Damn You, Marvel! Terrence Howard Not at Fault for Recasting in "Iron Man 2"

By: Adam Quigley Posted: October 18, 2008 Filed under: Casting

In a recent interview, Terrence Howard was asked about his part being recast in Iron Man 2. Apparently he was as shocked as we were.

It was the surprise of a lifetime. There was no explanation. Just...up and vanished. I read something in the trades implicating that it was about money or something, but apparently the contracts that we write and sign aren't worth the paper that they're printed on, sometimes. Promises aren't kept, and good faith negotiations aren't always held up. Even friendships, people you support...

Anybody else sense some bitter resentment after reading that? When I first heard that Don Cheadle would be playing Howard's character in Iron Man 2, I didn't care about the reason; I was simply annoyed that I wasn't going to be seeing Howard become War Machine. Now though, I just feel bad for Howard. He sounds like he's trying to remain professional about the whole ordeal, and yet you can sense his upset and frustration. He sounds more sad than angry.

Assuming that there's truth to Howard's comments, it seems I was right on in my postulating that Marvel was behind this bullshit and it was not at all the fault of Howard (despite the trade reports implying otherwise). The impression I'm starting to get here is that Marvel just wasn't entirely impressed by Howard's performance in Iron Man, and since they had already stated they were interested in having Don Cheadle cast in one of their movies, they said, "To hell with continuity!" and used the sequel as a means to make that happen. If that's the case, this doesn't exactly bode well for the Avengers movie.

What I'm really curious about here is what director Jon Favreau has to say regarding all of this. Did he support this decision? Did he fight it? Did he have any say at all? What's the deal?

[Source NPR via CHUD]