A couple of months ago it was rumoured that Jackie Earle Haley was up for the role of Sinestro in the Green Lantern movie. However the Watchmen actor seemed to quicky quash this by saying he hadn’t had any screentests for the film.
Then, when it was announced a couple of days ago that Peter Saragaard was in talks to play the main Green Lantern villain, Hector Hammond, it seemed Sinestro wouldn’t be in the movie anyway. However according to Hitfix, that’s not true. Apparently Sinestro will indeed be in the film and the people behind the movie still want Haley, but the plan is to do something rather interesting with the character.
As with several other comic book franchises, it seems they’re planning to build a story arc that will go beyond a single film. Apparently, “The groundwork is being laid in the first Lantern for a much larger role for Sinestro later on if this first movie does well.” It certainly makes sense, as in the comic the alien Sinestro starts out as one of the top members of the Green Lantern corps, before turning evil later on, so it look like they want to set up the character in the first film, ready for a possible sequel.
Let’s just hope this doesn’t turn out like Dylan Baker in Spider-man 2 and 3, who popped up for a cameo in both films, which seemed to suggest that at some point he was going to turn into the Lizard, but he never did. And with Sam Raimi leaving the franchise, now he never will.
Hitfix isn’t sure how close the studio is to a deal with Haley, and suggest the role may end up going to someone else, but it certainly sounds like they have some interesting ideas for the franchise.