Whenever there is a big-budget superhero film in the works there is always an electric buzz of anticipation surrounding who will be cast in the title role. But lately there has been a disturbing trend involving our beloved American warriors on screen: the actors aren't American. The most recent victim has been Superman, the hero who fights for truth, justice, and . . . her Royal Highness? Yup. Henry Cavill, who plays Clark Kent/Superman in the upcoming Man of Steel, was born on the small island of Jersey in the English Channel between Great Britain and France.
Another recent addition to Her Majesty's forces of good was Andrew Garfield, who nabbed the top spot in next summer's The Amazing Spider-Man. Oh, sure, you could argue that he was born in the U.S. and moved to England when he was four, but that doesn't count. Duel citizenship only goes so far as the accent, buddy. And he's quite proud of his nationality. And that's fine. I don't blame him, anyway.
Another of the big names fighting crime under the Union Jack is King Turd on the Guano Pile himself, Christian Bale from the over-appreciated, over-exposed, and heavily-defended The Dark Knight. It is well known that Bale heavily researches his roles (they call it method acting), even going so far as to study accents from around the world to accurately depict the people he's portraying. He takes it a step further and uses that accent when doing press junkets and television appearances, to keep the audience with him and not alarm them. Bravo to him for being that hard of a worker.
Hugh Jackman as the grumbling, easily-angered Logan from Wolverine and the X-Men films is an Aussie (okay, so Wolvie is actually Canadian, but he's badass enough to let it slide).
Famke Jensen as Jean Gray in the X-Men films is from Holland.
Eric Bana from the first Hulk film (though some would say it was a disaster), another Aussie.
Ioan Gruffudd from "America's first family of heroes" The Fantastic Four, another Brit.
You know, at this point, I should probably stipulate that I'm all for hiring the right actor for the job, and it doesn't bother me who plays the part as long as they play it right and from the heart. It has just been something that I've picked up on of late. I don't know if Britain is just churning out better actors, or if the directors (many of whom are also from other countries) are looking for actors with passports, because a lot of these movies are filmed in Australia, New Zealand, or England because of the lower costs to work there--something else this country needs to work on to increase revenue.
It doesn't really matter because we still have Robert Downey Jr. (oh, wait, he's starring as the iconic British detective Sherlock Holmes--haha! Take that, you Limey bastards!)
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