Jude Law in Talks To Play the Villain in Guy Ritchie’s ‘Knights of the Round Table’

I imagine the conversations that echo through the corridors of power in Hollywood sounding a lot like that famous scene in ‘The Social Network’ where Sean Parker sells Mark Zuckerberg on his vision for Facebook. “A million dollars isn’t cool,” he says. “Y’know what’s cool? A billion dollars.” One movie isn’t cool; y’know what’s cool? A universe of movies (and, also a billion dollars). In a few short years, we’ve gone from franchises to full-blown cinematic universes as the standard unit of measure in the movie business. Every idea is a potential fleet of individual series that can be spun off and woven together into a tapestry of moneymaking opportunities.

Among the well-worn concepts now being rebranded as movie universes is the classic legend of King Arthur, which Warner Bros. is planning as a whole bunch of interconnected movies. The first, ‘Knights of the Round Table’ directed by Guy Ritchie, is scheduled to open in July of 2016. It’s already got Charlie Hunnam lined up to play King Arthur and Astrid Berges-Frisbey as Guinevere. But there’s no Round Table without an evil square to battle against, a part that Variety says will likely be played by Jude Law, who is now “in negotiations” to co-star in the film.

Law has a strong relationship with Ritchie, having worked on both of the director’s ‘Sherlock Holmes’ movies. What’s unclear, according to Variety, is whether Law is the antagonist of just ‘Knights of the Round Table’ or the entire Arthur cinematic universe Warners is building. In other words: Is he playing Arthur’s Loki or Thanos? At this point, we just don’t know.

We also don’t know who will play Arthur’s mentor in the film, which is describe as “the last major role to be cast” before production can begin. Idris Elba had been up for the role at one point, but he’s not officially out of the running. Why not go full-Marvel on this thing and see if you can get Anthony Hopkins? After all, having a mentor isn’t cool; y’know what’s cool? Having an All-Father.