Emmy Award-winning actor James Spader, will battle Earth's mightiest heroes as the villain Ultron in Joss Whedon's upcoming culmination to Phase 2 of Marvel's movie plan "Avengers 2: Age of Ultron."
The comic-book company announced the news on its website Thursday saying: "Spader earned three Emmy Awards for his role as Alan Shore on "Boston Legal" and "The Practice," and will return to television this fall in NBC's highly anticipated series "The Blacklist." Most recently Spader was seen in the critically-acclaimed film "Lincoln" directed by Steven Spielberg and has previously worked with a long list of accomplished film directors including David Cronenberg, Curtis Hansen, Sidney Lumet, Mike Nichols, Tim Robbins, Robert Rodriguez, Steven Soderbergh, and Oliver Stone. David Mamet also directed Spader in the Broadway play Race." In addition, Spader had a lengthy run a few years ago on the second to last season of NBC's "The Office"
Joss Whedon will return to write and direct the sequel to one of the most ambitious projects in film history. After "Thor: The Dark World" and "Captain America: The Winter Soldier" the studio will release "The Avengers 2." Spader will play the antagonist of the film, Ultron, a robot originally created by Ant Man. However, since Ant-Man won't be a part of the Marvel universe until after the Avengers sequel, odds are good he'll become a creation of the billionaire genius Tony Stark, who has already dabbled in superhuman suits and artificial intelligences.
The film is due out in theaters May 1, 2015. Tell us what you think of the casting of James Spader? Will the former lawyer with a pension for monologues from "Boston Legal" be a great choice for a maniacal monologue-happy villain? Was he at all who you were expecting? Why or why not? Share your conversations with us below.
