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Batman V Superman: Jesse Eisenberg Was Not Originally Asked To Play Lex Luthor

His casting was potentially the most controversial in a film whose casting had already sparked much fan outrage - and now, it transpires things might have been very different.

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It has been revealed that Jesse Eisenberg, the new Lex Luthor in the upcoming ‘Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice,’ was initially offered a different role.

Discussing the matter with The LA Times, the Oscar-nominated star of ‘The Social Network’ does not reveal who director Zack Snyder asked him to play first, but the director hints it was “the exact opposite of Lex Luthor.”

Many fans had been screaming out for an older actor more closely resembling the comic book character, such as Bryan Cranston or Mark Strong - but with the much younger, less immediately threatening Eisenberg in the role, we can immediately expect a very different take on the iconic villain.

Eisenberg himself appreciates this: “When you’re doing a movie like this and playing a character that’s already been played, the further away it is from those previous incarnations the better.

“Because chances are, especially with a guy like Gene Hackman or Kevin Spacey, you’re not going to get favorably compared."

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Hinting at how this new take on the character will stand apart, Eisenberg says audiences can expect “a back story that’s tragic and an emotional inner life that’s authentic,” and praises screenwriter Chris Terrio (’Argo’) for “creating a character that seemed viable in reality.

“To call him self-aggrandizing is to say that the Titanic was a sailboat. He is a narcissist of the first order but complicated in that way as well in that he is terribly troubled and competitive and vengeful.

“He looks at Superman not as somebody to destroy but as genuine threat to humanity."

Eisenberg also addresses another key difference with his Lex - the abundance of hair on his head. A particular question mark hangs over this as the very first teaser image of Eisenberg in the role showed him sporting Luthor’s more traditional chrome-dome.

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As such, we can expect the flowing locks we’ve seen in the trailer to be lost at some point during ‘Batman V Superman.’ Naturally, Eisenberg isn’t telling how or why, but he does promise something pretty dramatic.

"When you see the movie, you’ll see. It’s the greatest scene that I’ve ever gotten to take part in — it accounts for the change in hair.”

Try not to pull your own hair out waiting for ‘Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice’ to finally hit UK cinemas on 25 March 2016.

Picture Credit: Warner Bros

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