Black Panther Actor Explains The Hero's Importance

06/07/2018 03:32 pm EDT

Sterling K. Brown is excited for his upcoming role in Black Panther, but to him, the character and movie serve an even greater importance.

The This Us Actor spoke to People about the heroes he grew up with. Christopher Reeve's Superman and Michael Keaton's Batman were his heroes, and he explained just how important Panther is to shaking that dynamic up on the big screen.

"I get to take my kid to go see a black superhero movie and he gets to see an image of himself as the man," Brown, 41, shares. "Chadwick Boseman looks like me. He looks like my son."

Brown couldn't hold back his excitement for the project from executive producer Nate Moore, and that turned into the role of N'Jobu.

"I said, 'Listen, I've been practicing my Wakanda. I know you've already got the titular characters taken care of, but how can I be down? Because man, it's a black superhero,' " he says. "It's huge."

He couldn't share details about the part, other than that it is "someone from T'Challa's past. "I don't have a huge part, but I've got a good part. I'm happy with my part."

Director Ryan Coogler spoke to ComicBook.com at San Diego Comic-Con about how different Black Panther will feel from the rest of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

"Obviously, T'Challa is an African king and there haven't been many movies made about that in any genre. So when you look at the movies of the Marvel movies… off the bat, that's going to make that very different," Coogler said. "This movie has a lot of different combinations. You're dealing with a guy who's real like Thor, but he's from Earth which changes things. It gives it context and it grounds it in a way. Even though we're dealing with a lot of fantastical elements, fantastical technology, it still kind of grounds it in a way that's very unique."

Fans got a tease of what the world of Wakanda will look like in the first trailer, and it looks stunning. Black Panther really does seem to be something different altogether from its MCU counterparts, and that's a good thing.

Black Panther releases on February 16, 2018.

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