Quentin Tarantino’s newest project, Django Unchained, which is set to release on Christmas Day 2012, has gone through some cast changes (most notably Kevin Costner to Kurt Russell which I’m extremely thankful for), as well as some unexpected casting (Leonardo DiCaprio and Joseph Gordon-Levitt). Christoph Waltz, Samuel L. Jackson, Jamie Foxx, Kerry Washington, and James Remar are also names seen in the cast list, but the newest additions are by far the most surprising.

Former Wu-Tang member Robert Diggs, better known as RZA, has been cast as Thaddeus, a role that hasn’t had much news released about it. As well as that, Sacha Baron Cohen has been cast as Scotty, a role that also hasn’t had much disclosure. In fact, the entire film itself has thus far been kept under wraps relatively well, considering you haven’t read the PDF version of the script floating around the internet.

Be as skeptical as you want, but The RZA can act. Surprisingly well, I might add. Besides doing some of the soundtrack for the Kill Bill films, RZA’s face has been popping up in numerous projects like Coffee and Cigarettes, Funny People, American Gangster, Repo Men, Due Date, The Next Three Days, and most recently, A Very Harold and Kumar 3D Christmas. He’s known for being a scene-stealer, and there’s a good chance he’ll fulfill that duty in Django.

As far as Sacha Baron Cohen, we all know and love him from films like Borat, Bruno, Talladega Nights, the Madagascar movies, and Sweeney Todd. He’ll soon be starring in a new film called The Dictator (not to be confused as a remake of the 1940 Charlie Chaplin film, The Great Dictator), which will be directed by Borat/Bruno director, Larry Charles. Cohen will also be portraying Freddie Mercury in an upcoming and unnamed Queen biopic.

As for participating in Django, Cohen is a special kind of actor. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but if he’s in a movie, the role was most likely written for him, so seeing him in a Tarantino film leads me to think that his role will be not only extremely interesting, but hovering around genius. I trust both Cohen and Tarantino when it comes to successfully making great films, so there’s no reason that a collaboration between the two won’t be explosive.

Tarantino is known for his offbeat but almost always-successful casting, and with stars of this caliber, there’s no doubt in my mind that Django Unchained will be one of the best films of 2012.