What’s your most mundane celebrity encounter? I once met Jamie Carragher, who is considered a celebrity round my parts, walking home from a football match. I said, “you alright mate?” He said, “sh*te game wasn’t it?” It was. His brisk pace left me well behind, presumably because he didn’t want to bother with my mindless chatter any more, or maybe he had an appointment at the orthodontist.

Henry Cavill painting Warhammer is on this same level of mundane for me. Sure he’s a famous actor, sure he’s incredibly hot, sure he reads the Horus Heresy novels, and sure he paints miniatures in his downtime between takes. But I do two of those things and nobody writes social media threads about how much I’m doing for the hobby.

Maybe I need to reload my arms before starting painting.

I like Henry Cavill well enough. His movies are alright, I liked his character in Mission Impossible. I’m not into the DCEU, but people like Man of Steel, I think. The Witcher was alright, but I don’t subscribe to the belief that Cavill saved the show from complete lore-breaking like others do (we don’t know what happened behind the scenes). He seems quite amicable on press tours. He’s undeniably a sexy man. Did I mention that already?

But Warhammer fans have latched onto Henry Cavill’s Warhammer interest with parasocial abandon. His Adeptus Custodes force is fine, even if the Emperor’s golden bois (and now gals) are a bit boring for my more Chaotic tastes. But why is everyone obsessed with Cavill and his Warhammer fandom?

The obvious first port of call is that he’s an ambassador for the hobby. He engages in choreographed conversations on international talk shows where a Graham Norton type will say, “And you’re into… World of Warcraft?” The audience laughs pleasantly as Cavill corrects him. “I just really enjoy it,” Cavill responds, exuding hotness and making every middle-aged woman (and most of the middle-aged men) in the immediate vicinity blush. He’s a palatable persona to spread the gospel of Warhammer 40K.

Henry Cavill is well known for being hot and cool. So when he talks about the artistry of painting and the quality of the novels, suddenly Warhammer might be a little bit cooler, too? He’s the antithesis of the stereotype that everyone who plays Warhammer is a sweaty nerd, and Warhammer players love that.

As well as being an ambassador to the general public, Cavill has not-insignificant influence in Hollywood, too. The Warhammer TV show on Amazon seems to be entirely his brainchild, or at the very least he’s the face of the PR campaign. We don’t even know if the show is being made, just that talks are happening and Cavill is ‘attached’. Whether he’ll produce, star, or which story he’ll tell are all unknowns. But, in the eyes of Warhammer players across the internet, he’s Definitely Playing Eisenhorn in a Perfect Adaptation of the Thing They Love.

His position as de facto lore ambassador of The Witcher has also endeared Warhammer fans to the idea that Cavill ‘gets it’.

There’s another side to this, though. In reality, Henry Cavill is a sign that Warhammer is getting more mainstream, something everyone has noticed over the past decade. Games Workshop has ridden on the coattails of Dungeons & Dragons’ post-Stranger Things popularity boom to heights the hobby has never seen before.

This has been combined with a new approach to miniatures, rule-writing, and advertising that is far more inclusive and welcoming to new players, meaning the game is more popular than ever. Games Workshop and Warhammer are no longer niche, and Henry Cavill’s ascent to deification has mirrored this spike in popularity.

But, to many, Cavill represents the platonic ideal of a Warhammer player. He has a killer jawline and a hot girlfriend. He’s a man that millions aspire to be and millions more aspire to be with. And he plays Warhammer.

An uncharitable take would suggest that the cult of Cavill is so keen to deify him because of his whiteness and masculinity. For many gatekeepers in the hobby, Warhammer is a refuge for white men that is being eroded by the wokerati (women and people of colour). Because we all know that women and PoC can’t enjoy fantasy and science-fiction, it’s all a ruse to impose themselves on white men.

I’m not suggesting that every Henry Cavill fan is a sour gatekeeper. But you have to wonder why he is platformed so incessantly on social media when Rahul Kohli, another A-list celebrity with a Warhammer obsession, is barely mentioned. Both post about their latest projects on social media, both are bona fide movie stars in their own right, so what gives? Cavill’s name is on the Amazon show that may or may not be being made, but that’s the only difference I see.

I’m not going to suggest that Henry Cavill is popular because he’s white. That’s clearly not the case. He’s popular because he’s a sexyhot superstar. And he does Warhammer. But I’m not entirely sure why he’s held in such high regard, as if he is the CEO of Games Workshop and not just a man who paints toy soldiers like the rest of us. His privilege certainly helps that status, but it’s not the only thing he has going for him.

Ultimately, I think people are just happy that cool, popular people like their nerdy hobbies, too. Anyone who played Warhammer in school during the ‘90s or ‘00s knows that we weren’t cool. I had a teacher read my name on the register and say, “Ben Sledge, that’s a rockstar name.” He looked up, saw my enormous Workshop-branded case of Warhammer, and said, “Maybe not.” Honestly, that’s hilarious with 20 years of hindsight, but it destroyed a 12-year-old kid who got enough of that from his classmates. Imagine if Henry Cavill had come to my aid right then. That teacher would have felt so embarrassed. That would have shown him.

This is the mindset that many Warhammer fans still carry with them, a chip on their shoulder formed by years of embarrassment – either from peers or self-inflicted. The only antidote? Henry Cavill. One of the cool kids saying that, actually, they like how you painted that Space Marine. Standing up for you and saying that, no, you do have a rockstar name. Henry Cavill is the man the average Warhammer player wishes they were, they were with. At the very least, he’s the man the average Warhammer player wishes was on their side.