I want to breeze through most of this review to complain about a comic book movie trope that bugs me. This movie features that trope in vast amounts.
Black Panther tells the story of a country, Wakanda, that from the outside appears to be a poor farming nation, but in reality is powered by a metal called vibranium that basically can do anything. It can create optical illusions, cure disease, make invincible suits and powerful weapons, save spinal columns, and probably tastes good, too. Traditionally, even though Wakandans are far more advanced than any nation on Earth, they choose to not help or hinder any other country as a mode of self-preservation. The conflict comes in when the villain, Killmonger, lays a claim to the throne. The cousin of Black Panther, he’s seen the real world, and wants to help the oppressed peoples rise up and crush the imperialist nations that have exploited them by giving them unstoppable vibranium weapons. This is a much more nuanced motivation than we see from comic book films, usually. What are the obligations to help people that are in need? Shouldn’t a country with means help those without those means? Obviously, his solution of violence is not the right answer, but it does cause the people of the country to eventually re-evaluate their obligation in the world. It’s a worldly grounded problem, and it works well.
OK, with that out of the way let’s get to my problems.
While the stakes seem high based on that previous paragraph, it’s really just a backdrop for a much smaller plot, and I feel the stakes are actually pretty low. The reason? Vibranium and particularly the Black Panther suits are nigh-invulnerable. Not only does nothing harm someone wearing the suit, but it’s able to store the kinetic energy from attacks. The wearer of the suit can then unleash that energy back out onto their enemies. Not even other weapons made from the stuff can hurt it. There are scenes where people are shooting point blank at Black Panther, and it doesn’t matter. They are shooting at cars made out of vibranium. No damage is done. Basically, everyone is invincible. When what amounts to a civil war breaks out at the end, everyone has invincible weapons and invincible shields to block those weapons so it doesn’t matter. To top it all off, Wakandans keeps attacking Killmonger and Black Panther, while both are wearing the suits. That doesn’t stop people from trying, and then getting blasted with a release of energy. (Not that this kills them. Vibranium armor.) In the end, a plot device you could see coming a mile a way solves the problem. The train tracks have a device that renders vibranium useless while the device is activated. So, of course they end up fighting on the tracks, and of course Black Panther wins.
When everyone is unstoppable the stakes are low, and boy does everyone seem to have an unstoppable suit lately in comic book movies. This one is basically turns the wearer into Superman; however, and Superman is really lame. Don’t be Superman.
All that said, the movie looks great. It’s way too long (like all comic movies), but it goes by at a decent pace. It was a fun watch, and the villain’s motivation is more tragic than farcical (Like Apocalypse in X-Men:Whatever that one was called.). Also, they couldn’t find a way to shoehorn Iron Man into it. So, full marks there. Finally, it helps prove that audiences aren’t the problem when it comes to studios not making films with diverse casts. The movie studios are the problem.
Black Panther judged against other comic book movies rating:
Black Panther as judged against all movies:
