Wolverine casting; comics movie rumors

Casting news on the upcoming "X-Men Origins: Wolverine" movie, now shooting down under, should make fans of the character's early 1990s adventures more than happy. It's been confirmed that Ryan Reynolds has been cast as Deadpool and Taylor Kitsch as Gambit, with rapper will.i.am playing Wraith. They join Hugh Jackman in the lead role, as well as Liev Schrieber as Sabretooth, Danny Huston as William Stryker and Lynn Collins as Kayla Silverfox, based on the comics character Silver Fox. Above photo is the first still released from the pic, courtesy of USA Today.

That's a lot of mutants for a "solo" pic — and perhaps not the ones that inspire the most confidence, either. The best Wolverine solo stories, such as the 1982 miniseries by Chris Claremont and Frank Miller or Barry Windsor-Smith's "Weapon X" — both reportedly influences on the film — were true "solo" stories staring a tough loner. Adding Deadpool, a motormouth assassin created by Rob Liefeld and Fabian Nicieza in 1991's The New Mutants #98, in particular alters the tone of the movie to something a bit more jokey. Gambit makes a bit more sense, especially since he's almost made it into the "X-Men" pics twice now, as do Stryker (played in "X2' by Brian Cox) and Sabretooth (played in "X-Men" by Tyler Mane). Silver Fox also was an element in early drafts of the "X-Men" script, but ultimately was one of the more troubling elements of the 1990s-era Wolverine comics, in which the character constantly discovered his memories were faked.

* In other superhero movie rumors, it's going around that "Justice League of America" will be pushed back to 2010 and that it may be revamped to remove Superman and Batman, preventing overlap with their respective solo movies.

* On the toon front, could "Brave and the Bold" — featuring Batman teaming up with a different DC hero each week — be the next DC-based WB animation series?

* Meanwhile, writer director Edgar Wright is waiting to see which of his two comics films will get the greenllight first: "Scott Pilgrim," based on Bryan Lee O'Malley's popular humor comic, or "Ant-Man" for Marvel.