T'Challa: The Black Panther Appreciation 2021

[Devaishwarya]

It is over.

We all win lol

We are the bigger winners because Coates will never darken Wakanda's borders with his shitty writing ever again.
The two fans who love this run will be drowning in their tears because he's gone...we will be knocking back the champagne like it's water.

[Ezyo1000]

And the thing is Zenzi could've been redeemed the regular way lol. It's clear by how Coates went out of his way to flesh out her backstory that she wasn't meant to be as evil as Tetu. Sure she was an accomplice in his terrorism but since we're given more context for why she joins the People I could've seen her becoming an anti-villain by the end of things after she realized Tetu was no different than Killmonger.

There was no organic buildup to her redemption, she was little more than a slightly fleshed out henchmen that as you said worked with racists like Hydra and slaughtered many Wakandans. Now all of a sudden she's gonna be instrumental in taking down the big bad of the entire run with 0 explanation of how she got to that point. It's intellectually lazy to skip over what should've been a recurring subplot across the last 30+ issues. Tetu and Zenzi were such wasted potential and under a future writer they can become great, with Tetu as Zaheer and the Zenzi as his ally who rebels to form her own faction.

Zenzi should of never been redeemed ever. The thing is that Coates didn't actually care about fleshing the character in a cohesive way. She sided with Tetu and had Zero issues slaughtering Wakandans with the people.

Her reasoning for hating Wakanda makes zero sense too because it's not like Wakanda did anything to her N'Jadaka wasn't representing Wakanda and in her little origin story she hates Wakanda simply because her life sucked. So since day one it was obvious Coates had no actual direction. Sided with the people, sided with Faustus and the strucker twins (this one really goes against any logic completely but w/e) sides with N'Jadaka. Then all of a sudden, she wants revenge on him, and is willing to help Wakanda in taking him down???

She is a villain straight up and should of been left as so, not an anti villain. Straight up villain just like his MA. Coates had a hard-on for having randoms take down the baddie's of stories. And for him to not only be judged less harshly for clearly horrendous storytelling and Character development, but to be PRAISED as some phenomenal comic writer penning a LEGENDARY run, when folks like Hudlin who did a damn good job got criticized for showing an unapologetically Black King? Frak that. It's an insult to actual comic writer's whom he is getting out on the same level as

[Ezyo1000]

T'Challa is to blame for colonizing space? Pretty sure that it was revealed that the Empire started from the descendants of the Wakandans who got lost when searching for the origin of vibranium. Coates potentially retconning his own work to take jabs at T'Challa is the least surprising so far.

And after Zenzi did I'd T'Challa just going to let her and Tetu go? It won't surprise me if Coates makes them part of whatever the Wakandan government supposed to be these days.

No one man remember? Of course it's his fault, Bast gotta gaslight and be Coates mouthpiece for one last Jab before his failed garbage of a run is over for good. Isht talkers gonna isht talk I guess

[Ekie]

The one good thing about all these delays is that we only have a month and a half wait to start a brand new Journey under a writer that has at least written comic books before and sounds like he appreciates both the character and the past artist who have worked with him. Very thankful that that first interview was one of Hope and appreciation. The exact opposite of what the previous guys first few interviews were

[Huntsman Spider]

In regards to the "no one man" thing, I'd just say that as cool and awesome and badass as superpowered monarchs are in superhero fiction, in reality we'd all be looking at them the way people increasingly look at Superman from DC --- a singular figure invested with so much power (and responsibility), how long or what would it take to make that figure snap and turn on the world and humanity at large? Would there be anything that other people could do to stop or even check that figure before things escalated to that point in the first place? What kind of measures would there be to hold such a figure accountable should something go terribly, horribly wrong?

That said, where I would argue Coates went wrong with his attempts to analyze and solve for those complexities was that he essentially seemed to conclude that Wakanda was (or should be) as morally flawed and compromised as any other nation in existence, just as much built off self-aggrandizing, self-justifying mythology that covered for deep moral and spiritual rot as any other nation in the world. To put it somewhat more succinctly, he made Wakanda into the African equivalent of the United States of America, given the reckoning going on in the real world over how many contemporary U.S. institutions are shaped by and built on --- again --- self-aggrandizing, self-justifying mythology covering for deep moral and spiritual rot, now on the verge of metastasizing into something beyond hope of ever healing or curing. As the United States was once upheld as a shining city on a hill, a beacon of freedom and democracy for the world to follow, so Wakanda, at least fictionally speaking, was supposed to be a shining beacon of excellence and an example for the African diaspora, let alone the rest of the world, to strive towards. Instead, under Coates's vision of the mythos, Wakanda is fundamentally no better, morally or spiritually speaking, than the world it inhabits or the nations with which it coexists, and that's . . . rather sad, actually. Maybe more fitting for the world we live in today, but still sad.

[MindofShadow]

In regards to the "no one man" thing, I'd just say that as cool and awesome and badass as superpowered monarchs are in superhero fiction, in reality we'd all be looking at them the way people increasingly look at Superman from DC --- a singular figure invested with so much power (and responsibility), how long or what would it take to make that figure snap and turn on the world and humanity at large? Would there be anything that other people could do to stop or even check that figure before things escalated to that point in the first place? What kind of measures would there be to hold such a figure accountable should something go terribly, horribly wrong?

That said, where I would argue Coates went wrong with his attempts to analyze and solve for those complexities was that he essentially seemed to conclude that Wakanda was (or should be) as morally flawed and compromised as any other nation in existence, just as much built off self-aggrandizing, self-justifying mythology that covered for deep moral and spiritual rot as any other nation in the world. To put it somewhat more succinctly, he made Wakanda into the African equivalent of the United States of America, given the reckoning going on in the real world over how many contemporary U.S. institutions are shaped by and built on --- again --- self-aggrandizing, self-justifying mythology covering for deep moral and spiritual rot, now on the verge of metastasizing into something beyond hope of ever healing or curing. As the United States was once upheld as a shining city on a hill, a beacon of freedom and democracy for the world to follow, so Wakanda, at least fictionally speaking, was supposed to be a shining beacon of excellence and an example for the African diaspora, let alone the rest of the world, to strive towards. Instead, under Coates's vision of the mythos, Wakanda is fundamentally no better, morally or spiritually speaking, than the world it inhabits or the nations with which it coexists, and that's . . . rather sad, actually. Maybe more fitting for the world we live in today, but still sad.

Coates tried to say something but he never really said anything lol.

All fluff, all thin... no depth. Pretty words that didn't mean anything. Long speeches that didn't say anything.

I actually have no problem with Wakanda getting lost in space and turning to conquest. Without the Black Panther guiding them... Wakanda isn't quite the same. The Black Panther is the beacon.

The Superman analogy is great... because in normal universe Superman doesn't break. He is a guiding light, despite the power he weilds. T'challa is the same way. And should get treated with the same respect.

If you wanna make elseworld stories where T'challa isn't that way, then go ahead (Hudlin did).

you can't give the BP title to a black dude who is in The Sunken Place man. You just can't.

[chief12d]

In regards to the "no one man" thing, I'd just say that as cool and awesome and badass as superpowered monarchs are in superhero fiction, in reality we'd all be looking at them the way people increasingly look at Superman from DC --- a singular figure invested with so much power (and responsibility), how long or what would it take to make that figure snap and turn on the world and humanity at large? Would there be anything that other people could do to stop or even check that figure before things escalated to that point in the first place? What kind of measures would there be to hold such a figure accountable should something go terribly, horribly wrong?

That said, where I would argue Coates went wrong with his attempts to analyze and solve for those complexities was that he essentially seemed to conclude that Wakanda was (or should be) as morally flawed and compromised as any other nation in existence, just as much built off self-aggrandizing, self-justifying mythology that covered for deep moral and spiritual rot as any other nation in the world. To put it somewhat more succinctly, he made Wakanda into the African equivalent of the United States of America, given the reckoning going on in the real world over how many contemporary U.S. institutions are shaped by and built on --- again --- self-aggrandizing, self-justifying mythology covering for deep moral and spiritual rot, now on the verge of metastasizing into something beyond hope of ever healing or curing. As the United States was once upheld as a shining city on a hill, a beacon of freedom and democracy for the world to follow, so Wakanda, at least fictionally speaking, was supposed to be a shining beacon of excellence and an example for the African diaspora, let alone the rest of the world, to strive towards. Instead, under Coates's vision of the mythos, Wakanda is fundamentally no better, morally or spiritually speaking, than the world it inhabits or the nations with which it coexists, and that's . . . rather sad, actually. Maybe more fitting for the world we live in today, but still sad.

This is a question I think a lot of BP writers and to a lesser extent fans always need to contend with. How many skeletons is this aspirational civilization supposed to have in the closet before it’s national mythology becomes forfeit and the norms upheld within it become symptomatic of oppression and exploitation? Coates’ ideology shines through in that regard, he doesn’t believe in the “dream” of America so he could never hope to conceptualize or respect the notion of Wakanda as a beacon for the world community, particularly the black diaspora.

In grounding the fictional culture in harsh reality (settler colonialism, slavery, institutional sexism) he not only upturns the idea of Wakanda as nation above all others but of its innate capacity for change in his treatment of T’Challa. It was T’Challa that turned a blind eye to the mass rape of Wakandan women, who never wrestled with the implications of ruling a nation founded on soft genocide, and who ignored (and for a time embraced!) the enslavement of non-humans in the Intergalactic Empire of Wakanda.

Under Coates T’Challa is not the subversive radical he was under McGregor, Priest, and Hudlin. Even when Priest explored Wakanda’s less than ideal political elements T’Challa was shown as being in direct opposition to them, acting as a visionary reformist. He banished the Hatut Zeraze and while he maintained the institution of the Dora Milaje he made clear his lack of interest and sought to only maintain peace. Coates sees T’Challa as a moderate, meekly defending a morally bankrupt status quo within a nation only ahead of the rest of the world in its technology, not its institutions or spiritual framing.

It is sad, because there are interesting ideas to explore, but outside the technical issues of his writing, those aren’t ideas meant to be explored in a BP book. It erodes the fundamentals of what makes Wakanda such a strong concept and T’Challa a revolutionary character, which isn’t to say Wakanda should be without flaw mind you. Coogler and Priest did extraordinary jobs with the lore despite not shying away from Wakandan flaws. But when Wakanda is virtually no different than America or Britain and T’Challa is a sycophant for the status quo then is it really Black Panther?

[Redjack]

This is a question I think a lot of BP writers and to a lesser extent fans always need to contend with. How many skeletons is this aspirational civilization supposed to have in the closet before it’s national mythology becomes forfeit and the norms upheld within it become symptomatic of oppression and exploitation? Coates’ ideology shines through in that regard, he doesn’t believe in the “dream” of America so he could never hope to conceptualize or respect the notion of Wakanda as a beacon for the world community, particularly the black diaspora.

In grounding the fictional culture in harsh reality (settler colonialism, slavery, institutional sexism) he not only upturns the idea of Wakanda as nation above all others but of its innate capacity for change in his treatment of T’Challa. It was T’Challa that turned a blind eye to the mass rape of Wakandan women, who never wrestled with the implications of ruling a nation founded on soft genocide, and who ignored (and for a time embraced!) the enslavement of non-humans in the Intergalactic Empire of Wakanda.

Under Coates T’Challa is not the subversive radical he was under McGregor, Priest, and Hudlin. Even when Priest explored Wakanda’s less than ideal political elements T’Challa was shown as being in direct opposition to them, acting as a visionary reformist. He banished the Hatut Zeraze and while he maintained the institution of the Dora Milaje he made clear his lack of interest and sought to only maintain peace. Coates sees T’Challa as a moderate, meekly defending a morally bankrupt status quo within a nation only ahead of the rest of the world in its technology, not its institutions or spiritual framing.

It is sad, because there are interesting ideas to explore, but outside the technical issues of his writing, those aren’t ideas meant to be explored in a BP book. It erodes the fundamentals of what makes Wakanda such a strong concept and T’Challa a revolutionary character, which isn’t to say Wakanda should be without flaw mind you. Coogler and Priest did extraordinary jobs with the lore despite not shying away from Wakandan flaws. But when Wakanda is virtually no different than America or Britain and T’Challa is a sycophant for the status quo then is it really Black Panther?

these questions and the necessary answers are part of the spine of my BP pitch and, i suspect, why I'll never get to do it.

[Ekie]

In regards to the "no one man" thing, I'd just say that as cool and awesome and badass as superpowered monarchs are in superhero fiction, in reality we'd all be looking at them the way people increasingly look at Superman from DC --- a singular figure invested with so much power (and responsibility), how long or what would it take to make that figure snap and turn on the world and humanity at large? Would there be anything that other people could do to stop or even check that figure before things escalated to that point in the first place? What kind of measures would there be to hold such a figure accountable should something go terribly, horribly wrong?

That said, where I would argue Coates went wrong with his attempts to analyze and solve for those complexities was that he essentially seemed to conclude that Wakanda was (or should be) as morally flawed and compromised as any other nation in existence, just as much built off self-aggrandizing, self-justifying mythology that covered for deep moral and spiritual rot as any other nation in the world. To put it somewhat more succinctly, he made Wakanda into the African equivalent of the United States of America, given the reckoning going on in the real world over how many contemporary U.S. institutions are shaped by and built on --- again --- self-aggrandizing, self-justifying mythology covering for deep moral and spiritual rot, now on the verge of metastasizing into something beyond hope of ever healing or curing. As the United States was once upheld as a shining city on a hill, a beacon of freedom and democracy for the world to follow, so Wakanda, at least fictionally speaking, was supposed to be a shining beacon of excellence and an example for the African diaspora, let alone the rest of the world, to strive towards. Instead, under Coates's vision of the mythos, Wakanda is fundamentally no better, morally or spiritually speaking, than the world it inhabits or the nations with which it coexists, and that's . . . rather sad, actually. Maybe more fitting for the world we live in today, but still sad.

Excellent summation
My thing is this (why I abhor this run)

Tchalla (and thusly wakanda) were CREATED to be the embodiment of our potential as a ppl. A genius and bold creation by Kirby and stan about our ppl NOT being all those things that white/western media portray and see us as. It is not the place for this type of political examination and Tchalla certainly isn't the character for it. Better suited for Luke Cage or Sam.
Tchalla is a king and a Superhero. Coats was unable to reconcile those two things together. in this fictional world Tchalla was and always should be above the tropes of evil dictatorships or complacency when it comes to the well being of his ppl.

This is fiction. Yea real world discourse is fantastic in comics but not when its antithetical to both the chara2 and the setting.
I refuse to ever read this run because of it.

[Ekie]

these questions and the necessary answers are part of the spine of my BP pitch and, i suspect, why I'll never get to do it.

It's been spoken into existence. It will happen and I can't wait

[Ezyo1000]

these questions and the necessary answers are part of the spine of my BP pitch and, i suspect, why I'll never get to do it.

My question is... Why? What is SO radical about your pitch, SO controversial, that your pitch is turned down, yet Blatant racist stereotypes, contrived sexism, and all around sidelining and Character assassination of T'Challa and the BP mythos by a neophyte comic writer with no oversight and full control as well as pull for his other neophyte colleagues to further damage the franchise save two, is somehow okay?

[Klaue's Mixtape]

Coates came a long way. Proud of the brother.

Last year, acclaimed nonfiction writer and lifelong comic-book geek Ta-Nehisi Coates stumbled into an incredible opportunity: Publisher Marvel Comics asked him to write a superhero series. The plan was for him to pen a number of issues of Black Panther, which chronicles the adventures of a long-running and much-beloved character from the Marvel pantheon named T’Challa. He’s the king of a fictional African nation, and Coates’s deep understanding of history, politics, and superhero fiction all made him well-suited for the job. There was only one problem: He had absolutely no idea how to write a comic book. Didn’t know what word-processing program to use, didn’t know how to describe what the artist should draw, none of it.

“It was very apparent to me right away that this could suck,” Coates says in a phone interview from his home in Paris. “Some people get a level of fame and people give them the ability to do things that they probably should not be doing. That is exactly what I did not want to happen.” Coates was not the first person to run into this specific problem. In the past few decades, an array of stars from outside the comics industry have gone from being comics fans to being comics writers. After speaking to a few such people, it became clear that publishers don’t have some kind of boot camp for celebrity novices — people largely get thrown in the geeky deep end and learn how to swim.

“Those really aren’t the sorts of things someone can teach; you pretty much have to figure it out on your own,” says J. Michael Straczynski, who started writing high-profile comics in the late 1990s after he was already famous for creating and writing the TV show Babylon 5. “Mark Twain once said, ‘A man who carries a cat by the tail learns something he can learn in no other way.’ Comics-writing is a lot like that.”

Marvel obviously had some initial assistance for Coates. He talked through his story ideas with Marvel editor Wil Moss and got a bevy of comics scripts to examine. Luckily for Coates, the geek world is also a small one, and he was also able to get the guidance of some friends who write comics professionally: Greg Pak, Kelly Sue DeConnick, Matt Fraction, and G. Willow Wilson. And the stars, as they say, are just like us, so Google helped him, too: When he needed to figure out what application he’d actually use to write the scripts, he searched around and found a tutorial that recommended a program called Scrivener.

Coates planned to do a full script from the start and learned a lot through imitation. Marvel sent him scripts done by superstar writer Jonathan Hickman for his then-ongoing series Secret Wars, and Coates would compare what was in the scripts to what was on the printed page. Right away, he made a crucial observation: “You can’t say, ‘In this year, this happened.’ You can’t do that. You actually have to think, ‘What does this look like?’” This was a huge departure from his journalism writing. “If you were writing a lede, a piece for a magazine, you could say, ‘When T’Challa returned to the throne, this had happened, this had happened, this had happened.’ But no, that doesn’t work in comics. You gotta write a scene.”

To make things more complicated, in any given scene, a character can only do one thing per panel. “You might want to write, ‘He takes a sip of something and shoots somebody,’ but that doesn’t work,” says comedian, screenwriter, and podcast host Scott Aukerman, who wrote two comics stories for Marvel last year and is on tap to publish another one in a few months. “Someone can’t take a sip of something and shoot someone unless they’re doing it literally at the same time.” In other words, you have to force yourself to pace everything out: in this panel, he takes a sip; in the next panel, he shoots someone. Compared to writing an article, a novel, or a screenplay, this approach can feel glacial.

But such detail is essential because you need to develop a deep relationship with the artist who’s drawing your comic — and like any relationship, that one is built on communication. “I tend to be far more descriptive in writing a comic book script than a movie script, because you realize that if you don’t communicate it, you’re never going to see it on the page,” says Smith. Of course, you don’t want to get too detailed, lest you seem a control freak. As Straczynski puts it, the artist “needs as much information as you can pack into the scene description without closing off their own process or desire for collaboration.” And no matter what level of detail you put in there, you’re still ultimately putting your story’s fate in the hands of another creator. “It’s almost like giving something to a director and then never showing up on set and hoping it comes out well when you get it,” says Aukerman.

The lessons outlined above are just the basic, practical ones; after that, it’s time to worry about how many panels go on a page, presenting exposition unobtrusively, or fitting your work into existing character continuity. It’s a massive headache, and the consensus seems to be that the only trick for getting a good rhythm is a pretty simple one: sheer repetition.

“It comes to me much more instinctually now,” says Coates. “Before, it just felt like you were a marathon runner and somebody had asked you to learn how to bike and do the Tour de France. You might have a base level of fitness and athleticism, but it’s just a different sport.”

He did it. Cant take that away from him. Salute.

[Cville]

Coates came a long way. Proud of the brother.


He did it. Cant take that away from him. Salute.

So it was a lie that he didnt know about Secret Wars? The sent him the scripts. Lol

[Huntsman Spider]

Coates tried to say something but he never really said anything lol.

All fluff, all thin... no depth. Pretty words that didn't mean anything. Long speeches that didn't say anything.

I actually have no problem with Wakanda getting lost in space and turning to conquest. Without the Black Panther guiding them... Wakanda isn't quite the same. The Black Panther is the beacon.

The Superman analogy is great... because in normal universe Superman doesn't break. He is a guiding light, despite the power he weilds. T'challa is the same way. And should get treated with the same respect.

If you wanna make elseworld stories where T'challa isn't that way, then go ahead (Hudlin did).

you can't give the BP title to a black dude who is in The Sunken Place man. You just can't.

Thanks for appreciating my Superman analogy.

This is a question I think a lot of BP writers and to a lesser extent fans always need to contend with. How many skeletons is this aspirational civilization supposed to have in the closet before it’s national mythology becomes forfeit and the norms upheld within it become symptomatic of oppression and exploitation? Coates’ ideology shines through in that regard, he doesn’t believe in the “dream” of America so he could never hope to conceptualize or respect the notion of Wakanda as a beacon for the world community, particularly the black diaspora.

In grounding the fictional culture in harsh reality (settler colonialism, slavery, institutional sexism) he not only upturns the idea of Wakanda as nation above all others but of its innate capacity for change in his treatment of T’Challa. It was T’Challa that turned a blind eye to the mass rape of Wakandan women, who never wrestled with the implications of ruling a nation founded on soft genocide, and who ignored (and for a time embraced!) the enslavement of non-humans in the Intergalactic Empire of Wakanda.

Under Coates T’Challa is not the subversive radical he was under McGregor, Priest, and Hudlin. Even when Priest explored Wakanda’s less than ideal political elements T’Challa was shown as being in direct opposition to them, acting as a visionary reformist. He banished the Hatut Zeraze and while he maintained the institution of the Dora Milaje he made clear his lack of interest and sought to only maintain peace. Coates sees T’Challa as a moderate, meekly defending a morally bankrupt status quo within a nation only ahead of the rest of the world in its technology, not its institutions or spiritual framing.

It is sad, because there are interesting ideas to explore, but outside the technical issues of his writing, those aren’t ideas meant to be explored in a BP book. It erodes the fundamentals of what makes Wakanda such a strong concept and T’Challa a revolutionary character, which isn’t to say Wakanda should be without flaw mind you. Coogler and Priest did extraordinary jobs with the lore despite not shying away from Wakandan flaws. But when Wakanda is virtually no different than America or Britain and T’Challa is a sycophant for the status quo then is it really Black Panther?

That's an interesting point you raise about T'Challa as a revolutionary figure getting watered down into a "moderate" who consigns himself to upholding an increasingly evidently corrupt and untenable status quo, and I'd add that the same argument could be applied to the superhero genre as it currently exists on the whole. A number of characters in the genre did start off as somewhat revolutionary or even radical, only to then get "sanitized" by corporate ownership into something more "palatable" to the masses and, not-so-coincidentally, the same corporate ownership that would balk at those revolutionary or radical messages being applied against them in real life. It's not so much to excuse what Coates did with the Black Panther mythos, as more an explanation of the kind of creative environment that would ultimately yield something like this.

Excellent summation
My thing is this (why I abhor this run)

Tchalla (and thusly wakanda) were CREATED to be the embodiment of our potential as a ppl. A genius and bold creation by Kirby and stan about our ppl NOT being all those things that white/western media portray and see us as. It is not the place for this type of political examination and Tchalla certainly isn't the character for it. Better suited for Luke Cage or Sam.
Tchalla is a king and a Superhero. Coats was unable to reconcile those two things together. in this fictional world Tchalla was and always should be above the tropes of evil dictatorships or complacency when it comes to the well being of his ppl.

This is fiction. Yea real world discourse is fantastic in comics but not when its antithetical to both the chara2 and the setting.
I refuse to ever read this run because of it.

Thank you as well, and I can definitely agree with that. It's just a shame that some of the glimmers of better ideas or concepts had to be wedded to such an awful, regressive take on the character and the mythos.

[Ezyo1000]

Coates came a long way. Proud of the brother.


He did it. Cant take that away from him. Salute.

Your right he did do it... He became a worse comic writer and storyteller than he was at the start

Can't take that away from him indeed