2018’s Black Panther was, and still is, one of Marvel’s most celebrated films, and four years later, audiences await Black Panther: Wakanda Forever with bated breath. Due to release in November 2022, the film is expected to be Marvel’s last production on the big screen this year. As such, the internet is exploding with news and rumors about the film’s plot, its cast, and any other details about production that might be revealed.

After Chadwick Boseman’s death from a battle with colon cancer in 2020, plans for the next Black Panther film underwent a period of turbulence as, according to Syfy Wire, the cast and crew discussed how best to honor the late actor’s legacy in a sequel film that had lost its titular character. It was decided that Boseman’s T’Challa would not be recast, and that the film would focus on the other vibrant characters of Wakanda introduced by the first film. Other casting news has trickled in steadily, and there are a slate of new characters set to be introduced that each have major implications for the story. Here’s every new cast member of Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, and other roles you might have seen them play.

MOVIEWEB VIDEO OF THE DAY

Tenoch Huerta

     Netflix

Tenoch Huerta is a Mexican actor that has made a career acting primarily in Latin America and Spain, and has also starred in plenty of American-made media. He played the role of Rafarl Caro Quintero in Netflix’s Narcos: Mexico, the character Li’l Mago in Cary Joji Fukunaga’s film Sin Nombre, Juan in The Forever Purge, and has made minor appearances in Hollywood films like Spectre. Huerta is rumored to play Namor the Sub-Mariner, the mutant son of a sea captain and a princess of Atlantis. The character is one of the first mutant characters in Marvel’s history, and is frequently depicted as an anti-hero with dubious morals. Not much is known about how the character will be portrayed in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, and there is no guarantee that Huerta’s portrayal will resemble the comic book character at all.

Dominique Thorne

     Warner Bros.

One of the most exciting new additions to this film’s cast is Dominique Thorne, who will play the role of Riri Williams, the superhero known as Ironheart. In the comics, Williams is a teenage genius that engineered her own super-powered armor resembling the Iron Man suit, for which Tony Stark decided to endorse her journey as a superheroine. Thorne’s appearance in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever will be her debut on-screen appearance as the character before the release of the Ironheart TV series on Disney+. One of the criticisms levied at Ironheart’s comic presence is that the character is a Black woman written by white men, a problem that might be addressed more appropriately by the Black-led production crew of Black Panther: Wakanda Forever. Thorne is known for playing Sheila Hunt in 2018’s If Beale Street Could Talk and Judy Harmon in 2021’s Judas and the Black Messiah.

Michaela Coel

     BBC 1 / HBO

Michaela Coel’s meteoric rise to stardom began with her 2020 miniseries on HBO Max titled I May Destroy You. Not only did she write the show, which was nominated for four Emmys, she also directed, produced, and starred in it. Coel has made appearances in two episodes of the Netflix series Black Mirror as well as a minor role in Star Wars: The Last Jedi, and has also served as a guest judge on RuPaul’s Drag Race UK. Not much is known about the character that Coel will play, but fan theories, as outlined by Screen Rant, suggest that she might portray the popular mutant Storm, famously played previously by Halle Berry. Other theories suggest that she will appear as Lady Slay, Killmonger’s lover and the one who brings the anti-hero back to life in the comics. Another idea is that Coel will play Aneka, a proud Wakandan leader of the Dora Milaje.