Robert Pattinson is the latest hot white man in Hollywood to be cast as a serial killer in a Netflix project and is it just me or is there a pattern here?
Our beloved Batman has taken on a new role in a dark comedy/thriller scripted and directed by Adam McKay, AKA the mind behind Netflix’s Don’t Look Up.
The film, titled Average Height, Average Build (lol), follows a serial killer who hires a political lobbyist to change laws that would make it easier for him to get away with his murders, Deadline reports. It’s meant to be funny and sardonic but also a genuine thriller since, you know, it’s about murder.
Much like Don’t Look Up, the cast for Average Height, Average Build is fkn stacked: Pattinson as the lead, of course, but then we’ve also got Amy Adams as the lobbyist and Robert Downey Jr as a retired cop intent on solving Pattinson’s murders.
Robert Downey Jr. will play a retired cop opposite Robert Pattinson’s serial killer in Adam McKay’s ‘AVERAGE HEIGHT, AVERAGE BUILD.’
The cop won’t give up on the murders despite his retirement, and the killer tries to prevent him from following his trail. pic.twitter.com/5YYdDNknWw
— Film Updates (@FilmUpdates) April 30, 2023
Also like Don’t Look Up, the film will be a commentary on real-life issues — in this case, corruption in politics rather than denialism about climate change.
Now look, I personally hated Don’t Look Up.
It felt like a pretentious, condescending circle-jerk that was created to make us feel like we’re on a moral high ground, unlike those (fictional) people who are in denial about global warming. Rolling Stone put it as “one man’s wake-up-sheeple howl into the abyss”, which is pretty apt.
Given what a cringe film it was, I was initially weary about Average Height, Average Build — even if McKay’s other works like The Big Short and Vice were good — but the addition of Robert Pattinson gives me hope. I mean, pretty much every film he’s been a part of recently has been a slay, and I find it hard to imagine him involving himself in a self-gratuitous project that is actually cringe.
And hey, at least he isn’t playing a real life serial killer in a docu-soap that inadvertednly romanticses killers. Lord knows we don’t need any more horny edits of known murderers on TikTok.