Black Panther Appreciation 2019

[XPac]

I'm not sure I understand everything here but I did say the question was a tough one. But all I'm saying is that Wakanda did nothing, and the fact that they did nothing has barely been a topic in the comics. Personally, I think the whole "Wakanda is isolationist and xenophobic and they're so cool" thing hasn't aged well. It was cool for some decades, I admit. I initially liked Black Panther and Wakanda because of that. But it just doesn't feel right anymore, at least to me. I'm just tired of that angle. Even if other nations don't want their help, let them at least try.





I think Achebe is the one villain that could work best in this context as far as I know. Maybe just retool his origin a little bit. But seriously, there's so much more interesting stuff to do with Black Panther in the MCU than making him fight another monarch for two hours. I mean, I'm not that against the idea of T'Challa kicking Atlantean or Doombot ass. I'd really like to see T'Challa fight enemies stronger than regular humans. But I can't just see it being that interesting of a story for where the character and his nation are right now.

Imagine the sequel starting off taking place immediately where the first film left off. T'Challa's still at the UN. The speaker guy asks him what Wakanda can offer the rest of the world as a nation of farmers. Audience gasps and murmurs. T'Chaka gives a knowing chuckle and says: "Well if you will like to find out, please follow me outside." He and his entourage walk off the podium. Ross gets a phone call with someone asking him what the hell is going on. T'Challa leads the representatives to multiple Wakandan aircrafts that decloak themselves. He tells them to get onboard so they can see the real Wakanda. They're fly off, with everyone on board confused and bewildered. Nakia takes T'Challa's hand and both of them smile off to the sun. Two hours later they fly right into the Golden City. Cut to the present and we get a quick montage like a trailer for a documentary about how Wakanda's revelation will shape this new decade. We see some of the stuff I described in the earlier post and a lot more. Shots of T'Challa walking around like President Obama meets Tony Stark meets Nelson Mandela.

Seriously I don't get how people can't see that potential to tell such a different, great and affecting story, or they can and just want to see that potential be literally destroyed.

Wakanda being xenophobic and isolationish is not supposed to feel right... that's why T'Challa is changing all of that. Wakanda is basically a prop to make T'Challa look better. Wakanda's flaws allows T'Challa to be an agent of change to right the wrong.

We have to remember that at the end of the day the point of all of this is T'Challa, not Wakanda... if Wakanda in the past at least looking bad allows T'Challa to look good in the here and now, it's a trade off marvel will make.

Plus you can't NOT have Wakanda do noting about all the terrible stuff which has happened to africa in the past, because in the MCU like in the real world it DID happen. It's similar to the issue Blue Marvel had in his mini... Wakanda like Blue Marvel basically HAD to do nothing because the MCU history had to be the same as the real worlds. And of course, them not doing anything creates the opportunity to raise some interesting questions about their decision to do nothing, so it all works out.

[Blind Wedjat]

That's not what I'm saying at all. Isolationism and xenophobia are part of Wakanda's history. What I'm talking about is this idea being pushed even when T'Challa is king. We saw this as recently as Secret Empire when he refused to give the Cosmic Cube shard to Scott Lang simply because Wakanda found it first and he didn't care. We all know what happened next: Wakanda got invaded, T'Challa got captured and the shard was taken. If T'Challa and Wakanda are written this way there's always gonna be that temptation to humble them. I'm tired of that, and I'd actually like to see Wakanda be the game changer people keep saying it is. Show, don't tell.

And this idea that the MCU or the MU has to resemble our world as closely as possible is silly to me. A world were ancient myths are confirmed existences, rich playboys can fly around in a suit of armour, where ordinary people can gain superhuman abilities through scientific experimentation or accident, where utopias suddenly pop up and where a big purple swole alien that kinda sounds like Josh Brolin blinked away half of all life with a snap of his fingers will never be like our own world. Almost every human institution conceivable will be affected somehow. As far as I was concerned, slavery and all consequent constructs did not exist in the MCU until Black Panther brought it up, because racism was never shown to be a thing prior to that. But there's a reason why The Boys and Watchmen (2019) have caught on in this post superhero domination climate. They're the properties actually showing how different the world is because superheroes exist. Watchmen in particular is exploring this through race relations in America, but it has shown how almost every facet of life is different because of the events of the graphic novel. For all of the MCU's credit, they haven't really done this.

There's no reason why Black Panther II can't explore that. It honestly should. I'm just tired of "Wakanda in turmoil/at war" stories. They are by far the most boring stories you can tell with the property. Lazy and uninspired.

Seriously, when was the last time T'Challa felt like a world leader operating on the world stage in the comics?

[Vibranium Weave]

People in this message board are saying the rumors are never true....but remember they were right about the Taskmaster being the villain of Black Widow.

[DigiCom]

They also predicted David Harbour was playing Ben Grimm: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WfSFbVFiGog&t=19s

[DigiCom]

Just for giggles, I Googled "black panther rumors" and found this list:

https://screenrant.com/black-panther...ue-hope-arent/

Even some of the "confirmed" rumors weren't entirely true. At best, they were able to make some educated guesses based on the trailer.

[Husk]

I don’t mind the monarch versus monarch angle. Admittedly, I’d prefer it was Namor if his rights weren’t so tricky as both T’Challa and Namor share the same vision for their kingdoms, but that leaves them at odds. It’s a nice moral quandary.

However, we’ve only fully experienced Wakanda in one movie thus far. Then as a battle setting in one. Do we have to leave it behind so soon to focus on establishing another kingdom? The Blip/Snap is the perfect opportunity to keep the sequel in Wakanda (or at least the nations around it). That throne won’t have been vacant for five years and Ramonda could easily have it usurped by any number of Wakandans such as Achebe or M’Baku (who hasn’t been a primary antagonist yet) or even from across the border, like Queen Zanda.

[Blind Wedjat]

I personally dislike the five year gap of the Blip. Feels like way too much time and it only benefitted Tony's journey during that time because he gets a five year old kid that's still young but old enough to have dialogue and feel a lot more worth fighting for. Everything else doesn't make much sense and there's way too much off screen character development during that time. Nat conveniently finds Clint, everyone finally sees Thor for what he is, and Scott escapes the QR without aging (even though he should have because Janet aged) all after exactly five years (thanks to a rat of all things). All of the immediate effects of the Blip are skipped over too.

Five years of Wakanda having no king, no princess, plus a significant portion of the population gone feels like a lot of baggage Coogler has to deal with that he didn't ask for. It wouldn't surprise me if that's part of the reason why it's taken him a bit long to get started. There's a lot that could have happened between those five years, especially when Coogler didn't get to do anything with Wakanda being open to the rest of the world (considering Infinity War takes place two years after Black Panther). And if he does choose to ignore of that I personally would be okay with it, but it'll just feel empty. Like the Blip meant nothing to them.

I honestly don't know why Markus, McFeely and the Russos didn't just use a year or two. That would have been enough.

[Ezyo1000]

People in this message board are saying the rumors are never true....but remember they were right about the Taskmaster being the villain of Black Widow.

No people on this board are saying how many rumours from "inside sources" get thrown around before a movie comes out that claim ball types of stuff vs actual true rumours?

Again for Black panther we heard all types of isht, from Cap and the secret Avengers were going to be in there, to Bucky, to Nakia is going to be malice, to a storm Cameo.. how many of those were true?

See people Will latch on to the very few times these rumours are true (and ignore all the other rumours they got wrong) and then start claiming up and down that it's true and these person is a credible source. Well when the director hasn't even finished the draft yet, the movie isn't in the shooting stages and still won't be out for another 2 and a half years, I'm not going to believe these rumours unless Coogler feigi or T'Chadwick say or confirm

[Ezyo1000]

Just for giggles, I Googled "black panther rumors" and found this list:

https://screenrant.com/black-panther...ue-hope-arent/

Even some of the "confirmed" rumors weren't entirely true. At best, they were able to make some educated guesses based on the trailer.

the first few confirmed rumours can't even be confirmed rumours because the trailer gives it away. Also lol on the Coates, Djalia and killmonger confirms.

[MindofShadow]

People in this message board are saying the rumors are never true....but remember they were right about the Taskmaster being the villain of Black Widow.

We never said "never." They percentages are just really really low. Farther out you are, the lower the percentages.

But, look at this example.

The first rumor that Taskmaster would be the villain of BW came out in March 2019. There was already a script in place and they started rewriting the script that February. And Disney showed the villain that summer.

Look at thta timeline and then look at the current timeline for BP2. It isn't even close to the same. You can't have leaks if there is nothing to leak. If there is no script, how can you leak anything? We are 3 years out from the movie.

[MindofShadow]

I personally dislike the five year gap of the Blip. Feels like way too much time and it only benefitted Tony's journey during that time because he gets a five year old kid that's still young but old enough to have dialogue and feel a lot more worth fighting for. Everything else doesn't make much sense and there's way too much off screen character development during that time. Nat conveniently finds Clint, everyone finally sees Thor for what he is, and Scott escapes the QR without aging (even though he should have because Janet aged) all after exactly five years (thanks to a rat of all things). All of the immediate effects of the Blip are skipped over too.

Five years of Wakanda having no king, no princess, plus a significant portion of the population gone feels like a lot of baggage Coogler has to deal with that he didn't ask for. It wouldn't surprise me if that's part of the reason why it's taken him a bit long to get started. There's a lot that could have happened between those five years, especially when Coogler didn't get to do anything with Wakanda being open to the rest of the world (considering Infinity War takes place two years after Black Panther). And if he does choose to ignore of that I personally would be okay with it, but it'll just feel empty. Like the Blip meant nothing to them.

I honestly don't know why Markus, McFeely and the Russos didn't just use a year or two. That would have been enough.

I actually agree with this. Especially since Cassie dind't really pay off for anything being aged other than one well acted scene. It was literally just Tony and maybe Widow (and I didn't really like the Ronan stuff, felt like a waste of time TBH. The movie was beyond hawkeye being the punisher. stakes were too high. It was hawkeye fanboism)

One way to reconcile is to see T'challa/Wakanda use their tech and resources to be instrumental in the rebuilding process with everyone back. So that shows him "opening up" whlie some within wakanda are pissed because Wakanda themselves haven't fully recovered from it themselves.

Or maybe the blip resulted in Wakanda tech/vibranium ending up in the hands of bad guys/weapons dealers. With half of the people instantly gone and the chaos involved, maybe some of the stuff T'challa has been doing for other countries and the tech given/shown started getting stolen. The movie could start with T'challa recovering tech from various villain hideouts.

What I'm talking about is this idea being pushed even when T'Challa is king. We saw this as recently as Secret Empire when he refused to give the Cosmic Cube shard to Scott Lang simply because Wakanda found it first and he didn't care. We all know what happened next: Wakanda got invaded, T'Challa got captured and the shard was taken. If T'Challa and Wakanda are written this way there's always gonna be that temptation to humble them. I'm tired of that, and I'd actually like to see Wakanda be the game changer people keep saying it is. Show, don't tell.

TBF, T'challa offered a legitimate reason in SE. I believe he blamed Tony for part of the predicament, the avengers were a ragtime militia type group (with a damn spy in there lol) while Wakanda was fortified, and he offered to help them by the Avengers bringing the shards to Wakanda instead.

I am always on the fence about T'challa retreating to Wakanda and holing up during world catastrophies vs actually actively helping. He did the same thing in EMH during the skrull invasions (made some sense bc he didn't know who to trust).

I do get what you are saying about the humbling thing though. I am really hoping, with Coogler being well... black lol and a fan of hte property that he never goes that route.

When it come to really powerful beings or countries/realms, Marve has a big problem with telling us instead of showing us. Some **** happened with Asgard. A millineia of being the protector of realms... 3 straight movies of them being pretty damn bad at it and getting the **** pushed in until saved by Thor lol. (and odin was weak as ****)

[Blind Wedjat]

One way to reconcile is to see T'challa/Wakanda use their tech and resources to be instrumental in the rebuilding process with everyone back. So that shows him "opening up" whlie some within wakanda are pissed because Wakanda themselves haven't fully recovered from it themselves.

Or maybe the blip resulted in Wakanda tech/vibranium ending up in the hands of bad guys/weapons dealers. With half of the people instantly gone and the chaos involved, maybe some of the stuff T'challa has been doing for other countries and the tech given/shown started getting stolen. The movie could start with T'challa recovering tech from various villain hideouts.

Ah I never actually thought about this. Especially the second part. That could be a great way to get the ball rolling. Deals with both the fallout of opening Wakanda to the rest of the world and T'Challa and Shuri both not being around to watch over things. I like that.

[MindofShadow]

Ah I never actually thought about this. Especially the second part. That could be a great way to get the ball rolling. Deals with both the fallout of opening Wakanda to the rest of the world and T'Challa and Shuri both not being around to watch over things. I like that.

Opens the door for someone like Moses Magnum, if MCu even have his rights anyway

[DigiCom]

Or maybe the blip resulted in Wakanda tech/vibranium ending up in the hands of bad guys/weapons dealers. With half of the people instantly gone and the chaos involved, maybe some of the stuff T'challa has been doing for other countries and the tech given/shown started getting stolen. The movie could start with T'challa recovering tech from various villain hideouts.

Now, that's a nice theory. Gives a bit of tension, without going the whole "Wakanda is being invaded!" angle. Again.

[XPac]

That's not what I'm saying at all. Isolationism and xenophobia are part of Wakanda's history. What I'm talking about is this idea being pushed even when T'Challa is king. We saw this as recently as Secret Empire when he refused to give the Cosmic Cube shard to Scott Lang simply because Wakanda found it first and he didn't care. We all know what happened next: Wakanda got invaded, T'Challa got captured and the shard was taken. If T'Challa and Wakanda are written this way there's always gonna be that temptation to humble them. I'm tired of that, and I'd actually like to see Wakanda be the game changer people keep saying it is. Show, don't tell.

And this idea that the MCU or the MU has to resemble our world as closely as possible is silly to me. A world were ancient myths are confirmed existences, rich playboys can fly around in a suit of armour, where ordinary people can gain superhuman abilities through scientific experimentation or accident, where utopias suddenly pop up and where a big purple swole alien that kinda sounds like Josh Brolin blinked away half of all life with a snap of his fingers will never be like our own world. Almost every human institution conceivable will be affected somehow. As far as I was concerned, slavery and all consequent constructs did not exist in the MCU until Black Panther brought it up, because racism was never shown to be a thing prior to that. But there's a reason why The Boys and Watchmen (2019) have caught on in this post superhero domination climate. They're the properties actually showing how different the world is because superheroes exist. Watchmen in particular is exploring this through race relations in America, but it has shown how almost every facet of life is different because of the events of the graphic novel. For all of the MCU's credit, they haven't really done this.

There's no reason why Black Panther II can't explore that. It honestly should. I'm just tired of "Wakanda in turmoil/at war" stories. They are by far the most boring stories you can tell with the property. Lazy and uninspired.

Seriously, when was the last time T'Challa felt like a world leader operating on the world stage in the comics?

T'Challa had a valid reason to not give up the cube fragment. Give Wakanda had sucessfully repelled Hydra twice, he had valid reason to believe it was safer in Wakanda than with the Avengers. Given Hydra ended up getting the cube fragments from both Wakanda and the Avengers, neither side was completely right or wrong there. But I don't think that was a case of xenophobia or isolationism... merely a difference in strategy. Wakanda protected the cube fragment in a staionally but well defended secure location, while the Avengers chose to be mobile and hide. Both strategies failed... but both were valid in theory.

And you make the MCU and MU resemble the real world, because it allows you to tell more relatable stories. Part of what made Killmonger so cool is that he had a point. He wasn't right per say... but his character was far more fleshed out than 99% of the comic book villains you see in movies, and a part of that stems from incorporating elements of social and historical struggles into his own personal struggle.

Obviously we don't know what the next BP movie will be about. Though it's certainly not unbelievable that Namor or Doom might be in it, at this point any rumor should be taken with a grain of salt. That said, given how good Cooglers last movie was I don't think we need to worry about it being lazy or uninspired regardless of what direction he decides to take. I think a billion plus box office plus an Oscar nomination more than qualifies him for the benefit of the doubt. I don't think we have anything to worry about either way.