I recently saw James Gunn’s new Superman movie, and as I sat there in the dark theater, I couldn’t help but think that Nicholas Hoult based his Lex Luthor on Elon Musk. Something about that smirk he kept flashing throughout the movie reminded me so much of the Tesla CEO’s. But Hoult’s mannerisms weren’t the only thing. His Luthor had several other characteristics that I, and many others, see in Musk, most notably a savior complex and a need to be adored. That’s in addition to the fact that in this film, Luthor is a tech billionaire with significant contracts with, and influence over, the government.
The thing is, during a lie detector test conducted somewhat in jest by Vanity Fair, Hoult told Superman star David Corenswet that he did not base his Lex Luthor portrayal on Elon Musk. Corenswet noted that Hoult had previously said he wanted to make his Luthor “as alpha as possible,” and asked whether there were any alpha male podcasts Hoult listened to to prep for the role. Hoult replied that he hadn’t listened to any podcasts, but he did listen “to the audiobook of Elon Musk’s book, even though I didn’t base the character on Elon at all. But I just thought it’d be interesting.” [Note: Hoult did not clarify if he was talking about Musk’s official biography, written by Walter Isaacson in 2023, or Ashlee Vance’s unofficial Musk biography, from 2015.]
Still, it’s hard not to spot the similarities between the controversial Musk and Superman’s greatest foe. And Superman isn’t the first movie with such similarities, intended or not. In recent years, Musk and other tech billionaires have seemed to have served as direct inspiration for movie villains.
Yet things haven’t always been this way.
Elon Musk inspired the most iconic superhero of the 21st century
Before Robert Downey Jr. starred as Tony Stark in 2008’s Iron Man, few people outside of the comic book world could tell you who Iron Man was. Yet, thanks largely to Downey Jr.’s portrayal, Iron Man became a household name—and kick-started the Marvel Cinematic Universe, which has allowed now-owner Disney to rake in tens of billions of dollars in box office receipts over the past 17 years.
In the script, Downey Jr.’s Stark was charming, intelligent, and slightly arrogant. He leveraged his extreme wealth and technological prowess to make the world a better place. This take on the character—who had existed in comic book form since 1963—was heavily based on Elon Musk.
In a 2022 interview with New York Magazine, Iron Man screenwriter Mark Fergus made it clear that the Tesla billionaire was an inspiration for Stark. Fergus said that Stark had historically been a Howard Hughes-style figure, but 2008’s Iron Man needed a more contemporary inspiration. Fergus and his colleagues decided that the contemporary Stark was somewhat of a trinity figure, a mixture of three people. The first two were Donald Trump and “maybe a little Steve Jobs.” But it was Elon Musk who was “the guy who grabbed the torch [from Howard Hughes]”—an industrialist who also would appear in the gossip pages.
“Trump was fun before he became president—he was actually kind of a goofy celebrity. Steve Jobs was always serious and angry; he never quite had that gift of the bullshit . . .” Fergus explained. “Musk took the brilliance of Jobs with the showmanship of Trump. He was the only one who had the fun factor and the celebrity vibe and actual business substance.”
Marvel didn’t shy away from this comparison, either. After the first film became a smash hit in 2008, the studio quickly greenlit a sequel, Iron Man 2, which came out in 2010. In that film, Downey Jr.’s Stark actually meets the real Elon Musk at a party in Monaco and compliments the real-world billionaire on SpaceX’s Merlin engines.
Yet, the late 2000s are a long time ago now, especially in terms of politics, culture, and Musk’s public persona.
Musk and tech billionaires are now movie villains
I’ve previously opined about how the world will likely never have another Steve Jobs—a tech leader beloved by the general public. There are many reasons for this. The primary one is that Big Tech companies were generally seen as wondrous institutions improving our lives on a nearly monthly basis in the early 2000s. Since then, their integration with our lives and influence over it have dramatically expanded—and not for the better.
Tech companies are now largely viewed as self-interested entities that prioritize their profits over the greater good. E-commerce giants destroy small businesses, social media companies’ engagement algorithms reward bad behavior and poison public discourse, and artificial intelligence firms are so entwined with government and power that one can’t help but be concerned about where it will all lead.
And because of this shift in public sentiment towards tech companies, a shift has also occurred in the public’s perception of the billionaire CEOs who lead them. This is perhaps nowhere more true than with Musk, who has publicly involved himself in governmental affairs of nations like no other CEO before him.
All these changes have led, rightfully, to more distrust of the tech industry and those who lead the companies that power it. Suddenly, those same leaders have become the role models for fictional movie villains.
It’s hard to watch the 2017 film The Circle and not see parallels between Tom Hanks’s evil social media CEO and Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg. And two films in 2022—Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery and Jurassic World Dominion seem to have patterned their villains after Musk and Apple’s Tim Cook, respectively.
The thing is, no director or actor in these movies has confirmed that any real-life tech CEO is the direct inspiration for these characters. In Glass Onion’s case, director Rian Johnson denied that the antagonist, Miles Bron, played by Edward Norton, was based on Musk, despite many observers seeing similarities between the two.
“That’s just sort of a horrible, horrible accident,” Johnson told Wired. But he also noted that “There’s a lot of general stuff about that sort of species of tech billionaire that went directly into [the movie],” adding, “But obviously, it has almost a weird relevance in exactly the current moment.”
That “weird relevance” has lasted years now. And, as Superman shows, it’s easier than ever for audiences to accept tech CEOs as modern-day villains, whether or not that villain is directly inspired by any singular individual. Society’s ongoing tendency to now view tech leaders as the bad guys likely means that we can expect more in the future. At least until they own all the movie studios.
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