Alicia Malone
Ever since Tom Hardy was announced as playing an unspecified part in Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight Rises, the internet has been aflurry with guestimates and speculamates as to who he’ll be playing.
Early rumors had the “Inception” star as playing Killer Croc, then it was Harvey Bullock, but now Batman-News.com have a report suggesting he’s actually playing Hugo Strange, the, er, ‘strange’ chap that likes to get about dressed as Batman!
Says the site, ”I’ve heard that Tom Hardy is in fact going to play the villain. My source strongly believes that Hardy is going to be playing Hugo Strange. This is the first bit of information from this person that I’m publishing, however they have been accurate in the past. For example, this person told me weeks before the recent Christoper Nolan interview that The Riddler would not be appearing in the film. They also mentioned that Rachel Weisz and Anne Hathaway were in the running for the lead female role a couple of weeks before Deadline posted their list. Given their track record so far, I wanted to post this Hardy news that I received via email. Again, this should just be taken as rumor.”
I guess the character is definitely more in tune with Nolan’s ‘real world’ approach to the “Batman” films than a ‘Killer Croc’, isn’t he? Maybe there is something to this? Then again, expect lots of these Batman rumors between now and… whenever Variety publishes some kind of confirmation.
For those not versed in the universe of Batman, like myself, I publish this character description of Hugo Strange from Batman Wiki :
Hugo Strange had a bald misshapen head, complete with bushy eyebrows, coke-bottle glasses and a thick beard accenting his jaw. He is an insane psychologist and chemical genius who knows Batman’s secret identity and lusts to take the identity for himself. Just as The Batman was familiar with him, Strange knew of his adversary long before they met. Cursing an underling for not killing him when he had the chance, Strange declared that “The Batman is the only man with the imagination to sense the exact nature of our plans.” Strange had first gained fame in the world of psychology when he claimed to have fully analyzed the Dark Knight from afar. Strange would lend credence to his own claims by learning of Batman’s true identity of Bruce Wayne. However, his hatred of Batman turned into more and more of a deranged obsession, using his medical expertise to hatch a series of bizarre plots based around genetics and mind control in order to defeat Batman and possibly take his place.
