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Rumour: Warner Bros wanted Ben Affleck to play Batman in Justice League

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By Matt Maytum published 8 February 2013

Apparently he was approached to direct and star

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Justice League can’t get itself out of the news of late. What with Mark Millar discussing the problems of the team-up , and the script reportedly in trouble , it seems as though everyone'S talking about it.

That includes El Mayimbe of Latino Review , a frequent source of rumours that have a decent track record of proving to be true.

He recently tweeted that when Ben Affleck was approached to direct Justice League , Warner Bros actually wanted him to star in it, as Batman.

FUN & FABULOUS FANBOY FACT OF THE DAY: DID YA KNOW WHEN AFFLECK WAS APPROACHED TO DIRECT JUSTICE LEAGUE THEY ALSO WANTED HIM TO PLAY BATMAN? February 8, 2013


Affleck wouldn’t have any trouble with the handsome playboy facet of the character, and he has a suitably lantern-esque jaw for rocking the necessary cowl, but he’d be breaking the unspoken rule about having two different superheroes on one CV, from rival publishing houses at that.

Then again, Ryan Reynolds has already sneered at that rule, playing DC Comics’ Green Lantern after having done Marvel’s Deadpool in X-Men Origins: Wolverine . And with J.J. Abrams going from Star Trek to Wars , we could be entering a new Wild West in terms of franchise loyalty.

Affleck’s obviously confident directing himself, and has moved up through ever more ambitious projects since his megaphone-wielding debut on Gone Baby Gone . His take on the superhero genre would be an intriguing prospect, especially if he directed himself (which, as far as we can work out, has never happened on a superhero flick before - alert us in the comments section if you can think of any examples).

For now, we’ll just have to dump this on the pile with the rest of Hollywood’s ‘What if?’ projects.

Justice League is expected to open in 2015.

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Matt Maytum
Matt Maytum
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Former Editor of Total Film magazine

Matt Maytum is the former Editor of Total Film magazine. Over the past decade, Matt has worked in various roles for TF online and in print, including at GamesRadar+. Bucket-list-ticking career highlights have included reporting from the set of Tenet and Avengers: Infinity War, as well as covering Comic-Con, TIFF and the Sundance Film Festival.

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