Here's your first look at Wonder Woman villain Ares (who may be played by Harry Potter's Lupin)

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The team behind Wonder Woman has been effective at keeping the villain (or villains) of the movie under wraps, but even they are no match for the New York Toy Fair. That’s where a Twitter user spotted our first look at Ares, the god of war and the movie’s rumored big bad. He’s looming in the center of the image below:

Ares definitely looks imposing: hulking armor, massive sword pointing straight at the camera, heavy-looking shield, and of course those bones protruding from his creepy helmet. Take a closer look in these images from Toy Ark:

Pretty ferocious, right? With a look like that, I was thinking the filmmakers must have cast someone huge like Vinnie Jones or Ray Stevenson to play that part, but according to a new report, they ended up going in the complete opposite direction. Batman-News reports that English actor David Thewlis, who you may recognize as Professor Remus Lupin from the Harry Potter movies, has been cast as Ares.

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We’ve known Thewlis would be a part of this movie since November of 2015 when the full cast list was unveiled, but the specifics of his role have been kept a mystery until now. Thewlis is a great actor, but he’s way scrawnier than those photos indicate this character would be.

Still, assuming the report is true, he would be a fascinating choice for Ares because I can easily see him playing the part of a petulant, vindictive god looking to wipe out humanity in a jealous rage because of resentment he’s harbored for years. There have been some rumors that Ares would be brought to life using a combination of live action and CG imagery, so perhaps the filmmakers are looking to use CG to pump Thewlis up for the film’s battle sequences.

Directed by Patty Jenkins and starring Gal Gadot, Chris Pine, Lucy Davis, Connie Nielsen, Robin Wright, Lisa Loven Kongsli, Danny Huston, David Thewlis, and Saïd Taghmaoui, Wonder Woman will open in cinemas on June 2, 2017.

Images: Toy Ark, Warner Bros.

Ben Pearson
Ben Pearson
Ben is an entertainment journalist who has written about movies online for nearly a decade. He loves the Fast & Furious franchise, prefers Indiana Jones to Star Wars, and will defend the ending of Lost until his dying day. He shook Bill Murray's hand once (so he's got that going for him, which is nice). Ben lives in Los Angeles with his wife.