Marvel Studios
Last summer, when Disney rolled out their plans to bring the Marvel Cinematic Universe to Disney+, one of the projects that mostly fell under-the-radar due to the high-profile nature of its live-action counterparts was the animated series What If…?.
Based on the Marvel Comic of the same name, What If…? will take a look at what the Marvel Cinematic Universe would look like if major events unfolded differently, such as if Loki wielded Thor’s hammer Mjolnir or if Peggy Carter became Captain Carter (which appears to be a British version of Captain America).
Now, most notably, one of those What If…? episodes — which would imagine the bonkers scenario wherein T’Challa somehow becomes Star-Lord — could mark Chadwick Boseman’s final appearance as the iconic Wakandan king.
Chadwick Boseman will appear as T'Challa one last time in Marvel Studios' 'What If' series for Disney+
In the show, T'Challa becomes Star-Lord instead of Black Panther pic.twitter.com/6SfOW5pLYN
— ScreenTime (@screentime) August 31, 2020
Following the announcement of the series, showrunner Ashley Bradley spoke with DiscussingFilm about the project, specifically the episode that imagines what it would look like if T’Challa had become Star-Lord.
“On the reel (shown at D23), there is this image of a Star-Lord T’ Challa because we wanted to see what if the worlds of Black Panther and the Guardians of the Galaxy collided? That was taking two universes, two to three movies, kind of twisting them in new ways,” Bradley said.
“With Star-Lord T’Challa obviously, we want to know how T’Challa ended up in other planets? What’s the story there? It’s super exciting to work on because again, it’s seeing these characters and seeing the combination of character interactions. Seeing the Avengers hang out together and more recently Endgame gave us the fun of seeing something like Ant-Man hanging out with the Hulk. What If…? is taking it a step further.” [via DiscussingFilm
In August of last year, Haley Atwell — who stars as Peggy Carter in the MCU — indicated that voice recording on the series had already begun. Then, back in December 2019, Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige revealed that Marvel Studios was already beginning production on season two, which would lead you to believe that work on season one was largely completed. Combine those two factors and it stands to reason that Boseman could’ve recorded his episode last summer, leaving fans with one final appearance as T’Challa to cherish.
Rest in greatest power, Chadwick. We’ll all miss you. Wakanda Forever.
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