Ant-Man Casting: Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Paul Rudd Reportedly Frontrunners

With Edgar Wright recently tweeting that it was time to get started on Ant-Man, it's probably no surprise that the casting rumors have started to fly. And while Joseph Gordon-Levitt is the Hollywood "It" guy du jour and has generally been attached to every open job in town (including Batman, Doctor Strange and Star-Lord, just to name a few), it's perhaps more surprising to hear Paul Rudd's name is also in the mix. This time, according to reliable industry trade Variety, it sounds like it's more or less a done deal that one of these guys will wear the antennae. "Insiders warn there's still a remote possibility another actor could emerge but as of now, Gordon-Levitt and Rudd are the main contenders the role," the paper reports via their website. Rudd, in particular, has long been associated with the role, with ComicBook.com having been the first to report it. Levitt, for his part, hasn't really been talked about as Ant-Man too much but the fact that Latino Review reported a while back that he was almost certainly about to close a deal for Marvel on something could be an indicator that this has been in the works for a while. At the time, most fans suspected the news and rumor site was talking about Guardians of the Galaxy, which was casting at the time and for which Levitt had already been rumored, but Chris Pratt signed on shortly thereafter and the rumors seemed to dissipate. Casting one of these two, both of whom are young and fresh-faced and both of whom have a history of comedy work on their resume (Rudd moreso than Levitt) might lend credence to suggestions that this movie will take its stakes a bit less seriously than previous Marvel movies. Comedy director Wright being attached to write and direct had some people suspecting that from the outset and then seeing the character in test footage wearing a suit reminiscent of the one from Robert Kirkman's Irredeemable Ant-Man cemented it in many's minds.