In honour of his efforts on What If…?, the late Chadwick Boseman, who played Black Panther, was awarded an Emmy for Outstanding Character Voice-Over performance. Just over two years after his passing, Boseman is honoured with his first Emmy nomination and victory. Jeffrey Wright (for What If…), the late Jessica Walter (for Archer), Maya Rudolph (for Big Mouth), Stanley Tucci (for Central Park), Julie Andrews (for Bridgerton), and F. Murray Abraham (for Moon Knight) were also nominated for their respective roles.
Boseman’s wife, Taylor Simone Ledward, collected the medal on his behalf. Specifically, her words were: “To think that one of the final things Chad would work on was something so essential to him and the world, but also something new, was a great moment when I learned of his nomination and considered everything happening on in the globe and our world. Without posing the “what if?” question, you will never arrive at your true goal. What if everything in the cosmos is aligned to help me? What if it turns out to be me? Chad would be really flattered, and I feel the same way about the recognition I’ve received on his behalf.”
Two of Boseman’s last live-action appearances, in Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom and Da 5 Bloods, earned him posthumous nominations and awards that came before his Emmy triumph. Boseman was a universal winner for most of the smaller celebrations, especially Ma Rainey’s. Many awards have been bestowed upon him for his work, including the Golden Globe for Best Performance in a Drama (Ma Rainey’s), the Image Award for Outstanding Actor (for Ma Rainey’s) and the Image Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor (for Da 5 Bloods), and the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance (for Ma Rainey’s).
After the success of Ma Rainey’s, he was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor.
After a lengthy fight with cancer, Boseman passed away at the end of August 2020. Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, the sequel that Boseman was supposed to star in as a homage to him and T’Challa, has instead taken a different direction. His alma institution, Howard University, has dedicated its fine arts school after him and established a scholarship in his name thanks to Netflix. The animated series What If…? comes to us from Marvel and Disney+. By altering the course of key events, the show explores the potential outcomes for the MCU and its audience in a number of parallel universes. Boseman returned to play T’Challa/Black Panther in the sequel. In the show, he portrayed the role of the voice of the protagonist four times.
The Big What-If? with Season 2 in 2023 and Season 3 already confirmed.