Samuel L. Jackson has said he is “still trying figure out why” he has never been in a Black Panther movie.
The star, who is set to return as Nick Fury in Marvel‘s Secret Invasion, has appeared in a slew of films in the franchise but he is yet to appear in Wakanda.
“I don’t know, it’s kind of up and down for me in an interesting sort of way,” Jackson told Entertainment Tonight. “Feels like I’ve been playing him forever. If I had it my way, I would’ve been in every Marvel movie because, I mean, he is Nick Fury, he knows everything that’s going on. I’m still trying to figure out why I’ve never been to Wakanda.”
His comments echo similar sentiments he made in 2018, when he said he wanted to be in Black Panther, but producers wouldn’t let him.
Appearing on The Ellen Show, Jackson told host Ellen DeGeneres he had asked repeatedly to be involved. “It’s a great movie, but I couldn’t believe that you weren’t in it,” she told him. The actor replied: “I couldn’t either! When they were making it, I kept saying, ‘So when do I go to Wakanda?’ And they were… [shakes head].”
He continued to say he had wanted Fury to make an appearance, even if it had been an inconsequential cameo. He said he asked the producers at the time: “‘Can I just walk down the street in Wakanda so they know that I know it’s there?’ Because I know it’s there. I mean, Nick Fury knows every black thing that’s on the planet, so he’s gotta know about Wakanda.”
He also said at the time that he wasn’t giving up on featuring in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever but he never did appear in the 2022 film.
Meanwhile, Secret Invasion is set to drop on Disney+ on June 21. The series received four stars from NME and was described as “Marvel’s thrilling answer to Star Wars noir Andor“.