Stephen Merchant

Dwayne Johnson’s new movie is based on the true story of WWE wrestler Paige — but it does change a few parts of her life.

Claire Foy’s version of Lisbeth Salander is probably not what you were expecting.

Even though it was the last in a kind of series, Logan introduced quite a few new characters into the X-Men universe, while simultaneously saying goodbye to some familiar ones. Of these new characters, some of them left the story barely after we’d gotten to know them, including Stephen merchant’s creepy, melancholy mutant Caliban.

There’s no easy way to say this, but if you saw Beauty and the Beast in theaters, you were ROBBED. All week long Disney has been dropping additional content from the hit live-action remake online to promote the upcoming Blu-ray release, including some pretty darn cute behind-the-scenes footage. But there is nothing cute about the latest clip, in which director Bill Condon reveals a scene that was unjustly deleted from the film. That sneaky dude has been holding out on us.

Fans of X-Men who saw the latest two movies — Logan and last summer’s X-Men: Apocalypse — probably noticed something kinda weird about one recurring character. Despite offering no continuity or explanation as to why it happened this way, the mutant Caliban showed up in both, in Logan played by Stephen Merchant, and in Apocalypse by Thomas Lemarquis. Despite a bit of an accent on Lemarquis’ part, they both looked mostly the same: albino, weird eyes, bald. There was just a weird lack of continuity, and James Mangold recently explained why.

Today in Uh, Okay news, the ridiculously prolific Dwayne Johnson is teaming up with the WWE and Film4 to produce a wrestling dramedy based on the Channel 4 British documentary The Wrestlers: Fighting With My Family. The film, which centers on the life of WWE wrestler Paige and her family, will be written and directed by the brilliant Stephen Merchant — of all people.

Unlike a lot of superhero movies, Logan seems to have kept its cards pretty close to its chest. Even though we’ve known the rough outline of the film for a while now, it wasn’t until this past week that we were finally treated to a full synopsis of the film. And while the footage we’ve seen has been enticing, it’s also been pretty carefully curated to reveal as little of the big picture as possible. In other words, James Mangold and Hugh Jackman have set the hook and now are just cruelly letting us run ourselves out.

With buzz reaching fever-pitch levels a full three months before the March 3 release date, James Mangold’s Logan could very well be the first true Event Film of the year. His sparse, dystopian, Western-tinged reinterpretation of the X-Men mythos has fans tittering with great expectations, and the Johnny Cash-scored trailer teased a performance of unprecedented toughness from Hugh Jackman as a battle-scarred Wolverine. A new batch of supporting characters also goosed the expectations of comics diehards, learning that they could expect to see the young X-23, Reaver leader Donald Pierce, and Morlock member Caliban. Today brings an eye-opening first look at Stephen Merchant as Caliban, and fittingly so, those eyes are mutated and inhuman.

What’s exciting about the new Wolverine solo movie Logan is how dark and creepy it looks compared to the superhero movies that have come before. It’s definitely a more mature turn from our favorite curmudgeonly X-Man, where danger and death are a lot closer and more realistic than they used to be. Giving his all to the creepy-factor is Stephen Merchant, whose albino Caliban we’ve seen in two photos already, and who looks a little different from the version of the character we saw in this summer’s X-Men: Apocalypse. Now, a third Caliban photo has been revealed, this one possibly odder than the last.

…And the Logan photos just keep coming. Though recently rumored, these new images from the upcoming Wolverine sequel offer the first official confirmation of Stephen Merchant’s role in the film. Typically known for his comedic work and collaborations with Ricky Gervais, Merchant appears to be taking on a very different — and visually striking — sort of role in Logan as the X-Men character Caliban.