Henry Cavill may have been announced for an adaptation of Warhammer 40,000, but since there hasn’t been any update on that project, it looks like this former Superman is going to be looking for work elsewhwre.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, Cavill has just been cast in the live-action adaptation of Voltron from Amazon MGM Studios. Cavill is probably the biggest star attached to the movie so far; the only other cast member that’s been announced for the film is newcomer Daniel Quinn-Toye, a theater actor who worked opposite Tom Holland in Romeon & Juliet.
No details have been released as to who Cavill could be playing, but I can imagine that he’s been cast as the main villain Emperor Zarkon. It would be kind of out of place for a star like Cavill to join the main Voltron group and just play a supporting character to newcomers.
It’s worth noting that the movie is also being directed by Rawson Marshall Thurber, who is best know for his comedy work like Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story and We’re The Millers. With Thurber also having experience with action like the recent Red Notice, it’s possible that they’re aiming for the Voltron movie to have equal parts comedy and spectacle.
To contextualize, Voltron was an anime back in the 80s called Beast King GoLion and Kikou Kantai Dairugger XV that was dubbed and edited for western audiences. The series was part of the retro mecha genre, revolving around a group of five young pilots named the Robot Lions who each had vehicles that could fuse together and transform .The most recent adaption of Voltron for modern audiences came out back in 2016 with Netflix’s Voltron: Legendary Defender.
Probably the closest thing we have to a Voltron live-action movie right now is unfortunately 2017’s Power Rangers movie which also featured a bunch of kids who had special vehicles that could fuse into a giant robot.
We don’t know when we’ll get a first look at Voltron yet, but Cavill is definitely a huge talent, and I can’t wait to find out more.
