The new Losers Club is now complete with the announcement that Isaiah Mustafa will be playing the part of Mike Hanlon in It: Chapter Two.
While Mustafa has a major role in the fantasy series Shadowhunters, some of you may know him better as the smooth-talking star of the popular 2010 Old Spice ad campaign, The Man Your Man Could Smell Like. You remember him, right? He was the shirtless guy who turned tickets into diamonds.
Old memes aside, Mustafa will be stepping into the role previously filled by the young Chosen Jacobs, who may still feature in flashbacks to the club’s high school days in the next film. Though the teenage Mike’s character arc in the first It generally took a backseat to the rest of the gang’s personal struggles, director Andy Muschietti says he has some troubling developments in mind for the character:
My idea of Mike in the second movie is quite darker from the book. I want to make his character the one pivotal character who brings them all together, but staying in Derry took a toll with him. I want him to be a junkie actually. A librarian junkie. When the second movie starts, he’s a wreck.
Stephen King loyalists may be disappointed that the sequel won’t stay true to Mike’s journey in the novel. But then again, that ship may have already sailed when the first film left out the part where Pennywise attacks him while taking the form of a giant bird.
Mustafa, meanwhile, will be joining a promising cast, including James McAvoy as Bill, Jessica Chastain as Beverly, Bill Hader as Richie, James Ransone as Eddie Kaspbrak, Jay Ryan as Ben and Andy Bean as Stanley.
Though the Losers Club have to wait 27 years for the return of Pennywise, you’ll only have to wait until September 6th, 2019, as that’s when It: Chapter Two hits cinemas.