EDGE Rewind: Was 'Black Panther' Actor Tenoch Huerta Too Hung for Disney?
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Too hung for Disney? That is the question raised by a tweet of "Black Panther" actor Tenoch Huerta that showed two pics of the actor side-by-side. On the left, he has a prominent bulge; on the right, he doesn't.
A tweet went viral showing Huerta in before and after pics that supposedly show that some digital tinkering went on for the final film. Entertainment Weekly said, "the tweet shows two side-by-side photos of Huerta's body in costume, with the image on the left serving more sausage than Oktoberfest. In a recent Rolling Stone interview, the actor is setting the record straight."
"Give Namor his penis back," the tweet demands, and as of today more than 127,000 people seem to echo that sentiment.
"The only thing that I can say is: the original was the photo in the right. Without [the bulge]! That's original," he told Rolling Stone. "No, I mean, I'm not going to lie to people. Every man in the world, we have fragile masculinity, but not in that issue. I will say, the right one, the real one is the photo on the right."
The EW report continued: "And bravo to Tenoch Huerta for being honest about the K'uk'ulkan in his briefs. Although it seems we're all missing one important fact here: A kingdom entirely underwater's gotta produce a lot of shrinkage. Just sayin'."
In the film Huerta plays Namor, the ruler of the underwater kingdom of Talokan. "Huerta's portrayal of the moody king has set hearts and winged feet aflutter, and the internet (being the internet) fired off some serious thirst tweets," added EW.
And while the 41-year-old actor is being called the film's breakout star, don't expect his character to appear in a Namor spinoff. In an interview with The Wrap , "Black Panther: Wakanda Forever" producer Nate Moore confirmed that he can return to another "Black Panther" sequel, but Disney won't be able to produce a standalone movie about the character.
The reason? "The situation around Namor harkens back to the pre-Marvel Studios/pre-Disney era of making movies out of Marvel Comics characters, before the studio streamlined and controlled intellectual property. Before Marvel Studios made 'Iron Man' as its own independently produced film, the company was in the habit of licensing or selling off rights to characters to other studios â the X-Men went to Fox, Spider-Man went to Sony, etc. And Namor is one of those characters that is still controlled by another studio."
"Huerta is of indigenous descent, with a Nahua maternal great-grandmother and a Purépecha paternal great-great-grandmother," reads his Wikipedia entry. "Huerta does not self-identify as Indigenous. However, he encourages people to learn more about their Indigenous heritage within and outside the community."
"What Huerta was most moved by as he stepped up to the challenge of bringing Namor to the MCU is how 'Wakanda Forever's' story and its conceptualization of Talocan are celebrations of Latin American identity with a distinct focus on its shared Indigenous and African roots," reported The Verge.
"Culturally, we are apart from [our] Indigenous roots," Huerta told The Verge. "Embracing those roots, and honoring these two sources â main sources in Latin America, which [are] African and Indigenous roots â is really important. I hope this helps people to embrace who they are. Who we are."
Check out these pics from Huerta's Instagram: