Pierce Brosnan has held many iconic roles, and one of them is maaaaaybe playing DC Comics character Doctor Fate in the ill-fated 2022 movie Black Adam. And if Brosnan is to be believed, his Fate will be back in Superman: Man of Tomorrow.
The news comes via GQ’s Man of the Year profile of Brosnan, which includes the following paragraph after they ask him if he’s banging down the door to join a Marvel movie:
“No, I’m not,” says Brosnan. “I’ve never banged down anyone’s door. I mean, they know where to find me. I’ve heard that Dr Fate was going to have his own show, or his own movie. I’ve heard that he’s going to be in the next Superman.” Would he want to do that? “I enjoyed that, the philosophy of that character, very much, and I would definitely be open to it,” he says.
So a little bit of backstory here. Brosnan was Fate in Black Adam, which was supposed to kick off a new part of the DC cinematic universe — change the hierarchy of power if you will. Mind you, Brosnan’s character was killed towards the end of the movie by the villain, Sabbac (Marwan Kenzari), who I definitely remembered was the bad guy of the film without checking. And while superhero resurrections are part and parcel with the genre, including Doctor Fate getting resurrected many, many times in the comics… Well, there was another death of another kind. Specifically, the DCEU (DC Extended Universe).
Without getting too in the weeds here, Black Adam was Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson’s attempt to wrest power from Warner Bros. and take over the direction of DC films, including a post-credits tease of the return of Henry Cavill’s Superman. It wasn’t meant to be. Black Adam was the biggest DC release of the year, but still didn’t do well by any standard. And James Gunn and Peter Safran came in with their new DCU to take things in a different direction.
So would Gunn bring back Brosnan, despite him kicking the bucket in Black Adam? Sure, why not? Gunn has been pretty open about picking and choosing what he likes from the previous iteration, as well as stating that nothing is canon until it’s established — down to, for example, reworking scenes from Peacemaker Season 1 to make them fit with Peacemaker Season 2.
But would Gunn go as far as to build a show or a movie around Brosnan’s Doctor Fate? Again, maybe, though we haven’t heard anything about it. The thing that gives me pause, though, is hearing he’s going to be “the next Superman.” Nothing against Brosnan, but I would take a leap and suggest that he possibly heard Doctor Fate would be in the next Henry Cavill Superman movie… Which is never going to happen.
Could Fate show up in Man of Tomorrow, the upcoming movie featuring Superman (David Corenswet) and Lex Luthor (Nicholas Hoult) reportedly fighting Brainiac? Also possible… There’s a mural shown in the Hall of Justice in Superman that depicts Doctor Fate, among other characters. But again, this seems like a surprising, out of nowhere detail to throw out in the middle of an otherwise unrelated GQ interview. heck, it could be something Brosnan read on the internet, or got asked in another interview (“would you want to be Doctor Fate again in the new Superman?” or some such thing).
Point being, maybe Brosnan is going to be Doctor Fate in the new Superman movie. Or maybe he’s just having a nice time being Pierce Brosnan.
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