Improbable Suggestions For Films That Are Never Happening

Probably because I've started rewatching my Brisco County Jr. DVDs, I was thinking about Bruce Campbell this weekend. More precisely, Bruce Campbell as a villain in a movie. I'm sure he's done it before, and I either haven't seen the film, or don't remember it*. I was thinking he can do charming, and it's the kind of charming where the audience can also be sucked in, rather than the kind where the audience sits there wondering how the characters are getting fooled. he can do brash, smug, and most importantly for where my brain went, grandiose. Thus, my brain concluded Bruce Campbell should be Dr. Doom.

I don't know if Campbell can do an Eastern European accent, but that didn't stop Julian McMahon in either of the recent FF flicks**. If Campbell can do the third-person stuff, the big speeches, the style, the accent isn't that big a stumbling block.

OK, so then my brain recalls this Morgan Freeman quote Roger Ebertused in his review of Red. Freeman said he liked playing villains because they're usually the most interesting characters, and you know they'll still be around at the end of the movie. Which means we need Super Villain Team-Up: The Movie, starring Morgan Freeman and Bruce Campbell. Hey, I like Bruce Campbell, but you know Morgan Freeman's getting top billing there.

I can't decide who'd be a good villain for Morgan Freeman to play, though I'm thinking Vandal Savage. I know, different comics company from Dr. Doom, he's just the first character I thought of that has the age that Freeman could play him. Vandal, in the comics I've seen him, is portrayed as having a good level of intelligence, and the ability to manipulate people, probably because he has thousands of years of observing human nature. He can be coldly sadistic and/or practical, but also be outright brutal. He might try intimidating someone, or tricking them into doing his dirty work, or even (as he did with the Ray) try to be their friendly mentor, but he might also decide to just kill someone if they're a problem. Morgan Freeman can easily do the "older mentor figure" part, but it might be fun to see him let loose and crack some impertinent underlings head open.

Hmm, maybe Bruce Campbell could be Count Vertigo? The Eastern European accent thing is still a stumbling block, but that's one classy villain.

* For example, he was in Congo, which I have seen at least a couple times, but I have no memory of him. Tim Curry, I remember, but not Bruce Campbell. I didn't remember he was in that Tom Arnold McHale's Navy movie either, until I was saw it while at Alex' over the summer, but that may have been my brain trying to blot out the memory of watching McHale's Navy. That also had Tim Curry in it.

** McMahon would be someone who plays the sort of charming that seems to work on the characters, but not the audience. At least, that was how it went on the few occasions I watched Nip/Tuck.