Just last week, we brought you the news that Natalie Portman (Black Swan, Thor), Naomi Watts (Dream House), Rachel Weisz (The Whistleblower), Anne Hathaway (One Day), Keira Knightley (A Dangerous Method) and Blake Lively (Green Lantern) are all vying for two completely different female lead roles in The Dark Knight Rises. One of the roles will be Bruce Wayne’s new love interest, and the other will be a villain.

Now, an inside source for Batman-News has told them that Tom Hardy, who was announced as an official cast-member back in mid-October will be playing the villainous role of Hugo Strange. While they do reiterate that this should be considered a rumor for now , they also mentioned that the source that gave them this information also told them that The Riddler would not appear in the film, weeks before the recent Christoper Nolan confirmed that fact in an interview, and also told them that Rachel Weisz and Anne Hathaway were in the running for the lead female role, a couple of weeks before it was public knowledge.

Hugo Strange first appeared in a February 1940 issue of Detective Comics and was one of the first villains that Batman ever faced, having appeared in the comics long before both The Joker and Catwoman.

One of the earlier comic book versions of Strange sees him as a scientist who uses a stolen “concentrated lightning” machine that he uses to generate a dense fog, allowing him to rob banks unseen. He later escapes from the “city asylum” (later known as Arkham Asylum) with “five insane patients” and uses them as test subjects, turning them into hulking zombies by administering a powerful artificial growth hormone that acted on the pituitary gland; a side effect caused the victim to become a mindless brute. Strange administers it to Batman, but the Caped Crusader saves himself by creating a drug that prevented any abnormal secretions from the pituitary gland. Later, a punch from Batman sends Strange falling to his apparent death.

There have been many versions of Strange throughout the years, head over to the DC Wikia if you’d like to read up on the others.

The Dark Knight Rises is slated to hit theaters on July 20th, 2012.