Why American Gods’ Recasting Of Mr. World Was So Brilliant

Warning: The following contains SPOILERS for the novel American Gods and American Gods season 3.

American Gods season 3 introduced actors Dominique Jackson and Danny Trejo as new incarnations of the New God leader Mr. World, and the recasting works brilliantly for a couple of reasons. While this was presented to his underlings as a push for diversity in their organization, it may truly be a tease as to Mr. World’s true identity and motivations in the Neil Gaiman novel American Gods, which inspired the show.

The American Gods‘ television adaptation has seen a surprising amount of turnover in its cast relative to how long it has been running. Many actors have quit American Gods or been fired from it for a variety of reasons.  Nevertheless, it was still a surprise to fans of the show when it was revealed that the role of Mr. World was being recast, as nothing had been said about Crispin Glover, who had played Mr. World in the first two seasons of American Gods, leaving the show.

The first change came in American Gods’ season 3 premiere, “A Winter’s Tale,” when Mr. World transformed into Ms. World (Dominique Jackson) and dressed down several of her henchmen while wearing a stunning gold dress with matching high heels. Later in the season, in the episode “Conscience of the King,” Ms. World changed back into Mr. World, albeit in another form. This Mr. World (Danny Trejo) was much more physically imposing that his previous incarnations, which made his threats seem all the more real as he voiced his displeasure to his followers and warned Laura Moon of the consequences should she fail to live up to her end of their bargain to work together to kill Mr. Wednesday.

While these changes might have been brought about to cover up Crispin Glover’s unavailability or to further diversify the cast, they may also serve as a subtle clue towards the truth of Mr. World’s real identity. One of the key twists of the American Gods novel was that Mr. World was truly Loki, the Norse trickster god, and that he had taken on the persona of Mr. World to indirectly make the world a more chaotic place by encouraging strife between the various deities. Beyond amusing him (which was often the only reason Loki did anything in the original Norse myths) it also increased his personal power, as Loki fed upon chaos.

Given how widely American Gods has diverged from the book’s story, it’s possible that Mr. World might not be Loki at all in the reality of the show. However, by establishing Mr. World as a shapeshifter and casting multiple actors in the role, American Gods is subtly teasing the eventual revelation that Loki is Mr. World. If that’s the case, it’s a brilliant way of taking advantage of what may have been a necessary casting decision and building upon the original book while still acknowledging it.

About The Author

Matt Morrison
(1835 Articles Published)

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Matt Morrison has been writing about comics since before the word
“blogging” was coined. He got his start writing for the
legendary DC Comics digital fanzine Fanzing,
before receiving his own column, The Mount. Since then he has gone on
to write for over a dozen websites, including 411
Mania, Comics
Nexus and The Cult of Nobody. He holds both an MS in Information
Science from the University of North Texas and a BFA from the
University of Texas at Arlington. Known as a font of comic book
history trivia, he has delivered lectures on the history of American
Comic Books, Japanese Manga, Doctor Who, and Cosplay at over a dozen conventions
and served as an Expert In-Residence for a course on Graphic Novels
for Librarians at the University of North Texas. In addition to his
work for Screen Rant, Matt is currently the Editor In Chief of
Kabooooom.com and writes reviews for No
Flying, No Tights – a graphic literature and anime review site
aimed at teachers and librarians. He also maintains a personal blog –
My Geeky Geeky Ways –
which hosts his extensive episode guide for the television series
making up The Arrowverse as well as his
comedic Let’s Play videos. What little spare time he has is
devoted towards acting, role-playing, movie-riffing and sarcasm. You
can follow his adventures on Twitter, @GeekyGeekyWays.

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