Ben Mendelsohn has been acting professionally for over three decades, but in recent years, he's proven just how captivating he can be playing villains. From Orson Krennic in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story to Nolan Sorrento in the upcoming Ready Player One, the man has a niche for bringing evildoers to life. He's even in consideration to play Captain Marvel's main antagonist. But there's one particular Marvel villain who Mendelsohn is especially keen to play one day: Doctor Doom. The actor expressed his love for the character thusly:
Doctor Doom's the greatest comic book character of all time...That's a great, great role...The thing that's really appealing about Victor is the damage, the trauma, the loss of the family and the wrong done to him and then the takeover, the revenge, and then the protectiveness of Latveria wrapped in that Cold War vibe. There's something about the combination of that. What actually makes him great is his caring bit. You know what I mean? That's what's great about Doctor Doom. And I just like him!
At this summer's San Diego Comic-Con, Legion showrunner Noah Hawley announced that he is working on a Doctor Doom movie for 20th Century Fox. While Ben Mendelsohn was unwilling to confirm or deny that he's involved with Captain Marvel during his recent appearance on MTV's Happy Sad Confused podcast, he did talk about why he's such a big fan of Doctor Doom. As things stand out, Mendelsohn hasn't received any calls about playing Victor von Doom and isn't keen on campaigning to play the villain, but as you can tell from his above quote, getting to don the metal mask would be an exciting opportunity for him. Let's also not forget that if Josh Brolin can play Thanos in the MCU and Cable in Deadpool 2, then there's no reason an arrangement couldn't be made to have Mendelsohn play villains in two different Marvel franchises.
Not counting the 1994 Fantastic Four movie that was never released to the public, Doctor Doom has been portrayed in a theatrical setting twice. Julian McMahon played the character in 2005's Fantastic Four and 2007's Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, and Toby Kebbell took over the role for the 2015 Fantastic Four reboot. All three of those movies weren't critically received well overall, and in addition to a standalone Doctor Doom story, there are reports that Fox wants to rex-explore the Fantastic Four mythos through Reed Richards and Sue Storm's children, Franklin and Valeria. As for the Doctor Doom movie, it's unclear if it will include him battling the Fantastic Four again or facing a different opponent, but if the plot works in Doom ruling Latveria, than that would be right up Ben Mendelsohn's alley.
Ben Mendelsohn can currently be seen playing King George VI in Darkest Hour, and he'll return to the big screen when Ready Player One is released on March 23, 2018. As for the Doctor Doom movie, stay tuned to CinemaBlend for more updates on how that is coming along.
