Black Panther tells a story that there is a Shangri-La nation—Wakanda–in the middle of Africa which has control over the fictional metallic element “Vibranium”. Wakanda used advanced technology to disguise itself within the forest of Africa. The main character, acted by Chadwick Boseman, T’Challa is the Black Panther and he was going to inherit the Wakanda kingdom after his father’s death. However, the antagonist Killmonger challenged his throne. T’Challa wished to get rid of white supremacy through peaceful connections, making sure Wakanda is self-sustainable, and sharing their knowledge and technology. T’Challa’s vision is built on and ensures independence. But Killmonger wanted to use Wakanda’s technology to invade the outer world and be a colonizer. Of course, T’Challa won in the end. The ending criticizes how the colonism in the past were inhumane with the failure of Killmonger and how the world shall be working together, like WTO and United Nations, with the success of T’Challa.
Black Panther. (Credit: Marvel/Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures/Everett)
The movie was a box office record breaker because of not only the popularity of Marvel Comics Universe but also the representation of the Black Panther and Wakanda. Wakanda is an imaginational country that represents how African countries could have been if there were no racism and colonism in Africa in the past centuries. However, we could also take Wakanda as a vision of how Africa could be achieving in the future.
In a 1990 interview with The Comics Journal, co-creator Jack Kirby described why he created the character: “I came up with the Black Panther because I realized I had no Blacks in my strip…I had a lot of Black readers. My first friend was…Black! And here I was ignoring them because I was associating with everybody else.”(Mattimore, n.p.)
This quote made me think of how being the first one to create something or speak something out could bring great impacts to the world. Black Panther is by far the most popular black superhero character in the world and I believe it unites the black community spiritually during this special period of time as Black Lives Matter protests are going on. Last but not least, I am looking forward to seeing more superhero characters from different races and backgrounds!
Thank you for the background! I think the quote you provided was much needed and very interesting. I think the vision for Africa you provided was also very interesting. I too look forward to seeing more superhero movies with characters of different racial and ethnic backgrounds. I do hope people have watched the movie before reading this though, if not it might be a spoiler (I had so no worries).
Thank you for sharing. I love the background introduction for the movie as well as the characters. For someone like me who is not very familiar with the marvel world, this is very helpful. Thank you
Nice work, the post was information and well written. As someone who’s pretty familiar with the MCU I think you hit all the key points that where in the movie. Also the quote was a really nice touch.
Nice post! I really liked the quote that you included. I have never really been into marvel movies so your post gave me a lot of insight.