Not sure if you’d noticed, but Michael B Jordan is your best mate now. Unsure of how it happened, but it did - he’s mine, too, it’s just a thing we all have to accept. Michael B Jordan came along and now you either want to be his best friend or you want to marry him, or both.
I may not be 100% confident in how this was allowed to happen - how a man beat out all the other best friends in the world - but I can have a good old stab at why. It begins to become clear once you lay it all out on the proverbial table - there appear a great many reasons as to why you’ve somehow found yourself with a new best friend. And they are these:
He’s just portrayed one of Marvel’s greatest villains
As fun as the Marvel movies are, they’ve certainly got a problem with their bad guys - a whole lot of forgettable ne’er-do-wells floating about the joint, here. Like, can you remember who the bad guy was in Thor 2? Or Iron Man 3? No, no you can’t. But like heck are you going to forget Killmonger in Black Panther - a good old-fashioned villain with a proper, understandable motive, all shot-through with a storming performance from Jordan. Also, important: very good at punching.
He’s adopted the ‘inclusion rider’ at his production company
Essentially, this means that films made under his Outlier Society banner will ensure “inclusion, both on camera and behind the scenes for crew members”.
The idea of the inclusion rider was first brought to many of our attentions by Best Actress winner Frances McDormand at the Oscars. It is a clause that actors can insert into their contracts to insist on at least 50% gender and racial diversity in the film’s cast and crew, ensuring a more balanced mix of workers on a project.
It’s a way to make sure women and minorities are properly represented in the industry, and good on Jordan being one of the first adopters.
He’s so attractive that teenage girls are having dental emergencies
This is perhaps one of my favourite stories ever - a 17-year-old girl was watching Black Panther and when Michael B Jordan took his top off she gritted her teeth so hard that her retainer snapped. This is amazing - imagine being so hot that people’s mouths explode at the mere sight of you. That’s fit, that is, you’re the fittest.
Oh and also:
Yep, MBJ sought the girl out, followed her on Twitter and offered to pay for her replacement, because that’s the sort of guy he is.
This demonstration of pain suppression
If you can be this charming while your mouth is ablaze from hot wings, you are charming full stop.
He doesn’t want any of your bullshit
Obviously, if you’re famous, people are going to come after you on everyone’s favourite website, Twitter. So when some dude had a go at MBJ for still living with his parents, he wasn’t having any of it:
Yeah, he’s a big old nerd
As you can see from the above tweet, he likes anime, which obviously made a good many people very happy - turns out that ‘internet users’ also like anime, who’d have known. Course, you can’t simply state two famous examples and not expect some Queen Geek to call you out for it (you cannot win, ever, nobody will let you enjoy anything):
No actual worries if you’re Michael B Jordan though:
Charity? Yeah he’s got that covered, mate
His mum suffers with lupus, so he works with Lupus LA to spread the word about the condition and raise money. Nice guy Michael B Jordan, making you look bad with every step he takes.
He’s been in TWO good superhero movies
Not only is he a great villain in Black Panther, he’s also damn good in Chronicle - that’s two separate superhero movies not in the same franchise, a feat to which not many people can lay claim. Of course, he was also in Fantastic Four, but let’s ignore that. And it’s not like he was bad in it or anything.
An open cardigan? Tucked in? Anyone wearing that would like like a fucking idiot, absolutely no exceptions
I TAKE IT BACK - no idea how he pulled this off:
Unprecedented. MBJ, we love you.
(Image: Getty)
