Austin Butler Playing The Hottest Marvel Character?
Unconfirmed reports point to Austin Butler going for the role of Fantastic Four's Johnny Storm, aka the Human Torch.
Could Austin Butler be on the shortlist to play Johnny Storm aka the Human Torch in the Marvel Cinematic Universe? Jeff Sneider on The Hot Mic podcast (via ComicBook.com) heard that Butler’s agents have been campaigning to get him the role. If Butler manages to nab the role, it would certainly help his rising star shoot up even faster.
Austin Butler’s career exploded this year after an Oscar-worthy turn in Baz Luhrman’s Elvis. The biopic starred Butler as the troubled King of Rock and Roll and his relationship with his manager Colonel Tom Parker (Tom Hanks). The movie received critical acclaim, with Butler’s performance getting the most acclaim of all.
After Elvis, Austin Bulter quickly became one of Hollywood’s most in-demand young talents. This led to him being cast as Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen in the upcoming blockbuster Dune: Part Two. The massively successful Dune already had a star-studded cast and book fans were anxiously waiting to see who would fill the role of Feyd-Rautha in the second film.
If Austin Butler ends up taking this Marvel role, we can likely expect to see him in a lot more blockbusters. Johnny Storm is going to be one of the biggest casting announcements in the near future, with the Fantastic Four officially joining the MCU. It’s likely a role that would require Butler to sign on for multiple films.
We know that Marvel has a Fantastic Four film in the pipeline, but we don’t yet know who will play the four members of Marvel’s First Family. We saw John Krasinski as Mr. Fantastic aka Reed Richards in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, but that was an alternate-universe version of the character. Just like Austin Butler, Krasinski’s appearance in the Fantastic Four film is still unconfirmed at this point.
With this Austin Butler news, we do have almost a full cast of strong fan theories at this point. Many fans are hoping that John Krasinski and Emily Blunt will fill the roles of Mr. Fantastic and Sue Storm aka the Invisible Woman. As for Ben Grimm aka The Thing, there are plenty of fan castings but no solid rumors on who might fill the role.
If Austin Butler ends up being in the Fantastic Four as the Human Torch, we can likely count on seeing him in some Avengers films in the future. Marvel announced Avengers: The Kang Dynasty and Avengers: Secret Wars for a 2025 and 2026 release date, respectively. That’s a long way to be looking down the road but that’s just how the MCU operates.
In the meantime, there are plenty of confirmed Austin Butler roles on the way that fans look forward to seeing. The aforementioned Dune: Part Two will be hitting theaters on November 3, 2023, and will continue the story of Timothee Chalamet’s exiled Paul Atreides. Butler is also set to star in the upcoming TV mini-series Masters of the Air, which follows 11 men behind enemy lines in a bomber known as the “Flying Fortress.”
