Canadian newcomer Iman Vellani has landed the lead role in the Ms. Marvel series heating up at Marvel and Disney+, Collider has confirmed.
Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah (Bad Boys for Life) have been tapped to direct multiple episodes, with others to be directed by Oscar-winning documentarian Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy (Saving Face) and Meera Menon (The Punisher). The show hails from head writer Bisha K. Ali.
Ms. Marvel follows Kamala Khan, a Pakistani American teen from New Jersey who is poised to become Marvel's first onscreen Muslim hero. Not only is the character getting her own Disney+ series, but she's also expected to appear in future Marvel movies.
Ms. Marvel will follow upcoming Marvel series such as WandaVision, Falcon and the Winter Soldier and Loki. There are also shows built around Nick Fury, She-Hulk and Hawkeye on the horizon.
This is a huge get for Vellani, who doesn't even have a profile page on IMDb Pro, but Marvel was always open to a discovery for this role. Deadline broke the news of Vellani's casting, reporting that she served on the Next Wave Committee at the 2019 Toronto Film Festival, which was tasked with identifying TIFF titles that today's teens might be able to identify with.
"We want stories from different genders and different countries and different people," Vellani told the CBC after recommending the Geraldine Viswanathan movie Hala. "I think that's really important because then people are going to understand each other. Even if they can't relate to it, you learn from it … Our big goal is to just help people understand other perspectives."
Now, Vellani will be part of one of those inclusive stories helping to change Hollywood and thus, the world, which is pretty cool. For more on the recently announced Nick Fury series starring Samuel L. Jackson, click here.