‘Legends of Tomorrow’ Wanted Stephen Lang for Future Oliver

Stephen Lang has already begun his campaign for the role of Deadpool 2’s Cable, but the Avatar alum very nearly came to play another one-armed future hero. Ahead of tonight’s Legends of Tomorrow trip to “Star City 2046,” the showrunner reveals that they considered older actors, Lang among them, for the role of an older Oliver Queen.

Now that we’ve seen Stephen Amell suited up and bearded out as a grizzled future Oliver Queen, it seems difficult to question, though not at first for showrunner Phil Klemmer. Speaking to Nerdist, Klemmer confirmed that they looked at older actors before deciding on effects that could convincingly age Stephen Amell:

There was a time where we were talking about what actor we were going to hire to play Oliver. We had casting sessions with all these strapping silver studs. It would have been totally fine if we had that Avatar actor, who played the villain, that guy [Stephen Lang] would have been a great 60-something Oliver Queen. But it all ended up working out so we could get Stephen and all the resources to make him legitimately look like a 60-year-old guy. That was the real achievement.

We originally talked about having Stephen come on to play Oliver, but it’s one of those things you could barely get your hopes up about. We were like, ‘There’s no way that’s going to work. Either he’s going to be too busy or someone will tell us we can’t do that or the special effects makeup would be too complicated or expensive to make him look like a 65-year-old man.’ We didn’t allow ourselves to believe it would happen. It was until we got dailies that it really sunk in. He turned in such a great performance where he’s still Oliver Queen, but he’s a different man. He’s not just older, he’s a man who’s been really changed in a hideous way by the past 30 years.

Granted, Legends hasn’t shown very much of the elder Oliver beyond a few photos, but will Amell convincingly sell the character by tonight’s “Star City 2046”? Would Lang, or another actor perhaps have been better options, or dampened the fun?

Check out the latest Legends trailers below.

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