HOME TRAILERS 2013 SCHEDULE PODCASTS REVIEWS POSTERS INTERVIEWS SHORT FILMS NEWS FEEDS ABOUT APPS

LATEST NEWS

Will Yun Lee is the Silver Samurai in 'The Wolverine' + More Join Cast

by Ben Pearson
July 10, 2012
Source: Variety, ComingSoon

When Darren Aronofsky backed out of the director's chair for The Wolverine, there was a collective sigh of disappointment among film lovers everywhere. But 20th Century Fox quickly set 3:10 to Yuma helmer James Mangold as a replacement, and after some more production delays, it seems they're finally ready to begin filming. We've known for a while that the story will take place in Japan, but star Hugh Jackman recently revealed that the villain of the film will be The Silver Samurai. Now we have word on who will play the sword wielding adversary, plus news on some Japanese actors who have been cast in other key roles.

Variety reports that Korean American actor Will Yun Lee (Die Another Day, the upcoming Red Dawn remake) has been cast as Kenuichio Harada, aka The Silver Samurai. In the comics, his mutant power allows him to imbue his katana blade with a charge that will cut through anything except, notably, adamantium, which is the material of which Wolverine's claws are made, not to mention being fused to his skeleton. That should makes for some interesting fight sequences at least.

ComingSoon has some casting news of their own, pegging Hiroyuki Sanada (Rush Hour 3, The Last Samurai) as Shingen, Hal Yamanouchi (The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, Push) as Yashida, and models-turned-actresses Tao Okamoto and Rila Fukushima as Mariko and Yukio. The Shingen character is a Yakuza leader and Silver Samurai's father, and Mariko is Shingen's daughter and Wolverine's love interest, so there looks to be a lot of complicated family connections for Logan to navigate once he heads East. Shooting starts next month for a scheduled release date of July 26th, 2013.

Filed under Casting, Movie News

From around the web:

DAVIDPD

What's this?! Hollywood casting an Asian actor in the part of an Asian character?! EGADS!!!
- LosZombies
  
  Unheard of!! :O GADZOOKS!
DAVIDPD

@LosZombies lol. I know right?
http://twitter.com/FidelReyes_ Fidel Reyes

Haha this guy also played the villain in Elektra
Ehsan Davodi

I love Hiroyuki Sanada and I love see one of this great actors in this spectacular sequel either : Ken Watanabe , Chow Yun Fat , Tony Leung , Koji Yakosho , Sonny Chiba or even Takeshi Kitano
- Dominic A
  
  HMMM they have this backwards : Watanabe looks exactly like Shingen ! He even looks like the Shingen in the animated series . Sanada looks more like SS . However , Yun Lee might have the better sword skills to play SS .I think of him more from " Elektra " Good villian-just-following-orders ; except for his character thinking Elektra would actually whimper ??? Overconfidence makes him not look " 5 seconds ahead " Blame the writers ... the women look right tho .
http://aidyreviews.net AIDY

Sweet. This guy is awesome and sexy fierce !
safety dance

For a moment there I thought it's Keanu. What's with his movie 47 Ronin?Any news?
cghata

A Korean actor playing one of, if not THE biggest Japanese character in Marvel comics? I personally don't care, but this movie probably won't do very well in Japan (a media powerhouse) because of that fact. I live in japan, and they talk about every citizen that makes it into international sports, music, movies, etc. One thing they really hate, and will no doubt rant about when this movie is released, is when foreigners with no Japanese blood play Japanese characters. They couldn't stop complaining about Memoirs of a Geisha. Guy seems to be a pretty cool actor, but this country has a phone book sized listing of actors. No reason they couldn't do the obvious thing and go Japanese.
- yuji
  
  I could see this going the other way, given the Japanese affinity for Korean entertainers. He'll actually be in a movie with BoA (if you live in Japan, you know how popular she is) that will presumably do pretty well in Japan well before The Wolverine comes out. So by the time this movie comes out he very well could be a more known/desired commodity to the Japanese audience. Not to mention that the character is Yakuza-based and most everyone in Japan knows that a lot of Yakuza members are actually ethnic Koreans with adopted Japanese surnames..... so it's not as much of a stretch as say casting a Chinese woman in the role of a traditional Geisha.
kirbyfan

I want to see Sanada in some action scenes! Someone needs to give this fantastic martial artist his own movie to showcase his skills! The mainstream public don't know how good Hiroyuki Sanada really is! I don't want them to make the same mistake Tarantino did with Sonny Chiba. One of the greatest martial artist ever, and all Tarantino had him do was freaking talk? If I had Sonny Chiba in a movie I'd unleash him!!