Who’s been waiting for Nova to show up in the Marvel Cinematic universe? Good news, he’s finally on the way! It was revealed back in March that a Nova project is in development for Disney+, although it hasn’t been clarified yet if this will included with the Marvel movies or be a series instead. We also don’t know yet who will be playing Nova within the franchise, but someone has envisioned what Ryan Gosling might look like as the Richard Rider version of the character.
To be clear, there’s been no official indication or reports from reputable sources that Ryan Gosling is being looked at to play Nova, but hey, that’s the fun of fan-casting; you can pick whoever you’d like for the role. Artist clements.ink decided to mock up how Gosling would look as Nova in their mind, and shared the final product on Instagram:
That’s not bad! Richard Rider was a high school student when he inherited the Nova mantle in the comics, but even with Marvel playing fast and loose with its chronology, it’s been a decent amount of years since he began his superhero career. Taking into account that the teenaged Sam Alexander is also fighting the forces of evil as Nova in the comics, it’s a good bet that when Richard is introduced to the MCU, he’ll be an older man too, so Ryan Gosling would be an understandable pick for the Nova role. Whether he’s actually selected among the pool of candidates being put together, we’ll just have to wait and see.
The seed has been planted for Richard Rider’s MCU introduction since Guardians of the Galaxy, which featured the Nova Corps, the protectors of the planet Xandar. Unfortunately, at the beginning of Avengers: Infinity War (which Nova was briefly considered to appear in), it was revealed that Thanos laid waste to Xandar and the Nova Corps while obtaining the Power Stone. In the comics, Richard was selected by Rhomann Dey, the last surviving Nova Corps member, to carry on in his stead before dying. So it seems like we could get a similar origin story in the MCU, although whether Richard will receive his power from Dey (who was played by John C. Reilly in Guardians of the Galaxy) or a different Nova Corps member, or perhaps through an alternative method altogether, is unclear.
The only other concrete piece of information that’s been revealed about the MCU’s Nova project is that Moon Knight’s Sabir Pirzada is writing it. On the chance Ryan Gosling is cast as Richard Rider, this would mark his superhero genre debut, although he’s definitely no stranger to action-related work, as seen with movies like Blade Runner 2049 and the upcoming The Gray Man. It’s also worth keeping in mind that it’s possible we could see Richard debut in the MCU before this Nova project arrives. For example, James Gunn admitted he’s read “75% of Nova comics in existence,” so what are the chances the character could be involved in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3?
Whatever the MCU has planned for Nova, we’ll keep you apprised on those details once they’re made available to the public. Until then, catch up on nearly all of the MCU content that’s been released since 2008 with your Disney+ subscription.
