I’m geeking out again, aren’t I?

So what do you guys think of these rumours? Personally, while I have absolutely no problem with the Bruce Wayne and Lex Luthor ones, I really don’t want Arrow crossing over. As much as I enjoy the show, it has become it’s own entity where they’ve already flipped a lot of DC characters, organizations and scenarios upside down, and by bringing it into the DC movie universe proper, the show will not only lose that freedom going forward, but also it will also have to shoehorn in the fact that there’s this city destroying, blue pyjama wearing alien sun god floating out there, that nobody seems to have noticed until now.

Last Updated: November 14, 2013