‘Aquaman’ villain, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, who plays high tech pirate Black Manta, will continue swimming in the DC pool. He has just been cast in HBO’s proposed drama based on the 1986-87 DC miniseries ‘Watchmen’. Abdul-Mateen joins a large cast which includes Jeremy Irons, ‘Sleepy Hollow”s Tom Mison, Frances Fisher, Jacob Ming-Trent, Regina King, Don Johnson, Louis Gossett Jr., Tim Blake Nelson, Adelaide Clemens, and Andrew Howard. All roles are under wraps, but it is believed that King is the show’s lead, while Irons’ character is described as “an aging and imperious lord of a British manor.” Abdul-Mateen and Irons are both now veterans of DC’s current film universe, as Irons has now played Batman’s butler Alfred Pennyworth twice, in ‘Batman V Superman’ and ‘Justice League’.
The concept behind the HBO series is unclear, but it is not another adaptation of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbon’s best-selling graphic novel. Photographs of certain props appear to indicate that the series will follow in the aftermath of that story, which was adapted as a live action film directed by Zack Snyder in 2009. Both the original comic books and the film ended with a bit of a cliffhanger, in that Rorschach (played by Jackie Earle Haley in the film) mailed his tell-all journal to a newspaper reporter. The details in that book could blow wide the thick conspiracy masterminded by his one-time ally Ozymandias a.k.a. Adrian Veidt (Matthew Goode) and to an extent, the U.S. government. At the end of the original story, only Nite Owl, Silk Specter, and the god-like Dr. Manhattan survived, but Manhattan left Earth, seemingly for good.
Damon Lindelof, c0-creator of HBO’s ‘The Leftovers’, is developing this series which at this time has only been ordered to pilot. But with ‘Game of Thrones’ ending, and with ‘Westworld”s lengthy production time, HBO could use another big, buzzy hit.
Check back for more info as it becomes available.
Source: Entertainment Weekly
