Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022)

Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022)

6/10

Starring

Letitia Wright

Lupita Nyong'o

Danai Gurira

Winston Duke

 

Directed by Ryan Coogler

 

Marvel Phase 4 has finally ended, and I couldn’t be more relieved. Not all the movies in this phase have been groundbreaking, except Spider-Man: No Way Home and Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. This movie, like most of the others, is one you watch once and probably won’t revisit.

This is the 30th movie in the MCU, and with Chadwick Boseman’s death, the franchise had to adjust. Black Panther himself is gone in real life, so the movies had to take a new approach to this tragic loss. In Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, the mantle of Black Panther passes to his sister, Shuri.

The plot of the movie takes on a different tone from what we’re used to. Instead of heroes bonding to fight a common enemy, Wakanda finds itself up against Namor, a known figure in the Marvel Universe, and his people. The usual sense of unity is replaced with tension as they are at each other’s throats.

We soon discover that vibranium isn’t exclusive to Wakanda. There’s another race, the Talokan, who live underwater in their own hidden region. Namor, their king, leads them, and they also have a rich vibranium deposit. Like Wakanda, they’ve used vibranium to develop their society and are unwilling to share it with the rest of the world.

When the United States creates a machine capable of locating vibranium under the sea, Namor and his people attack the ship carrying it, sinking it and killing the crew. The machine eventually finds its way to Wakanda. Namor then visits the Wakandan queen and demands the scientist who created the machine, threatening war if they don’t deliver the person.

Shuri sets out to find the scientist and discovers it’s a young adult. Determined to protect them, Shuri refuses to hand them over, which leads to her being captured by Namor. The queen now has to rescue her daughter without involving other countries, as Namor has warned that he doesn’t want his people’s existence revealed to the world.

The movie is ultimately about Wakanda versus Talokan. It’s an okay watch, but I’m hoping for stronger movies and shows in Phase 5 of the MCU. While this movie seems to be on track to becoming a box-office hit, Marvel can—and should—do better.

In addition, it is a nice introduction of Namor and Talokan, and this makes it a lot easier for Marvel to build on this new character in the future.