It’s incredible to think of a world without the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but in the year 2000, nobody would have believed it possible. The first X-Men movie came out in July of that year, while Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man was still two years away from swinging into theaters. As a result, the chances of an Avengers team-up film seemed rather slim.
In February 2000, though, Wizard dared to dream. The team at the pop culture magazine put together their own ideal cast for a potential Avengers movie. Some of the names are actually pretty interesting choices, while others fall straight into the 2000s daze and would have been laughed at today.
So, who would have been the genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist Tony Stark? Wizard picked Tom Selleck – well, he did have a killer mustache, right? “Tom Selleck is permanently in our cool book,” Wizard wrote. “The guy was Magnum P.I., for chrissakes. So when it came to casting armored Avenger Iron Man – who is suave playboy Tony Stark – we immediately consulted said book, and got a dead-on match.”
As Thor, the magazine picked Kevin Sorbo, who had played the lead in the popular Hercules: The Legendary Journeys TV show. Nowadays, Sorbo is better known for his controversial musings on social media, so this casting would have aged about as well as milk.
In the role of Captain America, Wizard chose former NFL star Howie Long. The basis here is that Long looked all-American and had started getting into acting thanks to his appearance in Broken Arrow. Yeah… This one is weird, because there must have been better contenders for the part.
Other hero castings included Peter Weller as Vision, Melina Kanakaredes as Scarlet Witch, Catherine Bell as Wasp, Pete Postlethwaite as Jarvis, Woody Harrelson as Hawkeye, and George Clooney as Wonder Man.
On the villainous front, there are three suggestions that need to be discussed, mostly because they would have been awesome had they happened. The first is Billy Zane as Loki.
“Loki, the God of Mischief, is so damn mean no one in Asgard dares make fun of his silly horn hat,” Wizard said. “Billy Zane is so mean, no one in Hollywood dares make fun of his work in The Phantom. We must get these crazy kids together immediately.”
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Wizard also envisioned Christopher Walken as Ultron, writing, “Ultron is a bad, bad man. Or robot, rather. Whatever he is, he’s evil. And when we think of evil we think of Christopher Walken, who’s flexed his evil muscle in films like Batman Returns and True Romance.”
The other god-tier villain casting mentioned is Terence Stamp as Immortus and Kang. “Ever meet a time lord who wasn’t English? Us neither,” Wizard wrote. “With his re-emergence on the Hollywood scene, Terence Stamp (Superman II, Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace) has shown us what it really means to master time. Let him play both evil time lords – after all, Immortus and Kang (the blue-faced guy) are really the same guy.” Amazingly, in the year 2000, it’s entirely possible that these castings could have happened in an Avengers movie. Apart from the villains, though, would the others have been as good as the actors the MCU picked? Probably not.
| Role | Wizard‘s 2000 Pick | Who Marvel Cast |
|---|---|---|
| Iron Man / Tony Stark | Tom Selleck | Robert Downey Jr. |
| Thor | Kevin Sorbo | Chris Hemsworth |
| Captain America | Howie Long | Chris Evans |
| Hawkeye | Woody Harrelson | Jeremy Renner |
| Scarlet Witch | Melina Kanakaredes | Elizabeth Olsen |
| Vision | Peter Weller | Paul Bettany |
| Wasp | Catherine Bell | Evangeline Lilly |
| Wonder Man | George Clooney | Yahya Abdul-Mateen II |
| Loki | Billy Zane | Tom Hiddleston |
| Ultron | Christopher Walken | James Spader |
| Kang / Immortus | Terence Stamp | Jonathan Majors (Kang only) |
| Jarvis | Pete Postlethwaite | Paul Bettany (voice) |
Marvel’s real Avengers return in Avengers: Doomsday on December 18, 2026, but this time Robert Downey Jr. is back as Doctor Doom, not Tony Stark.
