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When SZA reaches, she reaches for the top. The R&B singer-songwriter appeared on “The Jennifer Hudson Show” and threw her gauntlet down to play one of the most powerful X-Men in Marvel. She wants to play the MCU version of Ororo Munroe, aka Storm.
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SZA was on the show promotiong the film “One of Those Days” in which she co-stars with Keke Palmer and the subject of superhero roles came up. “I would love to be a superhero,” SZA said. As the conversation turned to who she would play, SZA said, “[Storm] comes from this whole other place where it’s the jungle … So, I think that would be so gnarly if I could be Storm’s origin story.”
SZA also pointed out she grew up as a fan of both DC and Marvel Comics, guided by her father’s hobby: “Well, my dad collects first-edition comics, so he has the first-edition ‘Thor’ comics and ‘Silver Surfer’ just in the basement.”
Storm was part of a game-changing line-up introduced in 1975’s “Giant-Size X-Men” #1. Among other things, as a native African, Storm was part of a brand new team with a much more international flavor. The comic introduced members from the Soviet Union (Colossus), Germany (Nightcrawler), Japan (Sunfire), and more. While it was not the first appearance of the fan-favorite Wolverine, the comic does mark his first time working with the X-Men.
It didn’t take long for Storm to also become a fan-favorite. Since her beginnings she’s become one of the leaders of the X-Men, a member of the Fantastic Four, and for a time she was wed to the Black Panther and became the Queen of Wakanda.
Halle Berry was the first actor to play Storm in live-action, starting with 2000’s “X-Men.” She returned for 2003’s “X2: X-Men United,” 2006’s “X-Men: The Last Stand,” and finally in 2014’s “X-Men: Days of Future Past.”
Berry was followed by Alexandra Shipp who played the mutant hero in 2016’s “X-Men: Apocalypse,” 2018’s “Deadpool 2,” and 2019’s “X-Men: Dark Phoenix.”
Technically, Storm has shown up in the MCU already, but not in live-action and not as the Earth-616 Storm. In the final episodes of “What If…?” we meet a version of Storm with the powers of Thor. This Storm was voiced by Alison Sealy-Smith, also known for voicing Storm in “X-Men ’97” and “X-Men: The Animated Series.”
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