Question: Which writer portrayal of T'Challa do you all prefer?
This is not a focus on necessarily favorite story but which writer wrote your favorite T'Challa. It's a bit odd since T'Challa has so many positive attributes and writers tend to not focus on his flaws or shortcomings that make a character rich and more interesting.
Question #2: What do you feel are his most prominent character flaws?
His arrogance and his reluctance to ask for help? Or his non trusting nature? Most writers ignore this.
1) Priest. Full stop.
2) He has several. He's a control freak, he doesn't let people get close to him, and he's always comparing himself to the myth of his father, not the reality. Add those together, and you end up with a guy who tries to do everything by himself, even when asking for help is the smarter move.
T'Challa is, to use a Cherryh title, like a wave without a shore. He is so accomplished there are few shores, or individuals, that his character and abilities can break upon. That is his greatest assest and flaw. In my opinion that is what makes him interesting and, therefore, difficult to write. I would imagine a character such as he is like DaVinci or Sherlock Holmes. His very abilities are very nearly liabilities because he has so few problems or people he finds challenging or even interesting. Simply by writing a fully realized T'Challa is also revealing his major flaw.
Reality is for those who are afraid of science fiction.
1.Priest overall, Redjack for Modern day more household known T'Challa.
2. He is borderline paranoid, keeps people at arms length and suffers from emotional detachment to some degree. He will manipulate anyone regardless of familiarity to achieve his goals, which ends up causing problems when he does it to allies. He has trust and control issues and since he is always planning, he never is actually at peace
I think its probably the best of both worlds though. They dont want CHADWICK to be replaced. This allows for us to still get T'CHalla. That way the actor taking on the role doesnt have to live up to Chadwick and T'Challa. He just has to live up to T'Challa with a clean slate.
I'm just trying to be open-minded.
Well...the older brother made it clear he feels they should recast and even gave his thoughts on why he feels they won't.
1. Hudlin, I like my T’Challa with a dash of cynic snark and a good deal of standoffishness born equal parts out of his own arrogance and his own sense of heroism. Priest is a close second and depending on my mood his super analytical, 10-steps ahead iteration of the character is my favorite too. I think as I reread his run I’ll consider his version my preferred one. Come back to me in a few weeks lol.
2. T’Challa has an extreme paranoia as a result of his father’s assassination. His childhood was stolen that day and ever since he’s been captured by that moment, making him emotionally distant and slow to trust others to an unhealthy degree. He has a nauseating sense of duty that makes him self-sacrificial to a fault and all too willing to manipulate (and if necessary, cast aside) those closest to him for the sake of his people.
He holds very little as sacred and is mostly fine throwing away his marriage, his friends, allies, and even his own family if it means a chance of saving Wakanda. He does this in part because he has this idealized version of his father created out of an irrational guilt over not saving him as a child. To this end T’Challa isn’t merely an emotional shut in who lies to and otherwise tries to control his friends and allies but someone who has adopted an insane ego to justify his own fears and provide himself an artificial sense of security.
His arrogant poker face betrays a deep sense of what can best be described as a fear of imperfection and loneliness. On one hand he’s convinced himself that his responsibilities all too often demand him to be something more than a mere man, to act as a god. On the other it’s hard to keep up appearances and he finds himself loathing the shell he’s built around his heart. It’s perhaps why he’s developed this proclivity to be a hero, because the trappings of royalty and the pressure of his father’s shadow aren’t as prevalent. It’s also why he tends to fall in love with women who couldn’t care less about his throne, hence why they tend to be non-Wakandan. T’Challa‘a arrogance, his paranoia, and his tendency to see others as nothing more than cogs in his machinations should be something he constantly struggles with.
Last edited by chief12d; 06-11-2021 at 07:10 PM.
Redjacks from panther quest is my favorite and I feel he fully encompasses all of those attributes you laid out. He had flaws, he did not play second fiddle, and he was arrogant without it coming off poorly.
The minute he told Captain America to remove his hand during the Atuma conflict I knew he was it
Last edited by Ekie; 06-11-2021 at 07:41 PM.