Black Panther Casting Reveal Draws Xenophobia Accusation From Sci-Fi Author Nnedi Okorafor
David Jonsson’s reveal as the new Black Panther at Comic-Con drew swift agreement from most of the fandom online, but the small pocket of pushback over his nationality was enough to pull Hugo and Nebula Award-winning author Nnedi Okorafor back into a franchise she says she already gave up on.
Marvel confirmed at its Hall H panel Saturday that Jonsson will play T’Challa’s grown son in “Black Panther 3,” set for December 15, 2028, with Ryan Coogler returning to direct. A handful of fans on social media objected that Jonsson, who is British, should not carry a role built around Wakandan and Black American identity. Okorafor answered those fans directly.
“Watching people complain about David Jonsson being cast as Black Panther because he’s British and Black Panther should be American is precisely why I walked away from the whole Black Panther thing years ago,” Okorafor wrote. “’American’, I know what they mean by that word. This country has so many fucked up identity issues. Xenophobia is right there at the top and it’s not limited to white Americans.”
The reaction Okorafor describes represented a minority position in the broader fan response, where praise for Jonsson’s casting outpaced criticism by a wide margin on X.
Pop Culture commentator Byl Holte wasn’t thrilled, believing Marvel casts only gay people in the role: “Is it a requirement that Black Panther has to be gay? I believe Chadwick Boseman was gay and died from AIDS, not cancer. I believe Letitia Wright is a lesbian. And I believe David Jonsson is also gay. NO MATTER WHAT THE LYING PRESS TELLS ME. If Hollywood is so LGBT positive, why is everyone still hiding in their closets?”
Coogler’s account of how the casting came together, relayed by Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige to Variety, points to a decision made almost entirely behind closed doors. “He had a secret meeting with him under cloak of darkness in a hotel somewhere, and called me afterwards and said, ‘He’s the guy, he’s the guy, I felt it. I felt it in my soul. He’s a good man, and he is the next Black Panther,’” Feige said. “And I got chills, and I got a little welled-up and said, ‘Let’s do it.’ So we’ve been sitting on this secret for a good five or six months.”
Feige’s account puts the casting call entirely in Coogler’s hands, decided on instinct in a single meeting rather than an open search. Marvel has kept a tight grip on Black Panther succession since Chadwick Boseman’s death in 2020, handing Shuri the mantle for “Wakanda Forever” before introducing T’Challa’s son as the heir apparent in that film’s final scene. Jonsson now inherits a role that carries the weight of Boseman’s legacy and Marvel’s highest-grossing solo franchise entry.
Coogler has directed every mainline Black Panther film to date and controls the creative direction of the next one uncontested.
Does a five-minute hotel meeting count as a casting process, or is that simply how Marvel operates when the studio has already decided who its next hero will be?
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