Ranked: The Films Of Ben Affleck

Judging by the outcry when the decision was announced, this may be an unpopular opinion, but we were on board with the casting of Ben Affleck as Batman/Bruce Wayne in the upcoming "Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice." Less perhaps out of all-out fandom than out of a recognition that Batfleck, as he quickly came to be dubbed, seemed to suggest a nuance in the approach to the film that precious little else had given us hope for. (Plus, we also got to call him "Batfleck" — not the first time Affleck's career has been blessed/cursed by a specially-coined portmanteau). 

Affleck has a complicated sort of charisma as an actor, with the blockish all-American handsomeness of a clean-cut leading man, but something else as well — supporters might call it an intelligence, but detractors see it as a sort of sly smugness: Affleck can be both heroic and hateable. In fact, when he's been cast as simply the former, as a straight-up romantic lead or a dashing aspirational...