“Gladiator II” is set for a November 2024 release, some 24 years after the original film debuted. At the end of “Gladiator,” we saw Russell Crowe’s Maximus felled, making his return impossible for the legacy sequel — though Nick Cave’s unproduced “Gladiator II” script would have seen the character resurrected. That means that a new lead actor was required for the sequel, and at the start of 2023 we learned Irish actor Paul Mescal had been cast.

The up-and-comer, who caused a small stir with his role in the miniseries “Normal People,” has been building quite a career for himself of late, landing an Oscar nomination for his performance in the brilliant “Aftersun” — the best movie of 2022 that no one knew how to talk about. He also impressed with his turn as Harry in British filmmaker Andrew Haigh’s “All of Us Strangers.” But his role as Lucius Verus II in “Gladiator II” is easily his biggest to date.

Mescal won’t be the first actor to portray Lucius in a Ridley Scott film. In fact, the original “Gladiator” saw a young version of the character portrayed by Spencer Treat Clark (“Glass,” “Weird: The Al Yankovic Story”). The 12-year-old version of the character was introduced as the son of Maximus’s old flame Lucilla (Connie Nielsen) and Lucius Verus, the former Emperor of Rome. Lucius is also the grandson of Richard Harris’ Marcus Aurelius, and will return in “Gladiator II,” with Mescal in the role.That means the now 35-year-old Treat Clark will obviously not be returning. What’s interesting, though, is that Scott has also seemingly recast the younger Lucius for flashback scenes.