After what seems like an eternity in development, we’re now less than a year away from the arrival of the fourth instalment in George Miller’s post-apocalyptic action series Mad Max, with Tom Hardy (The Dark Knight Rises) taking over from Mel Gibson as Max Rockatansky in Mad Max: Fury Road.
Considering Gibson’s troubles over the past few years, it comes as little surprise that the series has found itself with a new leading man, however according to Miller – who directed Mel in the first three movies – the decision to bring in another actor was purely down to Gibson’s age.
“I have a great affection for Mel. I was really heartbroken to see him go into [the scandals],” said Miller, who initially planned to stick with Gibson when he started devoping Fury Road over a decade ago. “But it’s a new time. I hope Mel gets to act in more movies because I think he’s a wonderful actor. You’re picking up the characters and the backstory as you go. And in order to create that backstory, we found ourselves having written two other screenplays. One of them is completed. The other one is in the form of a kind of unedited novel. So by the time we got there, we realised we’ve got a couple more Mad Max stories to tell, and that … required us to cast someone who was younger.”
Are you looking forward to seeing Tom Hardy in the role, or would you have liked to see Gibson back for another outing? Let us know your thoughts…
Mad Max: Fury Road is set for release on May 15th 2015, with a cast that also includes Charlize Theron (Prometheus), Nicholas Hoult (X-Men: Days of Future Past), Hugh Keays-Byrne (Mad Max), Nathan Jones (Conan the Barbarian), Zoë Kravitz (X-Men: First Class), Riley Keough (Magic Mike), Rosie Huntington-Whiteley (Transformers: Dark of the Moon), Josh Helman (X-Men: Days of Future Past), Jennifer Hagan (Jack) and newcomers Abbey Lee Kershaw and Courtney Eaton. Watch the trailer here.
Originally published August 11, 2014. Updated January 18, 2020.
