Starring: Angela Bassett, Letitia Wright, Lupita Nyong’o, Tenoch Huerta, Danai Gurira, Winston Duke, Florence Kasumba, Michaela Coel, Dominique Thorne, Martin Freeman, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Mabel Cadena
My Rating: 4/5 Stars
Rotten Tomatoes: 84% Critics, 95% Audience
Rotten Tomatoes Description: “In Marvel Studios’ “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever,” Queen Ramonda (Angela Bassett), Shuri (Letitia Wright), M’Baku (Winston Duke), Okoye (Danai Gurira) and the Dora Milaje (including Florence Kasumba) fight to protect their nation from intervening world powers in the wake of King T’Challa’s death. As the Wakandans strive to embrace their next chapter, the heroes must band together with the help of War Dog Nakia (Lupita Nyong’o) and Everett Ross (Martin Freeman) and forge a new path for the kingdom of Wakanda.”
Short Version: A sequel that falls just shy of its original, this movie is overshadowed by the grief of losing both T’Challa and the man who embodied him. Though the movie soars when it shows their characters handling their grief and despair, the trademark Marvel moments really detract from the film, and flimsy character development leaves a lot to be desired for new characters. My overall feeling of this film is that it could have been 5/5 star film if Marvel hadn’t decided to spend a large chunk of their time introducing a new character (see, the scientist in this film) and used that time instead to flesh out characters with a lot of potential that we only see in the “Black Panther” franchise.
Long Version: So many spoilers ahead guys. I know this movie just came out. But if you are here and you are reading past this warning, then anything that gets spoiled for you is not my fault, and trust my friends, there are elements of this movie you really want to experience before you read about them.
******************THE POINT OF NO RETURN*********************************
I want to start this review by addressing the obvious, the absence of Chadwick Boseman in the film and how it was handled onscreen. I think this was one of the strongest moments in the film for its emotional potency and the way that grief overshadowed the film. This movie opens with Shuri in the lab trying to find a way to duplicate the Heart-Shaped Herb that made her brother the Black Panther, because he was ill and dying. We see the moment that she learns she ran out of time, and then the screen cuts to black, ending the cold open with the familiar logo, but instead of the various Avengers, the letters are cut only with scenes of T’Challa. It is a stark and powerful opening, and sets the tone for the whole film.
If there is one thing that stuck with me, it was the following scene, where they follow T’Challa’s casket through the streets and the people are dancing with drummers pounding out rhythm, but Shuri and Ramonda can hardly keep from falling apart. That stark difference, the celebration of his life and the absolute devastation of his death, it lingers. Even more powerful when it was echoed later in the film with the death of the queen. Grief becomes the emotional backbone of this film. It is a plot that screams into the vacancies left in Shuri’s life, and in the moments where it remembers that this is a film about its characters, and not the larger MCU, it soars.
But, I have to admit there were some real issues in the film. The one that bothered me the most is how much screentime was devoted to Riri Williams. Yes, fans of the comic books, we have finally met our Ironheart, the heir apparent to the Ironman mantle and yet another member of our Young Avengers, but I wish we hadn’t yet. Don’t get me wrong, Riri is a wonderful character, and I was dying for her to be introduced, but she took so much from this movie.
Let me put it this way, so that you can see the tradeoffs. Riri Williams introduction brought us to America, which brought our favorite colonizer Everett Ross back into the mix, and with him the FBI and the US’s war strategy against Wakanda. In the grand scheme of things, the Ross b-plot could have been entirely cut, but for the fact that it put Shuri and Riri in position to be kidnapped. I refuse to believe we couldn’t have had Shuri kidnapped in another part of the world, without shoehorning in a bunch of unnecessary white people.
The inclusion of the American subplot also means that we didn’t get character development for any of the Talohan except Namor. We are introduced to this whole new civilization, taken to their amazing underwater city, and told their horrifying backstory, only to be entirely left hanging on who these people actually are and what they believe in beyond Namor vendetta’s against the surface dwellers. How have they innovated with Vibranium? How long do they live? You can’t just introduce blue people and have them act as puppets for the main villain, do you not see the kinda innate racism in that? Oh, yeah, they must all believe the same things as their radicalized leaders, all the blue people do.
Plus, we spend so much time with Shuri and Riri gushing over tech, and providing valuable development and history for Riri, at the expense or characters we see so little in the film, Like Aneka, who seems really awesome but was brought in for quick jokes and then quickly forced offscreen. Even Okoye was shifted to a background character for large swaths of this film, and don’t get me started on Nakia. This Lupita Nyong’o served ever moment she was on screen, but they didn’t even introduce her until the second act of the film. Marvel forsook the characters and actors that made the first film so incredible in order to shove Riri Williams into the MCU. I don’t think I can forgive them for that.
Now, let’s pivot for a moment and discuss Namor, who is arguably the most fleshed out new character in this film. I love that the film decided to pull from Central and South American mythologies in creating his character. He is such a beautiful foil for Shuri in this film, who is so obsessed with revenge that Killmonger visits her in a vision and calls her out on it. Namor has spent thousands of years simmering in his rage and protecting his people. He is a brilliant character to introduce, because he is one of the first we have seen who is innately powerful like the Black Panther or Capitan America, but also has additional abilities. I loved his character development and the way he is presented in this film, not merciless, but driven beyond the cost of the lives he may take.
Overall, I loved that this film introduced us to a whole new society, and you can see that their history and culture was so deeply thought out from the way that their home city was designed, and from their clothing and movement. I hope that in the future we will revisit them and learn more about that culture and the detail that so clearly went into its design. If you are anything like me, this film will leave you feeling emotionally raw. I teared up at least four times. In the end, I wish Marvel would remember that they can still do origin story films for new characters, they don’t have to force them into pre-existing franchises. If they did, this had the potential to be as good as the first “Black Panther”.
Favorite moments:
- The moment Ramonda approaches Shuri in the lab when she is feverishly trying to print the herb
- Ramonda and Shuri by the elephants, trying to move out of the mourning period
- Okoye coming out of Riri’s bathroom “I said five minutes, I gave you six.”
- Ramonda visiting Nakia in Haiti
- Shuri asking to be taken to Talokan.
- Shuri’s interaction with the children in Talokan
- Nakia tracking and saving Shuri and Riri
- Shuri recreating Riri’s car
- Ramonda saving Riri when the water bombs hit.
- Okoye wearing the Midnight Angel armor
- Shuri realizing the bracelet is the key to the heart-shaped herb
- Ramonda coming to Shuri in the final battle.
- M’Baku’s talk with Shuri after Ramonda’s funeral.
- Shuri’s last visit to Haiti
- Baby T’challa!
As always, all images belong to Marvel, Disney, the film and the production companies. Thank you all so much for stopping by and I will see you next week
Megan’s Musings 