In one corner, as Hercules, you have Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, a gigantic human and genuine movie star who will allow you to have faith in what feels like the umpteenth Hercules movie. And in the other corner, you have Kellan Lutz, a Twilight hunk and notably less gigantic human, who is also playing Hercules. And, as you can tell in the above teaser, it's the Lutz version we're getting our first look at. Unfortunately.
In all fairness to Lutz, he's got the abs and the angry fighting face to go with the character, and at least seems to know his way around a sword. But the introduction in costume on the set of The Expendables 3 seem like a transparent gambit to shore up his action-star bona fides-- "See, Sylvester Stallone believes in him!"-- and the action in the teaser itself seems cobbled together from every post-Gladiator sword and sandals epic imaginable. Every up-and-comer gets his own goofy franchise, I guess-- Channing Tatum wore his own sword and sandals in the supremely goofy The Eagle-- and Lutz has the challenge of making it his own. After all, the guy has already survived both the Twilight franchise and Tarsem's super-ridiculous Immortals-- can one more over baked movie really do him in?
Weirdly, Lutz is cornering the market on "cheap movies competing with bigger ones," as he's also starring in Tarzan 3D, a performance-capture take on the classic character not to be confused with this one, which will star Alexander Skarsgard in a loincloth. Say what you will about Lutz, but it takes some guts to go up agains much bigger stars twice.
If you want to know more about Hercules, you can catch Lutz and more of the cast at New York Comic Con this weekend. Kristy and I will both be on the ground there all weekend, so come say hi!
