surprised!

He talks about it in this interview. Was this the article?

"I've always avoided making films about slavery," Smith, 53, said. "In the early part of my career… I didn't want to show Black people in that light. I wanted to be a superhero. So I wanted to depict Black excellence alongside my white counterparts. I wanted to play roles that you would give to Tom Cruise."

Smith's stance has evolved as he now stars in the upcoming film Emancipation as Peter, a real-life runaway slave who fought to evade his hunters through the Louisiana swamp in his journey to join the Union army. Peter is known for the photo of his heavily scarred back.

"This was one that was about love and the power of Black love," Smith said of choosing to make Emancipation. "And that was something that I could rock with. We were going to make a story about how Black love makes us invincible."

https://people.com/movies/will-smith-explains-why-he-avoided-making-movies-about-slavery-i-wanted-to-be-a-superhero/

Lets hope this will be good.

I do remember he turned down Django Unchained back in the day for some stupid reason. Obviously that, like many other Tarantino films, was an alternate view of actual history.

But here he is in 2022 trying to whip up another Oscar-bait film.

Cool.