Best Superhero Movie Casting

I want to know/discuss who the best casting decision ever made was. Which character has been cast perfectly?



Now, I'm talking perfect casting. An actor who looks near identical to their comic book counterparts AND embodied the character in their performance to the best of their ability with what was given in their respective script.



So, Hugh Jackman's Wolverine (while played fantastically and near definitively by him) is not represented in this list. Neither is Michael Keaton's Batman for the same reason that neither man looks like the character they are portraying does in the comics, no matter how strong/iconic their performance.



So, this is the list I've compiled. It ranges from the inspired (Heath Ledger as The Joker) to the painfully obvious (Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury). Some characters have been cast perfectly multiple times. Superman, for example. Chris Reeve plays the perfect Silver Age Superman, while Henry Cavill is a spot-on Modern Age Superman. So, some characters may appear more than once.



X-Men Film Series:



Patrick Stewart as Professor Charles Xavier

Famke Janssen as Jean Grey

Kelsey Grammer as Hank McCoy/Beast

Alan Cumming as Kurt Wagner/Nightcrawler

Michael Fassbender as Erik Lehnsherr/Magneto



Marvel Cinematic Universe



Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark/Iron Man

Chris Hemsworth as Thor

Tom Hiddleston as Loki

Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury

Hugo Weaving as Johann Schmidt/Red Skull

Anthony Mackie as Sam Wilson/Falcon

Sebastian Stan as The Winter Soldier

William Hurt as General Thaddeus E. "Thunderbolt" Ross

Terrence Howard as James Rhodes





Spider-man Film Series:



Andrew Garfield as Peter Parker/Spider-man

Emma Stone as Gwen Stacy

J.K. Simmons as J. Jonah Jameson

Alfred Molina as Otto Octavius/Doc Ock

Thomas Hayden Church as Flint Marko/Sandman



Batman Film Series:



Danny DeVito as Oswald Cobblepot/Penguin

Christian Bale as Bruce Wayne/Batman

Liam Neeson as Ra’s al Ghul

Gary Oldman as James Gordon

Heath Ledger as The Joker



Superman Film Series:



Christopher Reeve as Clark Kent/Kal-El/Superman

Henry Cavill as Clark Kent/Kal-El/Superman



Misc Comic Films:



Mark Strong as Sinestro

Chloë Grace Moretz as Mindy McCready/Hit-Girl

Sam Elliott as General Thaddeus E. "Thunderbolt" Ross

Ron Pearlman as Hellboy

Jackie Earle Haley as Walter Kovacs/Rorschach

Mickey Rourke as Marv



Feel free to add to this list in the comments, and argue/debate who should remain on this list and who should be removed from this list.



*Note** This is a list for superhero comic book films. So films like A History of Violence, Road To Perdition to not apply.

And again, this isn't purely based on acting performance. It is based on TOTAL embodiment of the character. From looks, mannerisms, to performance. Who captured the character the best that made you look at the screen and think it was the same character, ripped from the page?



-R