'Morbius' Casts Tyrese Gibson

Tyrese Gibson may not have been cast as John Stewart in Green Lantern Corps (at least, not yet), but he has managed to land an upcoming superhero movie...and one that is actually in production right now, to boot.

The actor has been cast in Morbius, the upcoming Spider-Man spinoff from Sony and director Daniel Espinosa.

The film will star Jared Leto in the title role and Doctor Who's Matt Smith in an as-yet-undisclosed role.

The approach to Morbius -- providing few details and building what is likely a character-centered action-drama around star Leto -- is similar to what Sony did with Venom, which overcame audience skepticism to become one of 2018's biggest box office hits for the studio.

According to Variety, who broke the news, details of Gibson's part are similarly unknown.

The actor, best known for roles in the Transformers and Fast & Furious franchises, has lobbied Warner Bros. on Facebook for years, hoping to land the Green Lantern gig. The film is in development hell at the moment, so nobody has been cast at all, although rumor has it that the planned film would center on the buddy cop-style relationship between Hal Jordan and John Stewart, a pair of Earth Green Lanterns with very different personalities.

In 2009, Gibson wrote Mayhem!, a comic book that he was inspired to write after being a guest at Comic Con that year, and that he has said was created in part to contribute another black superhero to the pop culture canon.

In 2017, we wrote about 5 Marvel Horror Movies worth making (following the example of Fox's New Mutants), and here's what we had to say:

"Morbius is, in a lot of ways, like Doctor Strange: a brash and talented doctor searches for a cure to his affliction, and ends up stumbling into a entire new reality he never knew existed. The main difference is that the Doctor Strange movie transported Marvel movie fans into the metaphysical worlds of "magic" and multiverse theory; Morbius would take a normal man on a journey into a frightening world of the occult, while also providing a great "man vs. his savage nature" thematic arc that has been sorely missing from the modern vampire genre. The crossover potential with characters like Blade, Ghost Rider, or the Darkhold Redeemers also makes this a good pick."

If you're not familiar with the character: Morbius "The Living Vampire" is actually biochemist Michael Morbius, who tried to cure himself of a rare blood disease, but instead infected himself with a form of quasi-vampirism, which include both the power (strength, speed, flight) and weaknesses (bloodlust, aversion to light) of a vampire. He was originally a villain who battled characters like Spider-Man and the X-Men, always searching for a cure to his disease, but he eventually he became an anti-hero who fed on the blood of the guilty.

Gibson was recently cast in the role of Teddy Pendergrass for a new biopic of the singer.

Morbius The Living Vampire premieres in theaters on July 31, 2020.

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