It’s a good year for Nigerian singer Temilade Openiyi as her talent earns her global recognition again, this time in Marvel Cinematic Universe commonly known as the Marvelverse. Her rendition of Bob Marley’s ‘No Woman No Cry’ was played in the official teaser trailer of Marvel’s Black Panther sequel ‘Wakanda Forever’.
The trailer, which has over 30 million views on Twitter at the time of writing was released on Sunday by Marvel Studios on their social media platforms with stunning scenes of new and old cast backed up by the soundtrack by Tems’ rendition of Bob Marley’s “No Woman, No Cry” and Kendrick Lamar’s “Alright”.
Few weeks ago the 27 year old award winning artist became the first Nigerian female singer to bag the 2 BET awards in one night and was recently announced as a feature artist on Beyoncé’s new album Renaissance’.
In February BusinessDay highlighted 7 records Afrobeats stands to break in 2022, among those was predicting Afrobeats soundtrack in feature Hollywood movies.
Dayo Adedeji, Twitter influencer popularly known as Dynasty predicted more blockbuster movies adapting Afrobeat sound to the big screens stating examples like of upcoming movies like Black Panther 2 to be one of those movies to do so in 2022.
Read also: Tems set for fourth billboard hot 100 entry after Beyonce Renaissance album credit
“Recently there seems to be responsiveness infusing afro sounds to movies,” Dynasty said this while speaking with BusinessDay, “especially movies that represent black culture although they forget that the African culture is also part of the black culture and they neglected that for a very long time, we can see that they’ve started appreciating it,”
Ryan Coogler the movie director had to deliver as all eyes are on this movie not just because it’s the sequel for one of the most successful movies of all time not just financially but critically like Best picture nominations and a number of Oscar wins but also because of the tragic passing of Chadwick Boseman who played the lead character as Black Panther in the movie and other Marvel movie franchise.
As speculation of fans were swayed between a recast or non recast of the character with Coogler going for the later, the trailer has a more female centric feel with recurring star Angela Bassett looking to play a more important role than she did in the last movie.
Nigerians and the marvelverse
According to The Hollywood Reporter, Julius Onah, Nigerian-American filmmaker will direct the latest instalment of Marvel Studios’ franchise Captain America 4 which stars Anthony Mackie reprising his role in the MCU film as the new man to wield the iconic shield after the events of 2021’s Marvel Disney+ series The Falcon and the Winter Soldier.
The 39 year old filmmaker is known for his work on The Cloverfield Paradox (2018) and Luce (2019). He co-wrote the Jean-Michel Basquiat biopic, Samo Lives.
The filmmaker won’t be the first Nigerian in MCU as we’ve previously seen Chiwetel Ejiofor, British actor with Nigerian roots play ‘Karl Mordo’ in the ‘Doctor Strange’ movies.
