Is Sam Worthington the real deal or the male Gretchen Mol, an actor pushed on us by Hollywood who we eventually more or less reject? Only time will tell, but Worthington is getting a lot of time. Sure, he didn’t set the world afire in Terminator Salvation but he has Avatar next month and Clash of the Titans next year. And now he has a new role, according to Mania, and it comes from a yet-to-be-published comic, called The Last Days of American Crime. Says Mania:

In a near-future America, news has broken that, in a matter of weeks, the government is set to roll out mind-control technology that will kill the criminal impulse in all citizens. Chaos descends on America’s cities as the country braces for the new order. Career criminal Graham Brick is forced to accelerate the heist of his career with an untested new crew in order to beat the deadline. What could possibly go wrong?

“It’s really motivated by Mamet’s ‘Heist’ film and James Ellroy’s [novel] ‘American Tabloid’,” [creator Rick] Remender explained. “Ellroy being an example of the kind of hard-boiled crime that has a socio-political backdrop and Mamet’s ‘Heist’ a very well-thought out film that focuses on the heist itself.”

Worthington, seen recently in ‘Terminator: Salvation’ and returning next month in James Cameron’s ‘Avatar’ will take the role of Kevin Cash, the safecracker who (along with his beautiful girlfriend Shelby) is enlisted in the heist at the last minute.

Worthington actually pays a friend to go to Comic Con and to read comics to find properties for him – a very wise move for an up and coming action hero. I don’t know if he came to this nascent project from that direction, but it makes plenty of sense.

Talking to Sam on the sets of Terminator Salvation and Clash of the Titans I found him to be an incredibly personable guy; I hope he figures out a way to bring that to his screen roles.

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