It's been a few weeks since Ben Affleck was cast as Batman in Zack Snyder's upcoming Man of Steel sequel. And now that the inevitable fan backlash has died down a little, the actor has finally made his first public statement as Batman — though not, alas, in a raspy Christian Bale voice. (The Batman talk starts at about 1:43 in the video above.)
"They called me up and said, 'Do you want to do this?'" said Affleck during an interview on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon. "And I thought, 'I'm not 25, man. Are you sure about this?' And they said, 'Come down, we want to show you what we're doing.'"
"It was incredible. Zack Snyder's directing it — he has this incredible take on that's… Obviously, you can't do what [Christopher Nolan and Christian Bale] did. Those movies are amazing. He wants to do something different, but still in keeping with that. I thought, 'This is a brilliant way to do this, and I really know how to hook into this. And I said, 'Okay, I want to do it.'
(Related: The 7 best Batmans, as ranked by their chins)
Affleck went on to explain that the studio prepared him for the significant fan backlash he received by sending him a collection of the fan reactions to previous actors cast in the franchise. "People who were in these movies, and who did a great job — and these things were like 'KILL HIM!' And he was amazing! But before the movie comes out… It doesn't matter what you think then, it matters what you think when you see the movie, obviously."
And for any fans hoping they could complain Affleck out of the role, here's some bad news: "I handle shit. I'm very tough," said Affleck. Even the most skeptical fans would have to admit that this is a very Batman-like attitude.
