Jon Cryer names Gene Hackman & Michael Rosenbaum as best Lex Luthor

Last Updated on July 30, 2021

Zack Snyder's Justice League has inspired a new debate about who was the best actor to ever portray Lex Luthor thanks to Jesse Eisenberg's appearance as the character near the end of the film. The social media chatter has gotten so much attention that Jon Cryer, who plays Lex Luthor on The CW's Supergirl, is jumping in to declare who he believes is the best of the bunch.

Cryer actually shouted out two actors to portray the iconic villain. Taking to Twitter, Cryer posted "As far as I'm concerned, there are dueling #LexLuther GOATS. And these are them." The caption is attached to a picture of both Gene Hackman, who previously played Lex Luthor in the Superman movies with Christopher Reeve, and Michael Rosenbaum, who brought the character to life for a younger generation on Smallville. You can check out Cryer's tweet below:

Michael Rosenbaum noticed the acknowledgment and gave his appreciation in a response from one Lex Luther to another:

The debate over who is the best Lex Luthor actually caused the character to trend on social media and given the various responses, it seemed that just about any portrayal of the character had fans, including the vocal performances of Clancy Brown in Superman: The Animated Series and Giancarlo Esposito in Harley Quinn. Brown also chimed in about the attention on Lex Luthor and wrote "So many opinions flying around about #LexLuthor. Looks like #Lex figured out how to infiltrate #twitter right under the alien's nose."

Who is YOUR favorite actor to play Lex Luthor? Check out some of the Twitter debates below!