Julian McMahon first played Doctor Doom in 2005's Fantastic Four for what proved to be a largely disappointing take on the iconic villain. Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer went some way in making up for that, but both movies left fans wanting more.
Unfortunately, Toby Kebbell's take on Doom in 2015's Fantastic Four reboot did little to make up for those earlier efforts and it's now down to Robert Downey Jr. to do right by Victor Von Doom.
The former Iron Man's casting was announced at last year's San Diego Comic-Con. He'll suit up in Avengers: Doomsday and Avengers: Secret Wars, with a cameo in The Fantastic Four: First Steps looking likely.
Talking to Screen Rant at SXSW, McMahon had nothing but good things to say about Downey taking over as Doom in the MCU.
"It's Robert, you know what I mean? What are you going to say? His body of work speaks for itself. He's a super talented guy. I love watching his work," the actor enthused. "When we did the movies years ago, we were at the [precipice] of all that stuff happening."
"So, we were finding our way a lot, and we were trying to figure out what space the movie itself lived in. Was it a kid's movie? Was it a family movie? Was it more comedy-driven, or was it more trauma-driven? We were trying to find all that stuff as we were shooting."
"I think now that there's so many different realms of establishment of the way that you look at those pieces, you can pretty much do so many different things now," McMahon continued. "If you've got Robert Downey Jr, who's one of the great creatives of the last however many years we've been watching him for, mixed with the elements of how we can make movies these days? I think it's going to be pretty extraordinary."
Opinions remain divided when it comes to whether Downey is the right choice to play the MCU's new big bad. tThe biggest worry seems to be that he'll basically be an evil Tony Stark in Doom's armour.
Back to McMahon and, despite the Multiverse being in play, we don't expect to see any Doom Variants in the next Avengers movies. That would somewhat water down the villain's presence, a concern many fans shared about the Council of Kangs.
"I never got to express Doctor Doom the way that I saw Doctor Doom," McMahon said in a 2017 interview. "If Marvel Studios got Doctor Doom back, and I could play him the way I always wanted to, as a sniveling, conniving, freaky guy, I would do that for sure. The character I most want to play is the character I’ve already played! There’s so much there!"
Avengers: Doomsday is set to be released in May 2026, with Avengers: Secret Wars scheduled to arrive in May 2027.