A Marvel Actor Voiced Black Panther In An Underrated TV Series

Marvel has contracted a ton of actors to fill out its massive cinematic universe, and that number continues to grow steadily, but casual fans might not realize that there have been some performers who are carrying double duty under the Marvel umbrella. Usually, that extends to the cosmic side of the universe more than the "street-level" section of the proceedings, because it's easier to mask the fact that a famous face is playing a new character with prosthetics, makeup, and CGI. One example of that trend is Djimon Hounsou, who popped up in Guardians of the Galaxy and then played other versions of the villainous Korath the Pursuer in different projects. But the fan-favorite actor actually played Black Panther in a very unique way for Marvel, and viewers might have missed it on the first time around.

Hounsou voiced the Marvel hero in a six-episode "Black Panther" TV series that the company released in 2010 as a part of the Marvel Knights Animation imprint, which means the show rests comfortably outside of the MCU continuity. (This comes with a sigh of relief from some readers who might be worried that they missed something inside of the sprawling mythos that Marvel is poised to keep adding to until the assumed heat death of the universe or otherwise!) BET produced the "Black Panther" TV series, and the effort represented their first animated TV project since "Hey Monie!" all the way back in 2003, so this was new territory for everyone involved.

It's important to note that "Black Panther" exists as something called a "motion comic" as opposed to other animated Marvel efforts like "X-Men: The Animated Series" or something like that, and this could have been a lot of fans' first introduction to the T'Challa years before Chadwick Boseman would make the Avenger a household name later in the decade. Each episode of "Black Panther" is 20 minutes long, and there are only six episodes available, but it's a fun, quick run-through of the current Black Panther mythos that has some fun stuff for longtime Marvel fans. Djimon Hounsou is not alone in "Black Panther" either, as Kerry Washington, Alfre Woodard, Jill Scott, and more are all there in the voice cast as well. The fact that more people don't talk about this little show is really surprising.

James Gunn dialed up Djimon Hounsou to play the MCU's version of Korath the Pursuer in "Guardians of the Galaxy," which makes sense as the Kree are introduced in that movie as a major player in the cosmic side of the Marvel Universe during that film. In a fun moment for longtime fans, Hounsou actually reprises the role of Korath in "Captain Marvel" as a member of Starforce. Along with Yon-Rogg, Captain Marvel, and their squad, the strike team was tasked with fighting Skrulls in the ongoing war between the Kree and the Skrulls. Throughout the film, Hounsou's character comes into conflict with Captain Marvel and is defeated.

"Black Panther" is a different ballgame altogether as Hounsou was number one on the call sheet, and the first person to play the massively popular Marvel hero on television, which is going to make one heck of a "Jeopardy!" question one day! (Bonus points for anyone who gets the trivia question of Kerry Washington playing Shuri in "Black Panther" correct at your local geek trivia night as well.) It's just funny to see an actor who has logged the kind of career that Hounsou has get this chance, and then watching Wakanda fever grip the United States, and then the world, just six years later. He actually would have had the chance to play Black Panther in "Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer" if a couple of things had broken differently, and that's a wild concept to process.

Still, folks who really want to see "Black Panther" can stream the animated series on BET's YouTube channel, and that's getting to be a rarity in this day and age as more things become locked into a given streaming service. The "Black Panther" series is nice shorthand for viewers who might not want to sit through the live-action movie, although we'd highly recommend that, as Chadwick Boseman really is now the face of this character in every major way.

Multiple Black creators have tried to get Black Panther to the big screen before Ryan Coogler's watershed moment with T'Challa in 2018, and make no mistake, that phenomenon still hasn't been equaled to this day. But, one thing that probably hampered a lot of the momentum toward getting Wakanda to the movies was probably awareness of the hero's importance, well that and interference from former Marvel bigwig Ike Perlmutter, whose obsession with what he thought would sell as a toy product helped dictate far too much of Marvel Studios' direction in the early days of the franchise.

Once people became aware of how cool T'Challa was as a character, and let's be real, the fantastic performance of Boseman in that MCU feature, the skies were the limit for the Wakandan characters and their increasingly popular corner of the Marvel movies. Still, seeing a proof of concept can help grease the skids to make this whole thing a reality, and there's no question that Hounsou's vocal performance and series helped pave more of the way for a bigger presence down the line. Change doesn't happen at nearly the pace we'd all like sometimes, and people need to see what's possible before going and making it a reality in most cases. After all, sometimes a familiar face or voice makes all the difference when you're on the fence.