Black Panther *Spoilers*

[Ilan Preskovsky]

I don't see him as any of those things.
He's not likeable - indeed, he revels in death and combat. He treats everyone around him like dirt. His actions indicate he only cares about himself.
Sympathetic - Not really. He'd only be sympathetic if his stated goals were his actual motivation but his actions indicate they're not. His actions are pretty much entirely selfish.
Charismatic - His ability to hold the loyalty of his troops is extremely fleeting to say the least. Even the Royal Guard, whose whole purpose is to serve whoever sits on the throne, quickly grow tired of him and rebel against him in very short order.

To put it more succinctly, he was an arrogant immature snot who really needed therapy and/or a good slap up the backside of the head.

Yeah, I can't agree with any of these characteristics either. People are disposable to him. He seemingly has a romance with a woman, yet easily dispatches her to meet his goals (which was to seize control of Wakanda and start a war against the rest of the world, instead of changing Wakanda and changing the world), among other "noble intentions" (term used lightly) type actions.

Which really just makes him the villain he needed to be (for movie plot purposes). I can certainly see the train of thoughts that led him to where he ended up, but I can't agree with any of his methods.

Yeah, I don't get how people think you should symapthize with him on any level beyond the fact that he was abandoned as a kid. I would take it further than you guys, though. His response to the way that his people had traditionally been treated was reactionary to the extreme; essentially calling for a violent revolution which would do nothing but repeat the mistakes of the past but with the races reversed, effectively regressing human progress by hundreds of years. There was nothing remotely noble about his goals and I'm genuinely kind of troubled that people think there is.

He is a petulant, annoying, immature, small-minded bigot who was a perfect fit for the film thematically as the extreme opposite of T'Challa but I'm genuinely confused why people actually like, let alone sympathize with him.

[The Whovian]

Oh and the opening of this movie is beyond phenomenal

This is up there with ironman, TDK, tws and logan as my favorite CBM.. But im super biased so make of that what you will.

I agree. It's one of the best.

Shuri stole a lot of scenes. She was fantastic.

On a side note, a local comic book shop had a fundraiser so that 40 Black children ages 6 - 13 could watch the movie in the theater. Two whole rows were devoted to the kids. To see men and women who looked like them up on screen being glorious in so many ways, ooohing and awwwing the visuals and the fashion and the Wakandan aesthetics, the laughing at the jokes and slapstick, the cheering on the heroes as they charge into battle -- they always cheered the loudest, and sometimes they cheered first. You could almost feel the goodwill coming from the audience to the kids. Several of them even did a collective "EEWWWW!" during the big damn kiss. And even outside of those parts, the kids remained quiet and captivated for the rest of the movie. Those kids deserve this film. And, really, how many of those young girls are now going to focus on science and engineering like Shuri? Or become strong and fierce like Nakia and Okoye? Or becoming leaders like T'Challa?

She was fantastic! And that was cool to do that for the kids.

@JKthe Mac
Also Shuri had the right challenge Tchalla. Women arent ignored but when a king dies his eldest(Typically) son becomes king. Not his wife. But Shuri had every right to challenge him and even joked about it.

Yep

In the moview the only person to fully die and come back is Coulson and the mvoies dont acknowledge it. And before you say cap or Bucky they never died. Killmonger died in Tchallas arms. But i hope they break that streak and bring him back. I also loved Mbaku and i kinda dont wsnt him to become a bad guy now. But he was all about tradition and Tchalla is throwing all that out the window. That may send ManApe ovet the edge. But i did love what they did with him. He reminds me of later Silver Samurai. He hated logan but he was Noble and had Honor(Some writers made hima PoS but he was very likable at other times).

@JK
I agreed with what you said was just adding on top of that Shuri coulda challenged him. I worded it weird



As far as the after credit scene....... Bucky gonna smash! Shuri seems to like White boys

I laughed out loud when she quipped "Oh great, another white boy for us to fix". LOL!!

[regg215]

Overall was a fantastic movie, Certainly in the top 5 marvel films to me ( I would have only Winter Soldier, Civil War, Spider-man Homecoming and Iron Man 1 above it).
Things that stood out to me most were:

-Chadwick Boseman was impressive as the lead and I really think that once Downey and Evans eventually leave, an MCU lead by Holland and Boseman will be just as entertaining.
-Nakia and Shuri were also amazing in the movie. I am really hoping to see more of them in future films, will be really cool to see where marvel takes those two characters.
-I thought T'challa and Nakia was probably the best MCU couple outside of Tony and Pepper
-Fight Scenes were amazing- I knew they would be good due to how great Coogler did with the fight scenes in Creed but he elevated it even further in this movie
-Coogler does an awesome job of immersing you into a world in his films, Wakanda really felt so unique, would absolutely love to see what coogler could do with a star wars movie
-Ross and Klaue were both great additions to the film both were given good supporting roles and every moment they were on screen really complimented the film (Sad to see Klaue go- Serkis did a great job with that role, would have liked to see him back in BP2)
-Killmonger was a great villain and had by far the coolest costume of any character (hero or villain) yet in the MCU( in my opinion)

The only parts of the movie I didn't like or don't get why they are so praised :
-I do not get all the praise for Okoye, she was ok and didn't hurt the film but I thought she was far less impressive as a character than Nakia or Shuri was, would have liked it a lot better if the fight scenes given to Okoye could have gone to Shuri- although I know that would be hard given her role.
-I don't understand some of the praise for Killmonger as a Villain in terms of people saying he was complex- to me he clearly seemed like straightforward a power hungry standard bad guy. I get that his end goal was a little different than most villains, but once you have the guy kill his girlfriend and choke a elder person for not immediately listening to him you kinda lose the whole "complex villain" thing to me. He was a good villain, and was above most other marvel villains and it was a great performance by Jordan overall, I just don't get some of the praise he is getting overall.

In the end this was a fantastic movie would certainly be a 9.5 out of 10 for me.

[The Whovian]

And I thought they actually handled the "origin" part of this thing extremely well. Other than Civil War, non comics fans don't know much about Wakanda and Black panther origins. They did a pretty great job filling in the history here without it seeming like they were backtracking. I thought they meshed the history lessons in well to keep the movie feeling like it was progressing.

Right? If you've never read a BP comics, you have to know his origin. And I thought it was nicely done so as not to take away from the movie.

Breaking all sorts of records, on track for $216 Million, 4 Day open

Woohoo!!

I saw this last night with a sold out crowd. I am still on a high with this movie because there is so much to think about with it’s real world themes about Africa and black culture, as well as the super hero Marvel universe stuff. First, the Chadwick and the rest of the cast are phenomenal, but Micheal B Jordan’s Killmonger nearly stole the movie. Not since Loki have I felt compelled to sorta root for the villain. He is a ruthless killer, but you understand his motives and they make sense. And as a black person, you feel his pain about having an absentee father because in the black community, you know someone that has had to deal with that or you dealt with it yourself ( thankfully I never had to experience that pain). Also, it was nice to have strong women in the film that were important to the story. T Challa’s sister was one of my favorite characters as she was awesome! The cinematography and look and feel of Wananda was breathtaking. It felt like a real lived in place, though it did become obvious some of it was green screen.

For people that like to complain about MCU movies being to comedic this is your film, as this is the most serious of the films due to the real world themes it addresses. But that’s not there isn’t any humor because it is and it mostly works thanks to T Challa’s sister and Andy Serkis Klaw. The only real grip with the film is the CG and and the action scenes being a bit underwhelming. I mean they aren’t horrible by any means , but compared to action scenes in other MCU films or even some of the Marvel Netflix shows, they are just okay. The final fight was a bit of a let down too considering how brutal the first fight between T Challa and Killmonger was. Honestly though, the story and acting is so compelling that you won’t really care about any of those minor nitpicks.

I agree with everything you said IM. This movie knocked it out of the park.

Just saw it really really liked it. Absolutely packed house, and packed multiplex. Only minus I had is killing off Killmonger, great villain that I had genuine sympathy for even if he was the bad guy.

I kind of agree, but at the same time, there are consequences for your actions. And they could bring him back if they have to.

[The Whovian]

They could recon it with the soul stone. For example, if Thanos uses it in Wakanda for example, it might bring back people who are dead and Killmonger could return in a sequel. I for sure thought that the soul stone would make an appearance in the film at some point, potentially being be the explanation for T’challa being able to speak with his father on the spiritual plane. If fact, I thought one of the post credits scenes was going to reveal that the soul stone was in Wakanda, hence the big battle we see in the infinity war trailer, but that wasn’t the case.

Oooooooooooooh, I didn't even think of that. Good catch. I bet this is what they do.

Did anyone have the no cell phone warning with Chadwick and Letitia right before the movie? It was pretty funny.

Aw, man, no I didn't. That's a ripoff.

[The Whovian]

Overall was a fantastic movie, Certainly in the top 5 marvel films to me ( I would have only Winter Soldier, Civil War, Spider-man Homecoming and Iron Man 1 above it).

Yep. It's definitely right up there with those movies, IMO. I would put it higher than Spidey Homecoming.

[protege]

Just got home. But i loved it, the only complaints i have are the CGI was weak in some places. I literaly liked or loved every character. I liked what they did with M'Baku. He was more like a Silver Samurai type charatcer then ManApe but it worked.

One question why the hell does tchaka still have a fu**ed up eye in the after life? Lol im jk just something i was wondering in story. From a production standpoint thats the actors eye(Or glass eye maybe?)

Oh and Sigphi the score was almost all African music. I think they played Kendrick during the big chase scene and it was playing on Klaues radio. It was background noise. Then they played him again during the credits

Man Marvel dont like villians. They got rid of two of them and made the other a good guy. Oh and Tossed Hunters title off on bucky as a throw away line for comic fans. Thought its small enough Hunter can still be white wolf and pop up in the Sequel.

Oh and anyone complaing about Tchalla losing a fight. Go read a comic with Killmonger. He has a history of stomping Tchalla

About the music; my friend and i wanted to get the score after seeing the movie, but the only soundtrack available is the kendrick lamar album. I liked the song at the end, but i wish they released the score simultaneously.

[protege]

Saw it last night and it was a great film! Love all the themes and how they combined African & African-American issues throughout. I'd say it was the best origin film we've gotten from the MCU so far. It did get predictable after the challenge but that didn't stop the movie from being enjoyable.

Shuri was the stand-out, which I wasn't expecting. M'Baku was pretty cool, too. T'Challa got to show a different side than what we got in Civil War and it was nice to see him more "human."

MBJ was fantastic as Killmonger and his POV was totally understandable, even if his response was going too far. He had a point about how Wakanda could've actually been helping make the world a better place.

Love the call back to the comics with BP stopping the Rhino and the way Okoye did it was funny/cute. Speaking of which, the WOMEN!! Damn they were gorgeous!!

I think killing Killmonger off was a mistake as his character could easily grow into one of the best villains the MCU has. Same with Klaw.

And the music was phenomenal!

I rate this a 8.5/10

Speaking of klaw, i wonder if we’re going to get the full on version in the MCU.

[Sighphi]

this movie got the SW treatment where the last movie is always said to be the best in the franchise, everything is the best, best this, best that but it was just average.

It was very generic. There was nothing that was super special. Killmonger is surely not the best marvel villain at all. He just had a standard revenge plot. He popped in, did his thing, and was beaten and that's it. The What the Flick review was calling Shuri the smartest person in the MCU and nope. We are told she makes upgrades but we are never shown any new unique thing being made up. We see a whole science division where she works, who knows who came up with what.

Even Wakanda was generalized. I was hoping to hear all sorts of African mythological stuff instead we got the opposite. Man-ape talking about hindu gods and Klaw talking about South American things. And the tribes were just the generic farmers and miners, what? They developed the visuals for Wakanda but the rest wasnt worked on. I mean, why would you bring in Hanuman and El Dorado? Why not use African stuff?

The only thing that had be jumping up and down was the last fight with the cloak shields and the armored Rhinos. That was cool.

I dont really care about the CGI at the end because by that point the movie wasnt so good that this brought it down.

So i would give it an average score. Nothing too bad but nothing too good.

Oh, one last thing, i guess i will praise that it wasnt a joke-fest like all the other marvel films.

[The Red Monk]

It was a pretty mediocre movie, all things considered. The action would've been pretty good if you could actually see a damn thing but no, we had to have badly-done shaky cam garbage again. T'Challa wasn't a bad protagonist but he wasn't particularly compelling either - he was just...bland. His angsting over his father and Killmonger's childhood was probably the closest he got to some pathos and development. The supporting cast almost all managed to be so incredibly irritating that I honestly wanted them all to die or just go away before the mid-point (also, obligatory all women are good and all men are bad shebang in the end with the Wakandan military). Michael B. Jordan manages to be the worst MCU villain thus far with only Whiplash being worse than him, which is saying something. The visual design was mostly uninteresting except for the underground train line. The only midway likable character was the Jubari tribal leader. Obligatory "all black people got to stick together" message in the end which completely ignores that Africans are not a uniform people who all care about the same ****, they have the same racial grudges against each other as Europeans do against each other and tend to downright loathe African-Americans as "not real Africans" but the mongrel descendants of the tribes that got their asses kicked by other Africans and sold to the European and Arab slave traders.

[Punisher007]

Calling Killmonger's plan a "revenge plot" only is, simplifying things. That was only part of it.

[Punisher007]

I don't see him as any of those things.
He's not likeable - indeed, he revels in death and combat. He treats everyone around him like dirt. His actions indicate he only cares about himself.
Sympathetic - Not really. He'd only be sympathetic if his stated goals were his actual motivation but his actions indicate they're not. His actions are pretty much entirely selfish.
Charismatic - His ability to hold the loyalty of his troops is extremely fleeting to say the least. Even the Royal Guard, whose whole purpose is to serve whoever sits on the throne, quickly grow tired of him and rebel against him in very short order.

To put it more succinctly, he was an arrogant immature snot who really needed therapy and/or a good slap up the backside of the head.

It's almost like he was the villain or something.

[Daoud]

THAT. WAS. AWEEEEEEEEEESOOOOOOOOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It was everything I thought it would be and more! The story flowed perfectly, it had superb fight scenes, lots of action, great actors and the dialogue was perfect.

I love how the whole movie was centered around honor. Killmonger was not honorable. Black Panther was. I like how the point of that was driven throughout the movie, and it was great.

Outside of BP, Shuri stole the show. She was hilarious, kicked butt, invented cool tech, is beautiful and played by the amazing Letitia Wright. She was just outstanding! I really hope she has a big role in the upcoming Avengers IW movie. I want more of her!!!!!!!!!!!!!



BP was super cool. I mean, between his awesome display of fighting skills, sweet costume, impeccable character and big time tech...he was kicking serious butt! I thought all the actors in the whole movie were fantastic, but Chadwick was amazing. Him and Letitia...I just don't have the words. They were incredible.

Michael B. Jordan was also very cool as Killmonger. So was Serkis as Claw. I have to say, I was surprised they killed him off in this one. I thought for sure he would be in the next one. But that's cool because I don't like it when it seems like no one dies.

Danai was great as Okoye, as was Forest Whitaker, Lupia, Daniel (I've liked him ever since the Fades), Martin Freeman as Ross. All outstanding actors. I'm not sure they could have done a better job of casting.

The fight scene between BP and Killmonger at the end was really cool. The two costumes looked awesome, but I think BP's silver with black is more stunning and works better.

Towards the end of the movie, I leaned over to my son and said "I bet the last Infinity Gem is in Wakanda" and he said "Yeah".

I just love this movie. It's easily one of Marvel's best. I give it a 9/10. Now I can't wait to see them in Avengers IW. In the meantime, rock on BP!!

Excellent review Whovian!

This film is more than I would have dared dream for a Black Panther film, and now I dream for more!

Loved Wakanda! The film makers went to Africa to research various societies and it shows!
Wakanda has a verisimilitude that even movies set in mundane locations lack!
I loved how they were hidden but not isolated. They have spies allover the world.
They know the history of the world.

"Don't scare me like that colonizer!" :smile:

Shuri was indeed a pleasure! Shout out to Reginald Hudlin for making her and shout out to J. Cole and Coogler for giving her the distinctive role she has in this film!

All of the characters where important and the actors on point.
The writing was just perfect.

The only forced character was the same one that was forced in the comics and that was Ross.
While no where near as stupid as he was in Priest series, his scenes in Wakanda during the finale seem like they where added just to give the character something to do.
Like, couldn't Shuri hack Wakanda's automated defenses to do what had to be done?
Still just a minor annoyance and no where near as jarring as Fury cutting a hole through pavement in seconds before Bucky could get him in the "Winter Soldier".

Will be going back to the theater see it again!


Excelsior!

Daoud

[Vegan Daddy]

Love how M'Baku and his tribe are vegetarians.

[hulahulk]

I loved the movie. Definitely Top 5 MCU.

The Wakanda development, the supporting cast, the soundtrack, and the BP history stood out to me as the film's greatest assets.

The CGI at times was subpar, especially the BP/Killmonger fight in the mine. Their fall reminded me of the scenes in Spiderman 3 at the construction site.

I'm glad the humor was turned down a notch or two. The MCU needs balance to be better appreciated film to film.