David Dastmalchian is no stranger to comic book adaptations, having starred in the Ant-Man trilogy (as two different characters), The Suicide Squad, and Batman: The Long Halloween. Recently, the actor talked about wanting to play Morbius, and he's now expanded on why.
The Living Vampire, a classic Spider-Man villain, was supposed to make his live-action debut in 1998's Blade. That didn't happen, and the vampire was left in the comics until 2022, when Oscar-winner Jared Leto played him in Sony Pictures' Morbius. The movie was a critical and commercial flop.
Talking to GamesRadar+, Dastmalchian said that horror comics have always appealed to him, and shared what it is about Morbius that makes him such an exciting prospect as an actor.
"I think Morbius is, to me, a really interesting metaphor for addiction and some of the more difficult elements when wrestling with the different parts of ourselves psychologically that take over," he shared. "Especially anger parts, self-destructive parts, or uncontrollable parts of ourselves. So I just thought, I'm not smart enough to be a doctor, but I can play one."
"That would be a great role. I love vampires. Never in a million years would I have said if I could pick what, you know, what superhero or villain I want to play, that I would ever have picked Polka-Dot Man," Dastmalchian added. "I never in a million years would have thought of that character. But then you get to go play some wonderful, beautiful, complex character like that."
While he could return as Polka-Dot Man in the DCU, the door is surely open to Dastmalchian taking on another role in that world. There are two villains, in particular, that jump out at the Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania star.
"There's always been something really appealing to me about Solomon Grundy," he mused. "I think that there's this deep dark sadness within that character that is, and he evokes all the stuff that I love about, like, Southern Gothic horror, Halloween. I could see me just charging through Gotham on a dark Halloween night."
"I think J. Crane is a great [frick]ing character who's the flip side of all the work that I care about when it comes to psychology and psychiatry," Dastmalchian said of Scarecrow. "And imagine taking that and manipulating it for your own benefit."
We'll have to wait and see what the future holds in store for the actor in the MCU and DCU, as well as what becomes of the characters he's reeled off. James Gunn has brought many of the DCEU actors he worked with into the DCU, sometimes in new roles and occasionally in familiar ones.
Unfortunately, given that Morbius was such a bomb, we may be left waiting a decade or more before seeing him back on screen (similar to what happened to the Fantastic Four and Green Lantern).
Which of these characters would you like to see Dastmalchian play?