Justice League may have Atlantean role for Willem Dafoe & a fancy filming rig for Aquaman

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Last month we learned that Willem Dafoe had joined the cast of Justice League, but the details of what character he's playing is being kept under wraps. A new rumour from Birth.Movies.Death. may have just given us a hint though, as the site reports that Dafoe will be playing an Atlantean. Whether he's on the side of good or bad remains to be seen - although surely with a surname like Dafoe he can't help be anything but the latter - but in any case it will be great to have the onetime Green Goblin back in a superhero film once again.

Birth.Movies.Death. also report that Snyder is filming the underwater scenes in Justice League much differently to how he did for Batman v Superman. While the latter film had Aquaman actor Jason Momoa hold his breath in a water tank in his underwhelming cameo, Snyder has chosen to film Momoa on a "green screen stage" for Justice League. In fact, the report notes that "a majority of the movie will be shot on sets and Snyder will utilize background replacement". 

I have little doubt that Justice League will be visually impressive - that's always been Snyder's forte - but after Batman v Superman I'm much less confident on whether or not the big team-up movie will have a compelling narrative. In any case I'm sure Snyder will put the fancy rigging to good use, and having an actor of Dafoe's calibre on your set almost always makes the final film a little bit better.

Directed by Zack Snyder and starring Ben Affleck, Henry Cavill, Gal Gadot, Jason Mamoa, Ezra Miller, and Ray Fisher, Justice League: Part 1 is currently scheduled for a November 17, 2017 release.

Images: Warner Bros/Magnolia Pictures

Amon Warmann
Amon Warmann

Amon is a contributing editor and columnist for Empire magazine, but is also a Film and TV writer for GamesRadar+, Total Film, and others. He has also written for NME, Composer Mag, and more, along with being a film critic for TalkSport. He is also the co-host of the Fade to Black Podcast, and a video mashup creator. Can also do a pretty good Bane impersonation.