257. By Aslan’s Mane, is Netflix Really Casting a Lady as the Lion?

Breaking news. A new casting or creative announcement has got fans in an uproar. Alack, it must be a new day ending with the suffix -day. But in this case, the reliably rumored cast announcement is so strange, and so ghastly, and so out-and-out weird beyond the worlds, that it warrants us bumping our planned episode and focusing a whole other episode on this most bizarre and terrible news instead. We’re talking about the notion that a female actor (no shade on her) is rumored to be the new voice of Aslan.

Mission update

• Lorehaven review: Squire of Truth this week, Ice retro review next week
• Subscribe free to get updates and join the Lorehaven Guild

Episode sponsors

1. Enclave Publishing: Illuminary by Chawna Schroeder
2. Realm Makers Expo 2025
3. Johanna Frank, author of Here Lyeth
4. Inheritance by J. A. Webb

Quotes and notes

• “8 Facts About the Cancelled Silver Chair Movie,” NarniaWeb.com, Jan. 8, 2020
• “Update from Douglas Gresham Family,” NarniaWeb.com, August 2024
• Greta Gerwig ‘intimidated’ to be an American adapting The Chronicles of Narnia, The Telegraph (UK), Jan. 10, 2024
• “Make Your Voices Heard,” NarniaWeb.com, April 5, 2025

1. ‘Who is Aslan? Do you know him?’

• Aslan is the King of Beasts, the great untamed Lion, creator of Narnia.
• He’s supernatural and the Son of the Emperor-Beyond-the-Sea.
• Some call him an “allegory” for Jesus. That’s not quite what he is.
• Lewis called him a “supposal” for Christ. Think of this as an alter-ego.
• So although slandering Aslan isn’t slandering Jesus, it’s pretty close.
• Very basic to this understanding is that Aslan is a male Lion. He’s a He.
• He’s the King (not queen) of Beasts. He has a mane. He roars and rules.
• It matters, for various theological and natural reasons, that God is a He.

Aslan (left) gives a certain Netflix