Narnia Movie’s Meryl Streep Casting Causes Controversy Over Aslan Gender Swap
Meryl Streep’s potential casting as Aslan in Greta Gerwig’s Narnia is causing some controversy.
Earlier this month, Deadline reported that Streep is “in talks” to play Aslan the Great Lion in the Narnia movie that Greta Gerwig is working on for Netflix. Her casting has not yet been officially confirmed, as the two parties were “not quite at the offer stage yet” when Deadline’s article was published.
“In the novels, Aslan is a talking lion who serves as Narnia’s guardian and a guide for the human children,” the article notes. “Generally portrayed as a male, Aslan was created as an allegory for Jesus by author C.S. Lewis.”
The film will reportedly be an adaptation of Lewis’ The Magician’s Nephew, which was the sixth book in The Chronicles of Narnia series; however, it chronologically takes place before The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe and the following novels. This has not yet been officially confirmed at this time.
Why is Meryl Streep’s potential Narnia casting causing controversy?
Some readers of Lewis’ books are now upset with Streep’s potential casting. Aaron Earls wrote at The Wardrobe Door, “This would be a horrible decision for every possible reason…Art should not be up to the popular vote, but adaptations of already existing works have to give the largest voice to the original work. Gerwig and Netflix are free to develop a film series about a fantasy world created and ruled by a female lion, but that’s no longer Narnia.”
Others on X have questioned whether or not Aslan will still have a mane if portrayed by Streep.
I love Meryl Streep, I love Greta Gerwig’s films but if Aslan ends up… OK, I love the #Narnia books, CS Lewis wrote one of the best books on grief too. Check the illustrations, read the description, Aslan has a huge mane, he’s a male character. Let’s not do this. pic.twitter.com/M9MI3kIdfU
— Adam J. Yeend (@AJYeend) April 2, 2025
I hope the reports that Aslan is to be “reimagined as female” (and voiced by Meryl Streep, no less) turn out to be false. Arguably one of the most memorable scenes in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is when Aslan is shorn at the Stone Table and has his mane cruelly removed.… pic.twitter.com/CB2oylUJNF
— ?? ✨ ?????? ✨ ?????? (@MeMyselfOnline) April 8, 2025
Not everyone shares these sentiments. Claire Allfree wrote at The Telegraph, “I applaud [Gerwig’s] decision to cast Streep as Aslan. After all, Aslan is not literally Christ in the Narnia Chronicles but an imaginative iteration in keeping with the logic of Lewis’s Narnia, and thus within the parameters of Lewis’s thought experiment, ripe for living on in different form.”
Others have also chimed in supporting Streep’s casting:
This discourse on this is already SUPER exhausting. Aslan is not real. Aslan is not Jesus. It’s a talking animal movie for children. Calm down. https://t.co/fJvqjYurxE
— Lon Harris (@Lons) April 4, 2025
It’s the meme pic.twitter.com/h7ifnswS53
— December (@FriendOfAstraea) April 3, 2025
Seeing people getting mad at the idea of Meryl Streep playing Aslan, because “Aslan is Jesus, and Jesus wasn’t a woman!”
and sure, fair point to that. But I’m pretty sure he wasn’t a fucking lion, either— Dubious Sedai of the Brown Ajah (@DubiousCA) April 6, 2025
Aslan was previously voiced by Liam Neeson in the Narnia movies that were released from 2005 to 2010. Gerwig’s Narnia will get an IMAX release on Thanksgiving in 2026 before hitting Netflix on Christmas.
