Maybe it's because we have a thing for guys who like reading Shakespeare, Jane Austen, and Charlotte Bronte, or maybe it's just because we like men who can still look smokin' in wicked mustaches and cheesy costumes. But whatever it is, we love hot actors with an affinity for period pieces. These six stars are some of our favorite repeat offenders, as they've managed to make time travel sexy. But which historical characters do you find the hottest? See Michael, Colin, James, Orlando, Brad, and Leo in their best vintage roles now!
Mr. Darcy is Elizabeth Bennet's aloof love interest we can't help but love in Jane Austen's turn of the 19th century-set novel, Pride and Prejudice. And although many have played the character, Colin's representation in the TV miniseries is the most iconic.
Tom Lefroy was Jane Austen's too-cute love interest in Becoming Jane, set in 1795. The plot of the historical fiction flick was based on a rumored relationship between Jane and Tom.
Balian de Ibelin grows from a beaten down blacksmith into a leader of Jerusalem during the crusades of the 12th century in Kingdom of Heaven.
Leo loves his period pieces, which makes sense considering he looks like he's travelled back in time with his ageless good looks as Jay Gatsby in 2013's adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's 1925 novel The Great Gatsby. Cheers to that!
The handsome Rochester is played to steamy perfection by Michael in the adaption of Emily Bronte's Victorian-era novel Jane Eyre. Even though he's cold and mysterious, Rochester falls for his governess Jane.
Brad is the hottest Nazi killer around as Lt. Aldo Raine in Tarantino's violent WWII-set black comedy, Inglourious Basterds.
King George VI is played by Colin in The King's Speech, which is based on a true story of the king set in the 1930s. And although he starts off as a difficult, stammering, and angry prince, we see him mature as his speech improves into the king he was born to be.
Frederick Aiken is a young war-hero lawyer in the 1800s defending the only female co-conspirator charged with the murder of Abraham Lincoln in The Conspirator.
Will Turner rocks the rugged 1700s pirate look in the Pirates of the Caribbean movies.
Looking especially good-looking in his retro sunglasses, Frank Abagnale Jr. is the con-artist protagonist in '60s-set Catch Me If You Can.
In pre-WWI set A Dangerous Method, psychiatrist Carl Jung has some questionable, and sexual, methods for treating a beautiful and troubled woman. (Hint: they include spanking!)
Brad is still sexy rocking his hipster haircut as Army sergeant Don "Wardaddy" Collier in World War II-set Fury.
Set in the 1660s, the fictional film based on the real painting, Girl With a Pearl Earring, explores the relationship between the Dutch painter Johannes Vermeer and his muse.
Robbie Turner is the honorable and romantic protagonist in Atonement, who must join the army instead of going to medical school when he is accused of rape by the younger sister of the girl he loves in this '30s period piece.
Nothing like a guy in armor, right? Paris looked smokin' in it in Troy; he even won over the beautiful Helen of Troy.
Leo does double duty in The Man in the Iron Mask as the 1669 King of France, King Louis XIV, and his secret hidden twin brother Philippe who had been imprisoned for six years.
Clean-cut Lt. Archie Hicox looks incredible in his uniform in the WWII film Inglourious Basterds.
Gun slinging looks good on Brad Pitt as he plays Jesse James, aka "the fastest gun in the west," in the 1882-set Western The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford.
John "Jack" Worthing, aka Earnest, finds himself in a tricky situation thanks to some white lies in the film adaption of Oscar Wilde's play The Importance of Being Earnest.
Valentin Bulgakov is a mediating secretary who falls love in The Last Station, a film about Leo Tolstoy's final months in 1910.
The Duke of Buckingham has quite the facial hair in The Three Musketeers, which is set in the 17th century.
He may have lost his looks by the end, but Leo's Howard Hughes in The Aviator is quite the looker as the young director and aviator in this 1920s-'40s biopic.
Set mostly in 1962, X-Men First Class features a troubled Erik Lensherr before he becomes Magneto, complete with several notable beefy shirtless scenes.
Brad could suck my blood any day as the long-locked 18th century vampire in Interview With the Vampire.
Colin Firth is dashing as a famous illusionist in the 1920s in Woody Allen's Magic in the Moonlight. The man knows how to wear a suit.
Irish immigrant Amsterdam Vallon is on a quest to avenge the murderer of his father in the Civil War-set Gangs of New York.
Michael Fassbender is pure handsome as a struggling modernist painter who falls for a romance novelist in the British adaptation Angel, which is set in the early 20th century.
It really doesn't get any hotter than Brad Pitt's rugged role as Tristan in Legends of the Fall, which is set in the Montana wilderness starting around the early 20th century. That hair though.
The Last Legion is loosely inspired by 5th-century European history, specifically the fall of the Western Roman Empire, and stars Colin Firth's luxurious curls.
Everything isn't what it seems on the picture-perfect outside of Revolutionary Road's '50s family man Frank Wheeler.
Shakespeare gets a sexy leading man in Fassbender when he took on the role of Scottish King Macbeth in the 2015 historical drama.
Brad bares his bulging muscles as Achilles in Troy, which is loosely based on Homer's Iliad — and we don't hate it.
Who didn't fall for lovelorn artist Jack Dawson in the tragic classic Titanic? He had me at "I'm the king of the world!"
Michael Fassbender is fiercely sexy as Roman officer Quintus Dias in Centurion, which is set in Scotland in the early second century AD.