Kumail Nanjiani, one of the stars of the upcoming Marvel superhero movie “Eternals,” was body-shamed for being too buff for his role.
How it started: The 42-year-old Pakistani American actor and comedian shared a picture on New Year’s Day, showing a slice of pandan tres leches cake while wearing a tight shirt that accentuated his muscular physique.
His post ignited a debate online, with some people calling Nanjiani “unrecognizable.” Others joked and accused him of using steroids, according to BuzzFeed.
It’s really funny that Kumail had to take a bunch of steroids for a movie and then Covid hit so he just kept having to do steroids for a year
However, the accusation of steroid use has been around since late 2020.
You used to be a comic, before you became and activist.
But for a guy who doesn’t like masculinity, you got shot full of steroids to get your last role.
Fans to the rescue: Many of Nanjiani’s fans did not take the accusations lightly — they took to Twitter to defend the actor from the body-shaming trolls.
Some of the most popular tweets pointed out that many other actors have gone through body changes for superhero roles, yet none of them were criticized or ridiculed.
Chris Evans gets jacked for Captain America: “😍🤩😍🤩”
Chris Hemsworth gets jacked for Thor: “😍🤩😍🤩”
Chris Pratt gets jacked for Star-Lord: “😍🤩😍🤩”
Kumail Nanjiani gets jacked for Eternals: “He’s clearly using steroids”
Body shaming Kumail Nanjiani for…being jacked? Is way weird. Especially since all the Chris’ have done the same super-soldier program and never got any flack for it. I wonder what the difference is? pic.twitter.com/NIeUf3DwAb
Other fans quickly shut down all the accusations online and defended the actor’s physical appearance.
After Chadwick Boseman’s death there was a lot of talk about “never make fun of people’s bodies, you don’t know what anyone’s going through” but Kumail Nanjiani posts like. an average picture of himself eating dinner and that’s our the window I guess
Nanjiani made everyone’s jaws drop when he first shared a picture of his new look back in 2019. In an Instagram post, he mentioned that he would not have made it had Marvel not helped him get to where he is now.
“I would not have been able to do this if I didn’t have a full year with the best trainers and nutritionists paid for by the biggest studio in the world,” he said. “I’m glad I look like this, but I also understand why I never did before. It would have been impossible without these resources and time.”
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