2023 is going to be a big year for Jonathan Majors as the actor will tackle major roles in two blockbuster movies such as Creed 3 and Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, however, for those familiar with The Last Black Man in San Francisco, the drastically different nature of the two antagonists will hardly be a surprise coming from Majors.
That is because, before joining Marvel as Kang the Conqueror, Majors the actor was already a chameleonic figure capable of tackling a wide range of characters, with few movies showing his acting chops like The Last Black Man in San Francisco. See, although Majors made his name in HBO’s Lovecraft Country, it's that indie gem of a film that really shows why Kevin Feige chose Majors as the MCU’s Kang and why fans should be excited to see him play all of his variants.
Lost In The City, Lost In The Multiverse
Majors' first chance to portray Kang was as He Who Remains in Loki, the MCU’s amalgamation of two separate characters conceived to better line up with the Avengers’ mission in the Multiverse Saga. While comic book Kang, or the original Nathaniel Richards are played out to be incredibly cunning tacticians, perhaps too self-involved in the own greatness of their intellect, Majors’ Kang appears to have a certain aura of aloofness to him that almost makes him seem naive, a trait that undoubtedly many will pick up in Mont Allen.
As a whole, The Last Black Man in San Francisco is a beautiful film that shows what can be done with a $2m budget using clever exposition, a great story, characters, and script, nevertheless, it’s no box office wonder. The movie tells the semi-biographical tale of Jimmie Fails, who alongside his good friend and director Joe Talbot decided to chronicle their days in a now gentrified San Francisco, framing it from the perspectives of the movie’s Jimmie and his best friend Mont.
Mont is a struggling playwright and artist who lives with his grandpa and Jimmie in a downtrodden part of San Francisco, and like good outcasts they are, both dedicate a good chunk of their lives to taking care of a house that Jimmie firmly believes was built by his grandpa. Jimmie’s entire personality is formed from that story, it’s what he believes kept him out of a life of crime, whereas in Mont’s case it was his passion for the arts.
Jimmie is the true protagonist, yet Mont shines just as brightly as he acts as one of his friend's two anchors in the lives the two have, often doing their own things, with Mont dedicating plenty of time to writing his plays about the very men they always strived not to become. Mont is deeply introspective as if he almost lives in an entirely different reality at times, and it’s this precise quality that Majors has brought to his comic book villain, somehow making it work really well so far.
The Value Of Friendship
Besides the city, The Last Black Man in San Francisco places a lot of focus on male relationships and how each person’s values affect how they see friendship, or even how they choose to carry themselves in life. As outsiders, Jimmie and Mont are impervious to the local gang’s insults or their business, they see them as posers who merely chose to conform to the idealized version of masculinity the hood offered them.
None of the characters exemplify this like Kofi, the gang member that ends up getting shot, only after spending a day with Jimmie and Mont in the fabled San Francisco home. Kofi is often picked on by the rest of the gang members, whether it’s for his hairdo or his apparent lack of strength that eventually gets him killed, yet Mont sees him and the whole gang for who they really are: actors in this grandiose play that is life, playing the tough guy role on a daily basis.
Regardless of the film focusing on Jimmie and Mont, Kofi becomes an important player due to what he awakes in Majors’ character, the desire to call out things for what they are, whether it’s how messed up the neighborhood is, or how Jimmie uses his former home as an emotional crutch even if it that breaks their friendship’s current status and means saying goodbye to Jimmie
Majors’ play scene displays an exceptional ability to portray several characters at the same time, Mont has multiple scenes making use of that talent, and it’s hard to think it’s not part of what landed Majors the Kang role in the MCU.
Sure, Majors’ physical transformation makes him a fearsome rival for Adonis Creed and Ant-Man, but the actor’s abilities are clearly more than up to par for any movie and The Last Black Man in San Francisco showcases some pretty fine acting MCU fans should consider themselves lucky to have in their new big villain for the next four years.