In 2018, Henry Cavill starred opposite Tom Cruise in Mission: Impossible - Fallout, an action-packed thriller full of jaw-dropping stunts. But perhaps the most memorable and enduring image from that movie occurs during the bathroom fight scene, where Cavill's character August Walker pumps his biceps while readying himself for another round of packing punches, a moment which the internet instantly decided was him "reloading" his arms. (Secondarily, the curiously edited reload also appears to add a pocket to his shirt, as well as bestowing the actor with some additional facial hair.)
During a live recording of the Happy Sad Confused podcast in New York City, Cavill joined Josh Horowitz on stage to talk about, among other things, The Witcher Season 3, his return to the DC universe, and those persistent rumours about him being the next James Bond. But he also reflected on one of the most viral moments of his career—and no, we're not talking about the uncanny horror that was his CGI moustache removal in Justice League.
"I've seen so many conversations about this on Reddit where I managed to punch a pocket square onto my shirt and grow a beard," he said, before going on to clarify that the arm-pump was actually unscripted.
"It was a very intense fight scene, we'd actually been shooting it for about three weeks at that stage, which is a long time in comparison to things like The Witcher, where you have a day," he said. "And everything starts to get quite sore after a while, because it's a lot of repetitive motion, and the connective tendons in my biceps were getting sore, so I had to warm them up before I threw punches, and I'd literally do that to warm them up, and I did it once and I thought, oh god that probably looks really stupid, I can't believe I did that."
"And then I did another take without doing it," he continued, "and [director Christopher McQuarrie] is like 'Why didn't you do that thing? That was really good.' And I was like 'That was good?' And he said 'Yes, definitely do that.'"
Philip Ellis is News Editor at Men's Health, covering fitness, pop culture, sex and relationships, and LGBTQ+ issues. His work has appeared in GQ, Teen Vogue, Man Repeller and MTV, and he is the author of Love & Other Scams.
