When it comes to hotly anticipated movies like, say, Star Wars: The Force Awakens or any of the upcoming slate of superhero films, most of what we think we know comes from the rumors and unconfirmed speculation that swirl around these projects. Jeffrey Dean Morgan recently responded reports about his participation in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.
The death of his parents plays a pivotal role in the life of Bruce Wayne, who you may have heard has an alter ego, the vigilante crime fighter Batman. When pictures from the set surfaced showing a painting of a man that looks an awful lot like Morgan, people began to speculate that the actor may play Thomas Wayne, Bruce’s murdered father. On a recent episode of Jimmy Kimmel Live, the host asked Morgan about this point blank and he said:
God dang, it sure looks like me, doesn’t it? I think you probably have to go watch the movie to see if that’s me, but it looks a lot like me, man.
So, that doesn’t actually answer anything, now does it? But from his reaction, and the way he’s obviously trying to play coy, you get the impression that he knows something, or at least more than he’s willing to reveal. And many will note that he never comes out and says, no, that’s not me, which is only going to further fuel conjecture.
Check out the footage of his response below.
It wouldn’t be entirely bizarre if Morgan shows up in Dawn of Justice next year. He played the Comedian in director Zack Snyder’s adaptation of Watchmen in 2009, so the two have a working relationship. It’s possible the actor could have been called upon for a few days of work, maybe showing up in a flashback to the most important moment of Bruce Wayne’s life. I kind of hope that doesn’t happen, as it’s an incident that we’ve already seen many times on film, and I don’t think we need it again.
Perhaps, and I’m just spit balling here, that is actually Jeffrey Dean Morgan in the painting, but that’s all we see of him in the movie. It’s easy to imagine a scene where Ben Affleck's Bruce, wandering around Wayne Manor, stops to gaze portraits of his beloved parents hanging on the wall, or maybe even something less overt, like they’re simply there in the background. Maybe he’s in the movie, but not really in the movie.
Like he says, we’ll just have to wait and see for ourselves when Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice hits theaters March 25, 2016.
