Big Casting News -- Guess Who Plays Teddy's New Gay Fling on "90210?"

Actor Trevor Donovan (left) will soon be playing opposite Alan Ritchson

TV Line is reporting that Alan Ritchson has been cast to play a character named "Tripp" on 90210. Fan yourselves gay fanboys - because Tripp is a love interest for Teddy (Trevor Donovan)!

Tripp makes his first appearance in episode 318 of 90210, to air in March. The setting for his grand entrance is Cabo San Lucas during Spring Break, so presumably there will be lots of beach scenes and swim trunks involved!

We previously shared detailed spoilers about the upcoming storyline here - but don't look if you don't want to know exactly what happens between Tripp and Teddy. (It's pretty steamy!)

Just a litle background on Ritchson in case you aren't familiar with him: In American Idol's 3rd season he was one of the top 87 contestants.  (In one audtion episode he memorably stripped for Paula.)

He also has done an absolutely heroic amount of underwear modeling.

When he showed up on Smallville as Aquaman he definitely impressed with his physique, but early on his acting chops were, well, let's just say it's hard to stand out as a bad actor on Smallville (there's so much competition!), but I thought he did.

He got better with subsequent appearances however. Note: there always seemed to be a recurring theme to Aquaman's storyline - always clad only in board shorts, bound somewhere and deprived of water. Ritchson can play "parched" now like nobody's business.

Then he went and landed a big role on Spike TV's Blue Mountain State. He plays an oversexed dumb lug of a football player. And he's really good in that role.

His upcoming character on 90210 sounds vastly different from anything he's done before (other than possibly the underwear modeling). It will be interesting to see if Ritchson can pull off playing a privileged, private school educated Ivy Leaguer. At any rate, we'll be tuning in to find out!

Are you excited about this casting news?