With the ever-expanding Marvel Cinematic Universe (sometimes not a great thing), at least once a month, an epic fan cast emerges online. Part of this is anchored on upcoming characters or projects everyone is excited about. The other angle that frequently emerges is for a performer that everyone loves, and fans want to be eating well, to be fan cast just out of adoration. At the moment, that is the case with talented actress Keke Palmer.
Before we get it to this casting, let’s be clear about something: While many people have known Palmer for decades for playing a spelling bee and double dutch champion (Akeelah and the Bee and Jump In!, respectively), she’s stayed booked and busy with projects. In addition to dozens of TV shows and movies, she’s recorded an album and became the first Black Cinderella on broadway. Just in the last few years, Palmer has played major roles in Hustlers (2019), Lightyear (2022), and Nope (2022). Now, in the 2020s, we could definitely see her enter the MCU with this character:
Not only does Palmer have the range and the talent to play Rogue, but her southern charm (yes, I know, she technically grew up in Illinois) works great for a character whose pre-mutation attribute is being very creole. In the followup video, Jacob respectively asked people to consider the implications of a Black Gambit (a hyper sexual gambler) because a lot of people were talking about Lakeith Stanfield and Daveed Diggs. Honestly, I’m kind of torn and don’t have strong feelings about Gambit, and it would depend on the entire cast. If he’s the only Black man in the cast, I would pass, but if there’s more, then it could still work.
Keke’s response and fan art
Between TikTok and the uncredited Twitter repost, over two million people saw Jacob’s post. Even if it hadn’t gotten this big, you just know the very online Palmer would have seen this. Today, Palmer saw it and fully endorsed it! (Jacob is still processing this but appears ecstatic.)
All this excitement for something not confirmed or even acknowledged yet (fingers crossed, though) has already resulted in fan edits, and fan concept art.
I’m sure there will be a lot more to come as the MCU officially canonizes mutants (something avoided until Disney bought 21st Century Fox). While there’s very strong evidence they already have, with upcoming movies like Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (with Namor) and all these heavy Kree presences in projects like The Marvels and probably Secret Invasion, we might see more mutants and X-men very soon. Some people were already on the same wavelength as Jacob and had the edited images at the ready!
As a bonus, for the people who feel like the recasting historically white roles and characters (even fictional) as people of color would be supposedly taking away from white roles (which it isn’t), this would be the ultimate betrayal because a Black rogue would literally take the powers of a white woman (Carol Danvers a.k.a. Captain Marvel). Well, this is one version of the events, but I would love to see it.
(via Twitter/TikTok, featured image: STX)
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