Waking up that fateful Saturday morning on August 29 to a Twitter notification telling me that “‘Black Panther’ star Chadwick Boseman passes at age 43 due to colon cancer,” put me in complete shock. It has been about two and a half weeks later, and I still cannot believe it.
I find an immense pressure in writing this piece because it is dedicated to a figure who was much more than what a Google search explained to you. Boseman fought this illness for around four years, and in those four years, he accomplished his most famous works. You will most likely know him best from his role as King T’Challa or Black Panther in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). Boseman portrayed this character in four movies from when he was diagnosed in 2016 with Captain America: Civil War, to 2019 with Avengers: Endgame. In between those movies includes the eponymous 2018 film, Black Panther. He was a role model to so many young children as he represented an entire community that was lacking representation in the MCU as he portrayed the first black superhero. He also meant a lot to the older generation because to them, Boseman was someone they wished they had while they were growing up. His sickness was something he hid pretty well; all of these years, all of the MCU movies created, and he had cancer. Testimonies from people in the industry who worked with him can tell you that the previous sentence told you all you needed to know about Chadwick. (I am referring to him by his first name now because his last name seems too formal for someone who touched many people so deeply.)
Chadwick was all about his work, focused on roles that had true meaning to them. His breakout role surprisingly to me was not Black Panther, it was portraying baseball player Jackie Robinson, the first black athlete to play in Major League Baseball in the modern era, in the biographical movie 42 in 2013. He won the NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Actor in a Motion Picture for his portrayal of Robinson in 2014. From there he played other historical black figures such as singer James Brown in Get On Up in 2014, and later on, in the peak of his career, Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall in the 2017 movie Marshall, already a year into his treatment. It is saddening to think of the fact that this whole time Chadwick knew that his life was being cut short. His cancer went from what it initially was at stage three to stage four in late 2019. But he continued to push on and participate in the most impactful movies of this generation. If this tells you one thing, it is this: the money did not matter to him. I mean think about it, you are in the late stages of cancer, do you want to keep working when you know that your time will most likely be cut short within the next couple of years? I think for many of us the answer would be no. But that is exactly what he did, and because of that, his defiant impact was solidified in the world. When I realized this I was astonished because even though I never got to meet Chadwick it told me all about the person he wanted to be and was to so many grown adults and children, a hero.
Of course, I am not the only person who feels this way, so I asked other students about the personal impact Chadwick made on them.
Delight Pazvakawambwa (junior, biology/pre-med), remembers a quote of his: “You have to cherish things in a different way when you know the clock is ticking, you are under pressure.” She says this quote reminds her that, “Life is not guaranteed each day, so I have learned to live an intentional and purposeful life.” That quote of his truly speaks to his mindset in the last years of his life.
Delroy Brockett II (senior, biology/pre-med) loved this quote of Chadwick’s: “Purpose is not related to career. It is not related to a job. It is related to what God put inside you that you’re supposed to give to the world.” In talking about Chadwick and his impact he said, “Chadwick was truly more than an actor, he was an icon, an inspiration to so many kids and adults as well. The fact that he hid his illness all these years shows his focus on making a change in this world, especially in the age we live in today.”
Kayla Bruno (junior, psychology/pre-med) says that “Chadwick Boseman showed the entire world that God’s purpose for our lives mixed with our willingness to pursue it, will always have a lasting impact on the world, even if we are not here to witness it. Chadwick fulfilled God’s purpose for his life and he did it with pride.”
Even with these quotes, Chadwick’s impact on the world is hard to put into words. He simply did what God wanted him to do on this earth, and he did it not for himself, but for others. Chadwick was a husband, son, friend, colleague, and will continue to be a role model and hero for generations to come. Rest in power, King, “Wakanda forever!”
The Student Movement is the official student newspaper of Andrews University. Opinions expressed in the Student Movement are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the editors, Andrews University or the Seventh-day Adventist church.