Letitia Wright Won’t Be The New Black Panther?
Could Letitia Wright as Shuri be fully out of the Black Panther sequel? Things might be shaping up that way for the actress
This article is more than 2 years old
Letitia Wright looked like she was all lined up and ready to take the mantle as the next Black Panther when the franchise continued with the sequel. But apparently, that’s looking less and less like the case with the studio possibly looking to go a completely different direction and away from the actress. If she’s not going to lead Wakanda, then who is? Marvel has some interesting options possibly lined up to don the adamantium suit and get to work.
This latest rumor comes from a Reddit post, co-opted from 4chan that has a whole host of different Marvel rumors. Like we’ve said before, Reddit threads can be a mixed bag when it comes to actual sourced material. But this latest one contains a number of very specific tidbits of news about what’s coming in Marvel’s Phase Four of production. One of those rumors had to do with the direction of the Black Panther sequel. Long-expected to see Letitia Wright as her Shuri character taking over for T’challa, it looks like now Marvel fancies bringing back Erik Killmonger for the role.
Where this rumor falls down a little bit to start is around the rather obvious: Erik Killmonger didn’t appear to survive the events of the original Black Panther movie. But this being the comic book movie universe with reality shaping and shifting to whatever a story demands, I doubt it would be too heavy a lift to bring him back in some fashion. That being said, this role looked like it had Letitia Wright written all over it considering Shuri was next in line for the Wakanda throne as T’Challa’s sister.
Who takes the role as the next Black Panther comes in the wake of the tragic death of star Chadwick Boseman over the summer. What should have been his role to play for years to come, likely at the center of the Marvel Universe, was no more when he lost a fight to cancer. This left the movie in a state of flux with some thinking it would spell the end for the character going forward. But with others in line like Letitia Wright, it did make sense for the studio to want to continue the story in some fashion.
Letitia Wright may have tweeted her way out of the lead in the Black Panther sequel though when, over the summer, she shared some social media posts concerning the efficacy of Covid-19 vaccines. At the time, it appeared she was sharing *information* from conspiracy accounts that lacked validity. The backlash from the posts had the actress quickly delete social media accounts and she even issued a public apology. At the time, this looked like it saved her from going the Gina Carano route of having a full ouster.
And though Letitia Wright doesn’t seem to have been outright fired, there hasn’t been much in the way from Marvel around confirming how this next Black Panther would play out. There was some speculation that if it wasn’t Shuri then Winston Duke’s M’Baku would take the mantle. While this rumor circulated a couple of months ago, little has come of it since.
Besides Ryan Coogler being confirmed to continue directing the Black Panther sequel, there is still so much that is unknown around what happens next with the movie. We don’t even know who the star will be. It could be Michael B. Jordan returning as Killmonger or Letitia Wright may still have the gig as Shuri. It stands to reason we start getting confirmations soon with the film set for a 2022 release.
