James Bond actor Daniel Craig is the latest superstar actor to join James Gunn’s new DC Universe. Deadline reports director Luca Guadagnino and Daniel Craig are reuniting for a Sgt. Rock project at James Gunn and Peter Safran’s DC Studios. Justin Kuritzkes (Challengers, Queer) is reportedly writing the Sgt. Rock screenplay. Guadagnino and Craig famously worked together on this year’s romantic drama Queer. The Sgt. Rock feature would come before Guadagnino reboots Lionsgate’s American Psycho. The outlet states that no deals have been inked between DC Studios, Daniel Craig, or Luca Guadagnino, so we’ll wait and see if this pairing comes to fruition.
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The new DC Universe is gearing up for its first slate of releases. December features the premiere of the adult-animated Creature Commandos on Max, followed by the James Gunn-directed Superman and Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow featuring House of the Dragon star Milly Alcock. David Corenswet will be portraying the Man of Steel in Superman.
[RELATED: Superman Trailer Update From James Gunn Has DC Fans Hyped]
Created by Robert Kanigher and Joe Kubert, Sgt. Rock debuted in 1959’s Our Army at War #83. The World War II hero soon became one of the most popular military characters in comics, with the Our Army at War series being retitled to simply Sgt. Rock. Even though Sgt. Rock has no explicitly stated metahuman abilities, he’s been shown to withstand several gunshot wounds along with extranormal strength and endurance. And similar to Spider-Man’s “spider-sense,” Sgt. Rock possesses a “Combat Antenna” that warns him of impending danger.
As for Daniel Craig, he is famously known for being the most recent actor to play the world-renowned secret agent James Bond. Craig last played the legendary 007 in 2021’s No Time to Die, and will next appear in Guadagnino’s adaptation of the 1985 William S. Burroughs novella Queer, opening on November 27th. Craig also plays super-sleuth Benoit Blanc in Rian Johnson’s Knives Out murder mystery franchise. The next installment is titled Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery and is scheduled for release in 2025.
Curiously, Bruce Campbell once pitched Sam Raimi on a Sgt. Rock vs. The Army of the Dead movie. Campbell’s first foray into writing superheroes was for DC, where he worked with artist Eduardo Risso on DC Horror Presents: Sgt. Rock Vs. The Army of the Dead, which is why he might be interested in seeing it brought to the big screen. “Man, that’s a Michael Bay movie if I’ve ever seen one,” Campbell told ComicBook in 2023. “You get one of the Hemsworth boys — you get the cheaper one to play Sgt. Rock. It’s a Brad Pitt-y kind of role. You need that tough guy blond dude.”
“Oh my God, I think that it came out just now as a graphic novel, they put all is issues together, and I want to put that on Michael Bay’s desk and be like, ‘Dude, get going, start prep,’” Campbell added.
