Marvel fans are devastated by MCU Doctor Doom casting, we almost had one

Unless you’ve been living in an old boot in a cave deep in the mountains for the past few years, you’ve probably heard that Robert Downey Jr. is returning to the Marvel Cinematic Universe… as Doctor Doom.

It’s proven to be a controversial bit of casting, to say the least. Marvel fans are deeply divided over whether this is the kind of bold thinking the MCU needs, or a desperate step backwards.

Personally, I lean toward the latter, but I’m trying to keep an open mind. If Marvel can find a way to do this right and not just make the MCU’s Doctor Doom a green Iron Man, then I’m on board. I just hope whoever’s in charge remembers that he’s Reed Richards’ biggest rival in the first place.

While the casting for RDJ is now set, a new rumor is doing the rounds that we almost got a completely different Doctor Doom. According to the reactions on the internet, that would have gone down much better.

Rumors are currently swirling on Twitter that Mads Mikkelsen (Hannibal, Star Wars: Rogue One) was at one point in talks with Marvel to play Doom.

Take this with a grain of salt, as the source is completely unverified. What is interesting is how much more popular Mikkelsen’s choice seems to be/was among fans.

“It’s almost unquantifiable how much better this would have been,” Chase Mitchell wrote on Twitter in a post that has since gone viral with more than 140,000 likes and 10,000 retweets.

Mikkelsen of course previously appeared in the MCU as the villain Kaecilius in Doctor StrangeBut if the fact that he was in a previous MCU film was really a deterrent to playing Doom, I’m not sure RDJ would have gotten the job.

“RDJ will do well and we know why they brought him back but damn you are 100% right about this,” another fan agreed.

It’s worth noting that Mikkelsen’s casting still wouldn’t have done anything to address the criticism that Marvel failed to cast a real Roma actor for the role of Doom, but the overwhelming consensus seems to be that it would have been better than RDJ. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see how Marvel handles the iconic villain in The Avengers: Doomsday.