Well, there’s going to be no shortage of interesting stories from the set. The Kingpin for Marvel’s upcoming Daredevil has been cast, and he’s… well… familiar.
For the non-Marvel zombies in the crowd, the Kingpin is a gigantic mountain of muscle and the single most brilliant criminal mind in the Marvel Universe. He’s also a guy who seemingly looks fat and soft but is essentially a walking mountain; Marvel loves showing the Kingpin beating up ninjas. It’s a tricky role, so tricky that the movie version just cast Michael Clarke Duncan and was done with it. Admittedly, Duncan was probably one of the few bright spots in that movie, but still, it tells you how hard Fisk is to play.
So, Marvel went the character actor route: Vincent D’Onofrio has been cast as the man who runs New York City’s gangs. D’Onofrio is probably best known either for his performance in Full Metal Jacket or his time fighting the Dickwolf, er, working for Dick Wolf on Law And Order: Criminal Intent. He also holds the record for most weight gained by an actor for a role, which we only bring up because while he’s a fairly substantial dude, he’s going to have to break out the hoagies and the razor before he’s the full Wilson Fisk.
It’s a strong choice, not least because D’Onofrio is quite good at projecting intelligence and cunning, necessary for the role. It also means Marvel wants to catch a wider audience, as D’Onofrio has a substantial fan base from his Law & Order days. We’ll see how it all comes together in 2015.