It’s been a busy ol’ week here at Moonbase Alpha, what with Halloween celebrations and the sinister presence of a print deadline, but one of the major news stories centres on Warner Brothers’ upcoming Birds of Prey movie.

Via Variety, we now know that Ewan McGregor will be playing the nefarious Roman Sionis, aka Black Mask, in the picture. We’d already heard how Black Mask is to be the ‘big bad’ of the Cathy Yan-helmed film, and now we know that the former Obi-Wan Kenobi has landed that particular role.

Going back to his roots, Roman Sionis debuted back in 1985’s Batman #386. Created by Doug Moench and Tom Mandrake, the early word on the silver screen incarnation of the rogue has him pegged as “a brutally sadistic kingpin leading a gang called the False Face Society in Gotham City’s criminal underworld who has a fixation with masks.”

Throughout the years, the villain, like many of the Caped Crusader’s rivals, has seen his place on the totem pole vary; at times being a run-of-the-mill bad guy, at others being a truly sinister presence who is capable of all kinds of twisted acts.

In Birds of Prey, McGregor’s Sionis will be going up against Margot Robbie as Harley Quinn, Mary Elizabeth Winstead as Huntress, Jurnee Smollet-Bell as Black Canary, Rosie Perez as Renee Montoya, and a to-be-cast Cassandra Cain. And yes, already there are rumblings and speculation that McGregor may well face off against Batman at some point down the line, with him likely to have signed either a multi-picture deal or a deal that has the potential for him to be brought back to the big screen in the future.

Birds of Prey is currently booked in for a February 2020 release.