“So, you know, there’s been mutual interest with myself and DC for many years to find the right character. I, like everyone here in the room, love superheroes. So there’s been mutual interest with us for years, and we’ve been having ongoing discussions, myself and DC, for years about the right character, what the right character would be. That’s another thing, too: It had to be right.”

When pressed for which role he was in talks to play, Johnson cryptically responded with three qualities of the character.

“The first quality we were looking for was that he had to be extremely complex and have a lot going on,” he said. “What that does for me as an actor and the studio is it gives us space that we can explore; his complexities.

“The other quality was that he had to – the character we were looking for had to be well-known but never brought to life. Then what that does again as an actor, it gives me a little bit of space, and we talked about personality. It just gives me a chance to put an imprint into his personality, with the set of tools that I could bring to the table and put a very unique twist on his personality, but still pay homage to who he is.”

“The third thing – and most important – is he had to be a badass motherfucker, OK, and on a Superman level of power, where [he] could throw down. In those three qualities, I’m happy we’ve found that character.”