MAJOR spoilers for Black Panther: Wakanda Forever ahead.
In true Marvel fashion, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever managed to shock audiences with a surprise cameo from Michael B. Jordan. If you’ve watched the Marvel movies in order, you know that Jordan’s villain Killmonger is one of the best villains in the MCU, and people had been anxiously waiting to see if the actor would return for the Black Panther sequel. The Creed star managed to keep his cameo a secret, and now that the film is out he’s finally broken his silence about playing a small role in Wakanda Forever.
Leading up to the second installment in the Black Panther movies, Jordan had been asked many times if he’d play a role in it. He remained tight-lipped, giving blunt responses, like saying on a scale of one to ten, the odds of Killmonger returning were a two. He also claimed he didn’t know much about the movie, and that he didn’t know if he’d return saying “who knows how things will shake out.” Well, things shook out, and Jordan was bluffing this whole time, but now he’s finally talking about his role in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever. In an interview with Extra, he opened up about keeping his return a secret, saying:
I had to lie to my family over here. I had to lie to everybody out here. I had to just keep it under wraps… When you're dealing with Marvel and stuff like that, you know the routine. So you just gotta, you know, deny, deny, deny, deny, deny until the end of it, yeah.
This is giving major Andrew Garfield lying about Spider-Man: No Way Home energy. Much like the actor behind Peter 3, Jordan had to keep his role in the Black Panther sequel a secret. However, keeping this secret is hard when you have other projects to promote. So, like Garfield, the Creed star was asked many times about his return to the MCU and just had to play dumb, and he did it very well. My jaw was on the floor when Killmonger showed up in Shuri’s Ancestral Plane during Wakanda Forever.
Honestly, major props to Jordan for even keeping his role in the film a secret from not only the public but his family too. I’d imagine he had to answer a lot of questions once his loved ones saw the MCU movie. Nevertheless, I’m so happy he was able to keep his return a secret because it made his presence in the film all the more powerful.
In hindsight, I’m not all that shocked that Jordan returned. He’s worked with the film’s writer-director Ryan Coogler on multiple projects, including Creed, Black Panther and Fruitvale Station, so they had a streak to keep alive.
With Killmonger’s place on the Ancestral Plane, I’m curious to see if Jordan will come back for any upcoming Marvel movies. It would be pretty awesome to see him reprise the role, and develop a stronger relationship with Shuri by way of her connection to the past Black Panthers.
However, that seems like a long shot. So it’s probably best to focus on what we do know, which is that Michael B. Jordan will be making his directorial debut with the highly anticipated 2023 movie schedule release Creed III, which hits theaters on March 3.
