SPOILERS for Black Panther: Wakanda Forever.
Death is hard to accept, it’s hard to recover from, it’s hard to move past. Death is a part of our existence that crushes us with a lack of understanding and an oppressive wave of grief. And we do this because we love someone or something so deeply that we cannot let it go, and that grief manifests in multiple ways. The world mourned together on August 28, 2020 when it lost the phenomenal actor Chadwick Boseman. And now we’ve got to find our path forward without an icon.
Black Panther: Wakanda Forever is a movie about grief, and overcoming loss in the face of great challenge. The movie chose to make its story a memorial to the legacy of T’Challa and Chadwick Boseman who portrayed him. And it shows that the movies within Phase 4 of the MCU was about overcoming change, grief, and the world moving on too quickly. And this shows in how Shuri (Letitia Wright) faces the changes that come in the wake of her brother dying unexpectedly.
Shuri is angry, she’s not ready to let go, she’s facing her future with uncertainty and an inability to make the kind of choices that will allow her to fully grieve. And it’s reflected in the numerous ways her fellow Wakandans have moved on. Ramonda (Angela Bassett) is taking up the mantle of work and pushing forward to keep everything together. Okoye (Danai Gurira) is fully in work mode, ignoring the problem and distracting herself from it. Nakia (Lupita Nyong’o) has left, abandoned her life to separate from the memories. And M’Baku (Winston Duke) is blustering, putting on a front of strength while fighting against the actual pain buried beneath.
Shuri is all of them. She’s running, she’s distracting herself, she’s blustering, and she’s trying to keep herself together when it all wants to split apart. And this all gets escalated when suddenly the world refuses to give them time to heal. This comes in the personification of Namor (Tenoch Huerta Mejía), who is a being beyond Wakanda’s control forces them to move on too soon. It forces Shuri, especially, to accept a role she does not want and a task she is avoiding taking on.
And Shuri turns her grief on Namor, treating him as a cause for her pain when he is in fact something outside of the actual struggle, she’s dealing with is her own and Namor has nothing to do with her actual grief but she’s putting it on him because he refused to let her deal with it. And in the end, the process is not complete, even though this conflict has resolved it still rumbles under the surface and there is an acceptance that the grief may never truly go away. But we still have to accept it, and face it.
Just a quick refresher of my MCU ranking criteria.
Cast and Performances
Story and Plot
Best Fight/Action Scene
Rewatchability
Cleverest Easter Egg
Each film will be judged solely by me and then placed against all the other films. And rated on a scale of 10 with a total possible score of 50.
So, here is the quick breakdown of Black Panther: Wakanda Forever:
Cast and Performances: The women who lead this movie deliver phenomenal performances. Angela Bassett takes the reins early and really holds a strength of character that cannot be ignored. Danai Gurira is an emotional force as Okoye and she’s so powerfully balanced between strength and vulnerability. Letitia Wright struggles to take the reins completely as she is forced to accept a role clearly not originally built for her. And the antagonist of this movie Tenoch Huerta Mejía’s Namor walks the line between villain and victim and builds a beautifully complex character in the process. (8/10)
Story and Plot: The plot struggles to really get going for a long time and it is clear this movie was intended to be led by Chadwick Boseman, and his death forced a pivot that makes the story drag because it had to do a lot more character development to build up the women who were secondary to T’Challa in the first film. It’s got its good moments but it has a lot of scenes that feel out of place or somehow slow down the story. (6/10)
Best Fight/Action Scene: The attack on Wakanda by Namor and the Talokan is a visual treat. Namor’s flying style feels so unique and the power he displays in those moments is devastating to watch. There are incredibly stylistic shots and the way Wakanda has been shown majestically is turned to show it’s citizens suffering under their inability to survive without the technology it provides. (9/10)
Rewatchability: I think this one is one that will require another watch or two. There are some really beautiful moments and deep character choices that are hard to fully capture within a single watch. Plus the emotional moments really pull at the heartstrings and remind of why these stories are so powerful. (6/10)
Best Easter Egg: The Marvel Logo is a beautiful tribute to Chadwick Boseman, there were so many small moments where this movie reminded us who he was and why he was such an icon. It’s hard to let go, but this movie does what it can to help us with that process of healing. (9/10)
Total Score: 38/50
Current Ranking:
The Avengers
Spider-man: No Way Home
Avengers: Endgame
Black Panther
Captain America: The Winter Soldier
Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings
Black Widow
Spider-man: Homecoming
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2
Avengers: Infinity War
Guardians of the Galaxy
Captain America: The First Avenger
Iron Man
Captain Marvel
Black Panther: Wakanda Forever
Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness
Thor: Ragnarok
Spider-man: Far From Home
Avengers: Age of Ultron
Captain America: Civil War
Ant-Man
Thor: Love and Thunder
Thor
Iron Man 3
The Eternals
The Incredible Hulk
Ant-Man and the Wasp
Doctor Strange
Thor: The Dark World
Iron Man 2
Phase 4 has been completed. This phase is certainly one with flaws but also some spectacular movie moments and some incredible characters. After 30 of these movies I am excited to see where this franchise goes in the future, and continue to watch these movies unfold.
But until then, thanks for taking the time to get Ploominated!
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