Back in July, I asked readers who they had cast in their imagination for the characters in the The Never Hero. It’s a bit overdue, but here is compilation of the responses. Some were spot on with what I had pictured when I was writing, some were a surprise, others were a complete mystery. I’ve listed all names that were brought up below, added a few of my choices and a few that have come up in email correspondence.
JONATHAN TIBBS
- Grant Gustin
- Andrew Garfield
- Daniel Radcliffe
- Stephen Amnell
- Dylan O’Brien
LEAH DELACY
- Emma Stone
- Bella Thorne
- Sophie Turner
- Summer Glau
- Anna Kendrick
COLLIN
- Jay Baruchel
- Fran Kranz
HAYDEN
- Jonah Hill
- Kevin Smith
- Nate Torrence
PAIGE
- Amanda Crew
- Ashley Greene
- Krysten Ritter
- Tara Reid
GRANT
- Alan Richton
- Zac Efron
HEYER
- Paul Bettany
- Woody Harrelson
- Julian Sands
- Jared Leto
DOUGLAS TIBBS
- Gerard Butler
LINCOLN
- Jared Padalecki
OLIVIA
- Vanessa Williams
- Cynthia Addai-Robinson
I made a few observations after compiling this:
- Subconsciously (or perhaps consciously I guess), a number of folks are seeing Peter Parker and Gwen Stacy when they imagine Jonathan and Leah. Given I grew up reading Spider-Man comics I have to wonder if I didn’t somehow cause this by accident.
- Never set out to to do it, but there is a clear casting diversity issue. I included my choices for Olivia at the bottom after noticing, though I realize now that I never actually pointed out the characters ethnicity in the text itself. Luckily, this is not an issue in the sequel as the character population grows. Still, I never planned on having a bunch of white folks interacting with one another. In self-reflection, it is disillusioning, I wasn’t aware I had such a glaring myopia in my writing. At least my male to female ratio wasn’t too skewed.
Got a better person in mind for one of these characters? Let us know in the comments.
The Never Hero: Reader’s Casting Choice