As fans will know, the ending of the first Gladiator (2000) film sees Maximus bite the dust and join his dead family in the afterlife, leaving questions as to how Scott plans to continue the series.
On the Fitty and Wippa podcast, Crowe himself confirmed that he would not be returning to act in the sequel. Instead, the story will centre around Lucius, Lucilla’s (Connie Nielsen) son and Commodus’ (Joaquin Phoenix) nephew.
This premise spawns a whole manner of potential conflicts for our new hero. With Lucilla’s no doubt honourable commemoration of Maximus, but his own family’s blood being spilled by this same man, how will Maximus’s legacy impact the character of Lucius?
Paul Mescal has experienced huge acclaim for his roles in lowkey indie drams and limited series such as Aftersun (2022) and Normal People (2020). His ability to give subtly devastating performances is undeniably impressive, yet, his roles have never been placed in an action-filled world on the scale of something like Gladiator.
The reason Crowe’s performance worked so well, resided in his mix of vulnerability with straight up stoic bad-assery. Mescal has not taken a role before in in which he brawls with bad guys in sprawling action scenes, only parts in which he cries especially well.
But fear not, I believe there are foundations in place to make the perfect Gladiator hero already within Paul’s toolkit. In scenes of Gaelic football in Normal People, glimpses of a hunky brute flash briefly. Replace the teenage boys he flings aside with toughened savages, and his mouth guard with a full set of glimmering gold armour, and you have a first rate hero.
Now imagine that same figure, that pillar of masculinity, on his knees wracked over with grief and sadness at his fallen comrades. I believe Paul Mescal has the range to amaze the audience with sequences of violence, but also devastate them with powerful emotion.
All that’s left to do now is hunker down and wait.
