Black Panther thoughts · 8:12pm Apr 27th, 2020
Okay, this one I freely admit I didn't see until last night. Now, before you give me a shout on how I'm not a true Marvel fan, let me just say this. I do not generally follow every character, nor do I want to. My only context for seeing Black Panther in any form of media is generally when he's with his fellow Avengers. I've never had much desire to go beyond that. Okay, good.
Now, actual thoughts. It was... good. Like really good. Erik Killmonger Stevens easily has to be one of the best MCU villains. I also do appreciate the movie's take on M'Baku aka Man-Ape. By the way, so glad M'Baku wasn't actually called Man-Ape in film. For obvious reasons, that's a bit... embarrassing of a codename for a black man. At worst, in film, M'Baku could be called a bit stubborn.
But Killmonger... Hoo boy. He's completely insane, but you can see where he's coming from. Raised in Oakland, yeah he's seen the worst people can do to blacks like him. And he's exactly right that Wakanda stood by and watched while the Africans suffered. By no means does this make him a good man, and hell he's a raging hypocrite but you can see where he's coming from.
I also do love the little touches, like using languages from all over Africa, and the soundtrack being almost entirely native African tribal music, with a bit of hip-hop thrown in at certain points. In fact, Killmonger's leitmotif is tribal beats being replaced by hip-hop ones, representing his overtaking of traditional Wakandan values. Nice little thing on the soundtrack department.
I do note T'Challa is a bit less stoic than he is in the comics and other media. He's a bit more prone to emotion, which I find an interesting change. Also, I find it interesting to note Bucky is called White Wolf in the post-credits scene. As there's a Marvel character with that codename... https://marvel.fandom.com/wiki/White_Wolf_(Hunter)_(Earth-616)
One final thing. One thing I loved was how self-contained it was. You could just jump in and not know a thing about the surrounding universe and... bam.
Nice little write-up. It's a very interesting movie in a lot of ways, and I really enjoyed it; my dad has said it's a lot like an old "dynastic" drama but set in the Marvel Universe, and I can kinda see his point. Really got a hell of a cast too! And yeah, they deserve applause both for Killmonger, and for making M'Baku an actual character and not an embarrassing stereotype.
5251347
Yeah, M'Baku was the most pleasant surprise. I remember quite a bit about him, and seeing him be a graceful loser even if a bit traditionalist was... yeah, it was surprising. Massive update to the character to bring him to the modern-day. Actually, taking a few of the stereotypes and tossing them out the window like with Killmonger and such was a great move.
Also, Nakia? I liked her as a character but her and T'Challa's hookup at the end felt a bit 'because the plot says so'. to me.
5251348
That was great.
Indeed. I love that bit in the movie when he freaks out Everett Ross by threatening to eat him, and then telling him "Nah I'm kidding, we're vegetarian here."
Oh yeah, I'd forgotten until you reminded me. Oh well. Movie can't be great in every single way...
5251352
Oh, I howled at that moment. That is how you do an update of a frankly racist stereotype, keep some elements but toss out the ones that didn't work.
Oh yeah, they'd have been better off by taking the Doctor Strange route and acknowledging it wasn't going to work. That was brave on Doctor Strange's part frankly, don't do the romance.
5251356
You said it. They were really brilliant about it.
Yeah, that was nicely done too. And frankly it was pretty unique that Dr. Strange outright acknowledged that there was too much between him and Christine for anything to work out between them. Nice bit of realism for one of the most trippy Marvel movies.
I agree with you on this movie. Killmonger had many good points. It also had the whole sins of the father thing going on. Personally Loki will always be my number one favorite MCU villain with Killmonger coming in at number two.
5251377
5251348
Speaking of, I do recall a few later comics do pointing out how Wakanda rarely does fuck all outside of their own country, especially as their king tends to be out superheroing, as is his queen Storm at times. I vageully recall some comics where a few African leaders are talking to T'Challa and are like "Where the fuck were you when X horrible thing hit my nation? Why don't you share your country's tech with the rest of us." and some comics point out that the council of Wakanda suggets T'Challa don't, or at least in incriments, as the world at large isn't "mature" enough yet. They even apparantly have a cure for cancer
5251394
Oh yeah, Wakanda in the comics doesn't give a shit about anyone but themselves, and they sorta gave off that vibe here till both Killmonger and T'Challa came around, opening their eyes in their own respective ways. Killmonger with his warmongering, and T'Challa being T'Challa.
5251377
Me it's like this.
Thanos #1
Killmonger #2
Loki #3
5251440
Yeah, Wakanda is VERY isolationist. I remember how the HISHE went about it, that made a fair bit of sense
I also thought this movie was good. Not great, certainly not bad.
To me this is a perfectly average Marvel Movie. I say that because well out of all the Marvel films this one felt the most formulaic to me. Lot's of people bring up how "All the Marvel Movies are the same." While I disagree with this statement I do understand that what it's trying to say is that the majority of the films follow a typical formula. There's a hero, there's a villain who becomes a threat, the hero tries to beat him, fails at first but rises up to become stronger than before, they rematch and the day is saved. Throw in some humor and a few plot twists and that's more or less a bare bones synopsis of a Marvel Movie.
This was the only film where I could basically predict what was going to happen and when, like I knew when they were going to crack a joke of some kind, when the hero was going to win or when he was going to lose.
All that being said this doesn't make the movie bad, it's just I felt the other films hid their formula better. There are still some twists that surprised me, like I didn't see what happened to Klaue (Not sure how to spell his name).
And finally I absoltely love that this film adressed what I consider to be one of Black Panther's biggest flaws. That being the isolationism that has been mentioned above. Now I've had some friends tell me that this might be based off of how several places in Africa are to which case I suppose I'll excuse some of my issues if it's done for the sake of accuracy. But I think my big issue with it is that Wakanda is supposed to be the most advanced country on Earth. . . but they keep all of that to themselves. I understand why they would do this at first, and I'm not saying Wakanda should reveal itself, but in the present day, couldn't they try to help the rest of the world in secret? Yes this is risky, but we've already seen that they can't stay hidden forever, and well it seems like the right thing to do despite the risks of being discovered. It's not like they couldn't cover it up or defend themselves.
But I'm glad that they address this in the movie, and not only that they find what I felt was the perfect solution. Now I wouldn't be surprised if the next Black Panther movie doesn't follow up on this at all but I'm glad that at least this film addressed it. It brought the film up a few extra points for me. :)