Superman Favorite Confirmed for Another DC TV Series, Giving Them the Most DCU Appearances
Nathan Fillion is quickly becoming the connective tissue of James Gunn’s DC Universe. After bringing the belligerent Green Lantern Guy Gardner to screens in the hit film Superman, the actor returned for an appearance in Peacemaker Season 2 and will next appear alongside Space Sector 2814’s Hal Jordan and John Stewart in HBO’s Lanterns. Gunn has been clear that characters will randomly pop up in other shows and movies to create a sense of a shared universe and another upcoming animated series is about to take advantage of that policy by extending Fillion’s prominent position in the DCU into one of Jack Kirby’s sectors of DC space. Not even the boundary between live-action and animation can stop Guy Gardner’s confidence, attitude, or ill-advised bowl cut.
Mister Miracle showrunner Tom King confirmed to Entertainment Weekly that Fillion will continue to portray Guy Gardner in the upcoming adult-oriented animated series. Fillion is the first announced member of the voice cast and this will be his fourth outing as the character for DC Studios.
“We brought Nathan into Mister Miracle’s show, and doing that, it’s just so wonderful,” King explained, “You would think it would be different tonally from Lanterns, but it blends because that’s who Guy is.”
How Guy Gardner Could Fit Into Mister Miracle
Created by Jack Kirby in 1971 as part of his “Fourth World” New Gods, Mister Miracle is Scott Free, the son of the ruler of a peaceful planet who is traded to Darkseid as part of a peace agreement. If this sounds like Game of Thrones in space, you’re not far off. Scott eventually makes his way to Earth and becomes a celebrity escape artist, because if you can escape Apokalips you can escape anything. The animated series, inspired by King’s own critically acclaimed comic run, is expected to show Scott’s spectacular cosmic life right next to daily struggles with depression, domesticity, and whether or not he’s truly escaped Darkseid’s grasp. The book, however, doesn’t feature anyone wielding a green ring. While the inclusion of Guy Gardner may sound odd to some, to long-time comic fans it’s a perfect fit, as the characters do have a history. The addition of the obnoxious space cop works because of their storied time together in Justice League International, a book that has been a clear inspiration to James Gunn with his inclusion of Maxwell Lord’s Justice Gang in the DCU. Perhaps we’re seeing the first steps of Mister Miracle’s recruitment, as long as he votes for the right team name.
Nathan Fillion‘s Green Lantern work also predates the Gunnverse, as he began voicing Hal Jordan in 2011’s superior Lantern film Green Lantern: Emerald Knights and returned for several animated movies. He even “played” Hal in a delightfully silly episode of Tim and Sam Daly’s web series The Daly Show. “The Daly Superheroes” found Daly and Fillion displaying the joy that comes with getting to portray the DC icons. The episode also featured an appearance by Michael Rosenbaum, the long-time voice actor of the Flash on Justice League. Moving from Hal Jordan self-parody to playing Guy Gardner across live-action and animation makes his appearance in Mister Miracle feel less like casting and more like a homecoming.
Nathan Fillion is James Gunn’s Lucky Charm
For those keeping score, Mister Miracle isn’t just Fillion’s fourth time playing Guy Gardner for DC, this will be the tenth time the actor has gotten to play in a James Gunn sandbox. As one of Gunn’s most frequent collaborators, next to names like Michael Rooker and James’ brother Sean, Nathan has appeared in six of the filmmakers movies: Slither, Super, Guardians of the Galaxy, The Suicide Squad, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, and Superman. His scenes for Guardians 2 as Simon Williams, Wonder Man, were cut for pacing, but that also worked out, making room for the prestige series now on Disney+. With his appearances in Peacemaker, the upcoming Lanterns, and now Mister Miracle, Fillion just keeps pushing up those numbers. Perhaps the weirdest collaboration between the actor and filmmaker remains the comedy sketch, “Nailing Your Wife”, an installment of Gunn’s satirical web series PG Porn that looked at what would really happen if adult film tropes happened in real situations. In the short, Fillion plays a manslaughter-committing construction worker, compared to that, playing a cosmic police crusader with a caustic attitude seems conventional.
While the rest of the cast and a release date for Mister Miracle have yet to be announced, King previously said the series will have “huge implications” for the DCU. Adding an established Green Lantern with connections to the character supports that claim. At this year’s San Diego Comic-Con, Fillion crashed the Lanterns panel to explain, “I’m kind of a big deal here. I mean, my face is on a building.” He was absolutely right. His face was on a building, and he is definitely a pretty big deal in the DCU.
