Back in 2012, Barack Obama was voted in for a second term and things seemed to be looking up in terms of racial issues in the United States, until a black teenager named Trayvon Martin was shot and killed, and that reminded us all that yeah, America is still a very, very racist nation. The guy who did it, George Zimmerman, who wasn’t even a cop, he was just a member of the neighbourhood watch, was acquitted by the courts. So, he murdered a 17-year-old kid and got off scot free for it.

Big shock, right? Unfortunately that seems to happen all the time these days.

In America, that is. Not here. But there, it happens all the time. Hence black lives matter, the popular movement that’s taking on all these cases and bringing attention to the fact that the white murderers of black people are always getting acquitted. And now Shawn Carter, better known as Jay-Z, is contributing to that media attention, with a new multimedia project based around the Trayvon Martin case.

The project will be comprised of a movie and a 6-part documentary series

Jay-Z’s ambitious Trayvon Martin project is a collaboration with The Weinstein Company, who have made some very racially conscious films and done some great things for the black community in “Fruitvale Station.” That was an emotionally gut-wrenching dramatization of the death of Oscar Grant, one of the very first Black Lives Matter cases.

Also, the film was directed by Ryan Coogler, who’s gone on to make “Creed” and will later this year give us the first Marvel film about a black superhero with “Black Panther.” So, thanks for that, Weinstein Company. Hopefully with this new Trayvon Martin project, they can give us the next Ryan Coogler, and the industry can get an injection of these brilliant, talented, visionary black directors to compete with all the hack white directors who’ve managed to make it through because they’re white and it’s Hollywood.

The film and TV documentary series will focus on not just Martin’s death, but all his life. At the time of his callous, racially-driven, unprosecuted murder, Martin was a high school student, filled with potential. And when a neighbourhood watch guy named George Zimmerman slayed him and then went to caught and got let off, it attracted attention worldwide because that’s insane.

The project will be based on two books

The film and documentary will be based on two separate books. One is “Suspicion Nation: The inside Story of the Trayvon Martin Injustice and Why We Continue to Repeat It” (which is a very interesting and contemplative title, to say the least, since it seems to be looking at the bigger picture and not solely on the one murder case), which was written by a journalist named Lisa Bloom, and “Rest In Power: The Enduring Life of Trayvon Martin,” which was penned by Martin’s grief-stricken parents. Jay-Z is producing the documentary series, while The Weinstein Company is tackling its accompanying film.