Here Are 18 Actors Who Were Almost Cast As Your Favorite Marvel Characters

    I'd still pay to see the Spider-Man movies starring Timothée Chalamet though.

    Lauren Garafano
    by Lauren Garafano

    BuzzFeed Staff

    1. Tom Hiddleston originally auditioned for Thor, but obviously was cast as Loki instead.

    Getty Images / Marvel / Everett Collection

    Tom told Jimmy Fallon that he never actually auditioned for the part of Loki.

    2. Chadwick Boseman initially auditioned for Drax the Destroyer in Guardians of the Galaxy, but the role went to Dave Bautista.

    Getty Images / Marvel / Everett Collection

    3. Lee Pace was a serious contender for the role of Peter Quill but Chris Pratt was cast instead. Lee went on to play Ronan the Accuser.

    Getty Images / Marvel / Everett Collection

    Back when he was auditioning in 2012, he said, "I go in on Monday to meet them all and audition for it, so wish me luck...I'm very excited about it. The script is great...I have been [reading up on Star-Lord]. You want to know what you're doing. The character is a lot of fun. I hope it works out. We'll see."

    4. Saoirse Ronan was the "prototype" for the character of Scarlet Witch, but the role ultimately went to Elizabeth Olsen.

    Getty Images / Marvel / Everett Collection

    She told The Mary Sue that she hadn't heard much about auditioning for the role, but she was open to joining the MCU someday.

    5. Sebastian Stan originally auditioned for Steve Rogers but was told he wasn't right for the part and was offered the role of Bucky Barnes instead.

    Getty Images / Marvel / Everett Collection

    Luckily, he thought Bucky was a "much better role."

    6. Emily Blunt was Jon Favreau's first choice for Black Widow, but due to conflicts with the movie Gulliver's Travels Emily had to drop out.

    Getty Images / Marvel / Everett Collection

    7. Jason Momoa was in the running for Drax but he turned it down.

    Getty Images / Marvel / Everett Collection

    He told IGN, "I want my children to see their father happy. It's not that it's not a good role, it just wasn't the right thing. I was on Stargate: Atlantis for four years playing a similar character called Ronon, who was an alien who didn't say much and grunted. I've been there and done that, whether people have seen it or not."

    8. At one point, Sam Rockwell was in the running to screen test for Tony Stark. He didn't get the part but felt like his Iron Man 2 character, Justin Hammer, was his "chance to be Tony Stark."

    Getty Images / Marvel / Everett Collection

    He told A.V. Club, "In a way, I think Jon [Favreau] was basically saying, 'This is your chance to be Tony Stark. This will be your version of Tony Stark.' We gave him the glasses and kind of sleazed him up a little. But that’s exactly right. It was a chance to do Tony Stark."

    9. Amandla Stenberg was very close to being cast as Shuri but dropped out because they felt the character should be played by a dark-skinned Black actor.

    Getty Images / Marvel / Everett Collection

    They told CBC, "These are all dark skin actors playing Africans and I feel like it would have just been off to see me as a biracial American with a Nigerian accent just pretending that I'm the same color as everyone else in the movie... That was really challenging, to make that decision, but I have no regrets. I recognize 100% that there are spaces that I should not take up and when I do take up space it's because I've thought really, really critically about it and I've consulted people I really trust and it feels right."

    10. Danny DeVito auditioned for Rocket, but Guardians of the Galaxy director James Gunn felt that the character needed a younger-sounding voice.

    Getty Images / Marvel / Everett Collection

    In a Facebook Live Q&A, he said, Danny was "an older man now and Rocket is not an older man, he’s a younger man. And Danny DeVito’s voice just wouldn’t work."

    11. Katherine Langford was cast as an older version of Tony Stark and Pepper Potts' daughter Morgan in Avengers: Endgame. Her scene was cut though because the creators felt like it was too confusing.

    Getty Images / Marvel / Everett Collection

    12. John Krasinski was asked to audition for Steve Rogers way before Chris Evans had even been offered the role.

    Getty Images / Marvel / Everett Collection

    At his audition, he was asked to try on Captain America's suit and as he was pulling it up, Chris Hemsworth walked by and said, "Ya look good, mate." John joked that he left right after seeing how "jacked" Chris was.

    13. Timothée Chalamet auditioned for Peter Parker and was apparently very stressed during it.

    Getty Images / Marvel / Everett Collection

    He said, “I read twice and I left sweating in a total panic. I called my agent, Brian Swardstrom, and I said, ‘Brian, I thought about this a lot and I have to go back and knock on that door and read again.'"

    14. Jessica Chastain was up for both Maya Hansen in Iron Man 3 but turned it down due to scheduling conflicts. She was also offered Dr. Christine Palmer in Doctor Strange but decided if she was gonna be in a Marvel movie she wanted to be cast as a hero.

    Getty Images / Marvel / Everett Collection

    15. Yahya Abdul-Mateen II was testing to play M'Baku before Winston Duke was offered the role.

    Getty Images / Marvel / Everett Collection

    16. DeWanda Wise was originally supposed to play Maria Rambeau but had to drop out because of her prior commitment to Netflix's She's Gotta Have It.

    Getty Images / Marvel / Everett Collection

    17. Matthew McConaughey was offered the role of Ego in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 but he turned it down to be in The Dark Tower.

    Getty Images / Marvel / Everett Collection

    He said, "I like Guardians of the Galaxy, but what I saw was 'It's successful, and now we've got room to make a colorful part for another big-name actor.' I'd feel like an amendment. The Dark Tower script was well written, I like the director and his take on it, and I can be the creator, the author of the Man in Black — aka the Devil — in my version of this Stephen King novel."

    18. Finally, Amanda Seyfried turned down the role of Gamora because she didn't want to be green and she thought Guardians of the Galaxy wouldn't do well.

    Getty Images / Marvel / Everett Collection

    She said, "I didn't want to be part of the first Marvel movie that bombed. I said, 'Who wants to see a movie about a talking tree and a raccoon?' Which is clearly — I was very wrong... I remember Jennifer Lawrence talking about once how long it took her to get blue. And I was like, 'That seems like hell on Earth,' because then you get to set and you're only there for a couple hours, and then you have to take everything off. And that was literally the reason."