9 Actors Who Almost Played Comic Book Villains

If not for a scheduling conflict, Zack Synder's Batman V Superman would have brought Adam Driver's considerable acting talents to the role of Metropolis' nefarious business magnate Lex Luthor.

From the torn-apart villain Kylo Ren to the self-absorbed artist Adam in Girls, his intense turn in Silence and his quiet, thoughtful performance in Paterson, Driver has pitched dark and soulful performances in much of his film career thus far. He's an actor of incredible range who can seemingly just about do anything, so you can see why he'd be approached for such an iconic DC villain.

Ultimately the role fell to Jesse Eisenberg, who mined a rich vein in "young narcissistic know it all" as Mark Zuckerberg in The Social Network. The Silicon Valley stylings of LexCorps' headquarters in Snyder's film can leave us in no doubt that, for good or ill, this millennial iteration of Lex was baked into the design of the movie from the get-go, and the movie was savaged by critics, so it's perhaps for the best that Driver wasn't trapped here.