So much like a hero
His loss was a tragic blow to film and superhero fans across the world.
But now people have been honouring Black Panther star Chadwick Boseman in the most 21st century way – by making the tweet announcing his death the most liked in Twitter history.
The tribute comes after Chadwick’s family announced in the early hours of Saturday that he had passed away aged 43 following a secret four-year battle with colon cancer.
The news shocked fans as Chadwick’s career had been booming. Since being diagnosed, he’d played the title character in 2018’s history-making Black Panther, appeared in three more Marvel films, won critical acclaim as civil rights lawyer Thurgood Marshall in the 2017 biopic Marshall, and, in the past 18 months alone, starred in two action movies – 21 Bridges and Spike Lee’s Da 5 Bloods.
Now the tweet announcing his tragic cancer battle has been “liked” (or, as more appropriate to say, ‘acknowledged’) more than 6.7 million times and retweeted more than 3 million, breaking all Twitter records.
Twitter described Chadwick’s record as a “tribute fit for a king”, as it also re-released a Black Panther emoji.
Fans were last night putting pressure on Disney not to recast the role of Black Panther, despite Chadwick last year revealing that Black Panther 2 was expected in May 2022.
The original was the first Marvel superhero movie with a black lead and the first to be nominated for Best Picture at the Oscars. It made more than £1billion at the box office.
Chadwick said before its release: “Boundaries should be shaken and moved. There’s a hero here that I hope people grow to love.” And love they did.