Actor Kobna Holdbrook-Smith, who had a small role in Marvel’s Doctor Strange, returned to the world of superheroes in last year’s Justice League as Crispus Allen, a Gotham City Police Department officer who in the comics eventually becomes The Spectre.
Thanks to Justice League: The Art of the Film, fans can get their first really good look at the character, who appeared onscreen a couple of times but was not named until the credits.
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Allen debuted as a Gotham cop in the pages of Detective Comics #742 by Greg Rucka and Shawn Martinbrough, and later became a prominent character in Gotham Central by Rucka, Ed Brubaker, and Michael Lark.
The character has also appeared on Gotham played by Andrew Stewart-Jones, and by Rob Brown in The Dark Knight Rises.
One of the rare objectively good cops in Gotham City, the character was seemingly a go-to in Justice League for Commissioner Gordon.
In the comics, Allen was murdered by the corrupt cop Jim Corrigan in the pages of Gotham Central, becoming the new human host for the Spectre during the Infinite Crisis event.
It remains to be seen if Holdbrook-Smith will reprise the role in a future film, though J.K. Simmons is set to reprise his role as Commissioner Gordon in Matt Reeves’ planned Batman movie.
Besides The Batman, there is the remote chance that Holdbrook-Smith could appear in Justice League Dark if it should ever get off the ground; that movie reportedly will feature The Spectre alongside supernatural heroes and antiheroes like John Constantine, Swamp Thing, and Zatanna.
The Spectre is the merging of a human soul with God’s swift arm of judgment; a supernatural hero with near-limitless powers, many of the character’s solo stories over the years have centered on making villains and sinners pay for their transgressions in violent and creative ways.
Justice League is in theaters now, and is expected to come to digital, DVD, and Blu-ray in February.
