Writer/director Leigh Whannell's reboot of the classic Universal property THE INVISIBLE MAN is set to begin filming in Australia next month, and we still don't know who will be playing the title character. Now it has been announced that Aldis Hodge has landed "a role" in the film, but if there was a character description included in the announcement it must have been written in invisible ink, because no details appeared in it.
Hodge got his first screen credit playing one of Zeus Carver/Samuel L. Jackson's nephews in DIE HARD WITH A VENGEANCE and has been working steadily ever since. His other credits include episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Charmed, Friday Night Lights, Supernatural, The Walking Dead, and Black Mirror. Film credits include roles in STRAIGHT OUTTA COMPTON, WHAT MEN WANT, JACK REACHER: NEVER GO BACK, BRIAN BANKS, and A GOOD DAY TO DIE HARD – not as Zeus's nephew Raymond, but as a CIA agent called Foxy.
Here he joins the previously announced cast members Elisabeth Moss and Storm Reid. Moss is playing
Cecilia, who receives the news of her abusive ex-boyfriend’s suicide, and begins to rebuild her life for the better, but her sense of reality is put into question when she begins to suspect her deceased lover is not actually dead.
Reid's character is a young girl named Sydney, and
with her mother gone, she’s picked up the maternal slack and is capable and mature for her age. She’s an outgoing lover of fashion who aspires to see the world, and she initially likes having Cecilia around as a role model but grows mistrustful of her when strange things begin to happen around the house.
Perhaps Hodge is playing the father of Sydney, who Cecilia is trying to rebuild her life with… I'm trying to fill in the blanks here.
The invisible man in this version of THE INVISIBLE MAN is Adrian Griffin,
a billionaire sociopath who made his money by developing an invisibility suit for the Department of Defense.
I'm assuming it's going to be a big deal when we find out who's playing that guy. Whannell, Universal, and Blumhouse Productions were said to be hoping to get either Armie Hammer and Alexander Skarsgard for the role, but it could end up being someone else entirely. Maybe it is Hodge.
We should know before long, because THE INVISIBLE MAN will soon be in production, heading toward a March 13, 2020 release date.
That's a date it shares with GODZILLA VS. KONG and is just one week before the release of A QUIET PLACE 2. March is crowded. There has been talk of GODZILLA VS. KONG moving to a different date, but I don't think THE INVISIBLE MAN and A QUIET PLACE 2 should be released so close together, either. We'll see how this will all work out soon enough.