I really loved it. The setting and characters were great, but even better was getting a marvel movie that felt actually different. We've had so many superhero movies and while I've enjoyed most of them they sure have gotten to feel samey. Getting a more serious superhero movie (that isn't helmed by Snyder) was just great.
Your thoughts on Black Panther and where you rank it in the MCU (Spoilers)
I have my issues with it, mostly a feeling of incongruity from the first to the second half of the film and it’s inability to break too far away from the Marvel formula, but it’s really good.
I’d put it up there with my favorites (that I’ve seen); Iron Man 3, Winter Soldier, Guardians 1 & 2, and Doctor Strange.
I like the movies that try to do things a little differently.
I like the fun of the first half of the film and the more serious tone of the second half, but I think the tone of the latter half is what puts it up closer to Nolan’s Batman films and Logan for me. It gets more serious and pulls it off very well. It’s not quite on par with those, but it’s closer than I thought any MCU movie would get. It deserves credit for that.
Saw BP for the second time today. Still great. Just really likable characters that stand out on their own. That's my main take away; good, likable characters. That and they handle the overarching theme of humanitarianism well. I mentioned in a previous post that I didn't care for Everett Ross (I still don't). It was explained to me by @deathstriker that he is the token helpful minority character common among these Marvel films, which he is and I understand that. I think it's the fact that with Falcon from Captain America or War Machine from Iron Man I actually like those characters? I'm not a fan of stuck up CIA dude who pushes his weight around. I hope he backs off a little if he shows up again. Only other thing that I thought was off on a second viewing was W'Kabi (Rhino leader dude) and his betrayal. He must have had a heck of a grudge or some deep hatred for the events surrounding his parents death at the hands of Klaue. W'kabi's friend, T'challa, who he has known his entire life, failed W'Kabi by not bringing Klaue back from South Korea and that was enough for W'Kabi to embrace Killmonger. I feel like that turn was too sudden and should have been given more time to fester and build up.
Next BP movie I want more time on T'Challa and his abilities. I want to see a sparring brawl with T'challa and Captain America. They are both enhanced humans and they seem to have similar motivations and attitudes towards duty. I think they would really like each other. That's just me nerding out though.
@cerberus3dog: Wait, you think Ross, Rhodey, and Falcon are token characters? Not just side characters like all the other side characters? Why? Ross and Klaue were always Black Panther characters, which is what made em nice to see in Age of Ultron and Civil War, knowing they'd be allies and enemies with T'Challa respectively. I mean, I agree they didn't use him well here, but seems taking things too far to call him a token (let alone those other side characters).
Yeah, when rhino guy was super disappointed in T'Challa failing to keep Klaue it took me out of it for a moment. His turn wasn't handled well, but at least his surrender was good.
It'll definitely be great to see more of Cap and T'Challa on the same side in Infinity War. We got a little tiny bit of that in the post-credits of Civil War, but most of that movie was them at odds, which was also nice since they're both so damn good and dignified.
@theht: maybe i'm using token wrong here. I'll change it. I meant token just to mean that one minority character that always is cast as the side character.
@cerberus3dog: ah, i understand a token character to be one that's just there because of their ethnicity but are basically either stereotypes or non-characters. generally not a good mark on a story. well, "generally" nothing, it's safe to say it's never good imo.
for me Ross was basically filling the outsider role. someone to go to Wakanda and be in awe of their tech and amp up the theme of isolationism. he just wasn't done as well as he could've been. that scene with the sister was cute though.
@theht said:
@deathstriker said:
I don't really see how it's like every Thor movie, especially as someone who thinks Thor 1 and 2 are pretty boring. Thor really never had to deal with being a leader/king, he's largely just been their top warrior. Other than Zemo and Loki I've forgotten every other MCU (movie) villain, but Zemo was hardly in the movie and his plan was too omnipotent for me. Loki hardly feels like a villain. He's really only a villain in Avengers 1. In every Thor movie he's more or less an anti-hero. If he was that bad or evil he would've killed Odin in between Thor 2 and 3. I thought it was obvious Loki would get the "Vegeta treatment" from the start.
I do think Black Panther has a big advantage when it comes to the ensemble cast. I never cared even slightly about the Warriors Three or Sif (Marvel doesn't seem to either going by Thor 3), Falcon is alright at best, Pepper and Hogan are one note and Pepper isn't likable at all. If the three main women in T'Challa's life were all killed or randomly stopped being in movies that would be a bummer.
I mean, T'Challa becomes king and immediately goes out on a spy mission. They're both warrior royalty tasked with rising to their station. Every Thor movie is basically about Thor becoming a leader and fighting for his home and people.
Villains-wise, I think Zemo is similar to Killmonger in that his premise is great even if he isn't the most fleshed out. I like Zemo more because he actually succeeds. Dude has an effect on all of the heroes, especially T'Challa, whose arc in Civil War felt way more substantial than here (but that's fine, there's other stuff going on in this movie just as well). Loki was a villain in Thor 1 and Avengers 1, and an anti-villain in Thor 2. Thor 3 he's just an anti-hero. And Loki in Thor 1 basically set the bar for villains in terms of the kind of attention you could give them as a key player in your story, and while Killmonger and Zemo (and I'd add Kaecilius to this bunch) are closer to his level, they're still not as substantial a character as Loki, or a few others. Loki felt like a proper character, whereas pretty much every other Marvel villain (except Ego, Vulture, and maybe Stane) feel like basic comic-book villains. Killmonger, Zemo, and Kaecilius are just below them in terms of being fleshed out characters, but their motivations (and accomplishments in the case of Zemo) are significant enough to still hold them up as great.
And what makes em all great is that their motivations are interesting, and in the case of the aforementioned fleshed out characters, that they were fleshed out and interesting. Like, Ego's big plan isn't anything special, but we still get a great character and path there. But again, Zemo stands out additionally for me because he actually succeeds in dividing the heroes; creating an environment using lies to reveal a truth that actually gets Iron Man to be out for blood, it's fuckin great. That fight didn't end because the heroes realised they were being played, it ended because Cap fucking wins (and barely). Not to mention a whole bunch of heroes are fugitives now. Like, goddamn, what a great in the shadows villain that actually operates in the shadows and also actually gets shit done.
Ronan, Red Skull, Whiplash, Killian, Loki in Avengers, Ultron, Dark Elf Guy, Hela, Robert Redford... who am I missing? Oh right, Evil Tiny Guy, and I guess Abomination. They're all just various degrees of basic-ass comic-book villain, and for what those movies are, that's fiiiiiine. Of course I wish they were all great instead of just fine (or most of em anyways, I enjoy a good fun baddie like Hela from time to time), but of those great ones, Killmonger certainly isn't the first. My opinion, obviously.
And ya, Loki was never as evil as say Ronan, or Red Skull who's a literal Nazi (though Ronan's kind of a space Nazi tbh), but he was still definitely the bad guy in Thor 1. He just wasn't bent on enslavement or destruction iirc, only power and revenge for feeling like he didn't belong (and I think part of that was Odin keeping his lineage from him, but anyways). That he wasn't unsympathetically evil doesn't mean he wasn't the antagonist there. I mean, maybe you wanna make a distinction between antagonist and villain, but I don't see much point in this context of discussing Marvel superhero movies.
I always wanted them to do more with the Warriors Three and Sif, but apparently the makers of those films were like "nah," especially in the last one. I personally didn't mind Jane, Jane's sister, and Dr. Skarsgaard, but eh, to each their own. I actually kinda liked em, but most folks seemed to hate em. But ya, the side characters in Black Panther are mostly great. The sister and the general are pretty much on the level of a Falcon or a Widow. T'Challa's love interest (who's never quite elevated to much more than that) and Ross were low points. If they ate it or disappeared I wouldn't really feel their absence myself.
But man, I wanna see so much more of that general. Michonne was the best, but I stopped watching Walking Dead a while back.
Except for that one scene where they're talking another language when in a conversation with someone who doesn't speak it. Ruuuuude.
Killmonger succeeds in his own way, since T'Challa is now going to help black people everywhere, not just Wakanda, which was his main goal. The hero learning from the villain because they were right in their own way is interesting and something I like to see. Legend of Korra does it with almost all of her big bad villains for each season, since they're usually right, they just do things the wrong way. I like Civil War, I put it #2 on my list, but I'd be surprised if certain heroes having animosity towards each other or being outlaws lasts long in Avengers 3 with the threat that Thanos poses. The trailer already shows people from team Cap and Iron Man working together fine, I expect Killmonger's influence to be permanent in the solo BP movies.
Outside of Avengers 1, I don't recall Loki doing anything all that bad. He put his dad in a retirement home so he could get drunk and party with him gone lol... it's not like he was conquering a realm. Like I said before, I always thought they were going to give Loki the Vegeta treatment. I'd be shocked that if he dies it's not by some villain like Thanos killing him as he tries to do something good. Loki in the Thor movies never felt that evil or bad to me, more confused and acting out. Zemo's plan was required too many things to go just right, which is a bit of a negative to me. I actually think Hulk's villain (Abomination) is pretty underrated. I liked him more when he was human, but his fight after the transformation was good.
@deathstriker: Oh, it's definitely true that the Avengers are all gonna be chummy post Civil War. To the governments of the world though, some of em are still fugitives. At the end of Civil War you can tell from Stark reading Cap's letter that there's no real lingering animosity, but during that fight Iron Man was 100% out for blood and apparently willing to bring Cap low to get it.
I wish I stuck with Legend of Korra. I think I was about to get into the part where we learn about the first Avatar or something, but at that point the show'd fail to really sink its claws into me. Certainly not like The Last Airbender did (the show not the movie), but that had an easier go of it seeing as it's basically one of those big long journey shows, which I tend to prefer. Korra seemed to be more of your regular baddie saga type deals, which isn't bad exactly. I dunno, maybe I was just expecting a more grand overarching tale rather than that kinda thing where there's still a throughline of character development but no big quest.
It's true that Killmonger had an influence, the same way most villains have an influence on their respective heroes (even the really forgettable ones like Dark Elf Guy), but I wouldn't say at all that he succeeded. He didn't want to help the world so much as get revenge on it. Dominate the board rather than upend it. My read of the end was that Wakanda would be helping the whole world going forward (which is good because they're all about to get wrecked by The Mad Titan, besides being good for its own sake of course), which would've been where T'Challa and Killmonger diverged. It's that classic thing of using technology to rule and to kill, or for peace and progress. As it was becoming increasingly clear to the Wakandans that isolation and secrecy had an expiry date, their path moving forward and into the world was the main question of the movie, and Killmonger the hateful wrench to their thumb-twiddling, making clearer right from wrong for T'Challa.
But I'm not disputing his motivations being great, only that he was the first great villain in the MCU. Zemo's desire for revenge is set a little more narrow (squarely on the Avengers iirc), and Kaecilius spurned the hypocrisy of his mentor and turned to forbidden arts, both of which I thought were well done and made for compelling villains within their stories, same with Ego's loneliness and Vulture's scorn and disillusionment. I got kind of a soft spot for Stane, even though he's just a greedy capitalistic villain, but it works, especially with the evil mentor angle. That Loki in Thor didn't feel evil or bad to you, just confused and acting out, I'd say is actually testament to how great a villain he was there.
Honestly, talking about it more kinda has me higher on this movie than I expected I'd be the longer I sat on it. It's meaty the way a good king story is and then some (definitely understand The Lion King comparisons, Africa similarities aside), whereas other movies I really like such as Doctor Strange stand out for things less constant throughout their movies, such as having one of the best resolutions to a final boss fight. There's great stuff in them, but they're not as consistently emotionally resonant and weighty as most of the stuff in Black Panther (or at least the stuff after Killmonger shows up in Wakanda; I found the early stuff to feel a bit meandering. Fun! But it made me think "okay, what's the actual plot of this movie?"). Like, sure, Hela's ambitions are technically similar to Killmonger's, but Killmonger's corruption is less distant and given more gravity than the forgotten goddess of death wanting to conquer realms beyond. Not to crap on Thor 3 too much; the best, most emotional part of Thor 3 is when Odin gives Thor that pep talk at the end and then Thor goes fucking hammmmm, and that scene's pretty damn high in terms of overall best MCU moments.
Yeah Black Panther might just stay at #4 for me, quibbles aside.
@deathstriker: Sorry, I didn't see the part about Zemo's plan. Yeah, I can see how it's a bit much for him to rely on Iron Man deciding to do the right thing and show up in that bunker at the end, but then again maybe not. The biggest unpredictable things about that movie for me was the twist at the end with Zemo and the super soldiers, and Tony actually losing it. So an in-universe consideration of a baddie like Zemo being able to play these public heroes like a damn fiddle doesn't feel too too far-fetched to me.
Ehh, Blonski was okay. Tim Roth was great, definitely, but that whole movie's kinda forgettable, much like Thor 2 and Iron Man 2. I don't think any of those are outright bad, just... kinda whatever lol.
I really enjoyed Black Panther. It was a great movie to watch that wasn't headache inducing, by that I mean that everything plot-wise went pretty smoothly with defined acts and clear themes. I think they could have cut the last "all out" battle completely and kept it to just T'Challa and Killmonger. What I liked the most was being brought into a different world that had such a different perspective to everything else we've seen so far from Marvel movies. We've seen the really out there space stuff with Thor 3 and Guardians, the not-too-distant future tech of Stark, multi-dimensions with Dr.Strange, and brought it back home with Spidey, but now we actually get a movie that introduces a far-future society that happens to exist in our time and it's African. The whole concept is unique compared to the rest.
I don't really have a ranking for the Marvel movies mostly because there are so many and I actually kinda forget some exist. I sometimes have to remember that Ant-Man, Thor 1+2, Iron Man 3, and Avengers 2 were actually a thing so those would be at the bottom for me. Just after thinking about Black Panther, I'd have to say that it does deserve to be at the top for addressing themes and commentary in a really mature way, being well made, and drawing me into a cool world with interesting characters. I consider Winter Soldier to be in the same caliber of story and theme. These two movies are like the "Empire Strike's Back" of the Marvel movies so far where all the other films seem kinda goofy in comparison, at least from a critical perspective.
I've enjoyed pretty much all of the MCU movies. I'm not going to rank them. Off the top of my head I couldn't distinguish the Avengers/Cap sequels from one another. I could easily make a case for Black Panther to top the list, but I do really enjoy the more light hearted films. I identified with the father story of GotG 2 and Thor 3 was a blast.
It's very good. It was easy to forget it was a Marvel movie (which is always a good sign) and it actually felt like it had something to say, which is a rare thing not just in Marvel films but with most big blockbusters in general. But it definitely could have used a little more polish around the edges, with the CG and some of Kilmonger's dialogue in particular. It also felt a bit too long. I think a few script tweaks could have cut the it down by 20 or 30 minutes without losing much...I left for ten minutes to use the bathroom during the final act and didn't feel like I missed anything important, and also found myself checking my watch a few times.
I don't have a codified ranking for it, since my Marvel ranking system begins and ends with "Thor Ragnarok is the best Marvel film and nothing else comes close," but BP is definitely a cut above all the Phase 1 and most of the Phase 2 movies. I'd have to rewatch a lot of the earlier films to make a proper judgment, though.
I think black panther fell into a trap of too much hype for me. I really liked the movie but going in hearing nothing but praise and 98% on rotten tomatoes, I think I got over hyped. I would have liked more Klaw, more Wakanda, and more killmonger back story. I normally don't like origin stories cause they are just retelling things I already know, I've seen batman's parent killed dozens of times. I liked how black panther picked up bombing story for civil war to quickly make T'challa king. I would have liked more of the bad guys side of this cause in civil war there was random bad guy I forget name of now and its Klaw is the master mind. When did that happen? Maybe I missed something but it seemed to easy a tie and than they dismissed him just has fast when I was getting interested.
Wakanda didn't seem real to me in any way. The whole city was hide in a forest, but there isn't a forest. There are great plains were they seem to be farming and raising rhinos, there's ceremonial waterfall, and street markets, but the bulk of movie was underground base.
Killmonger's back story was great, and my only real complaint here is I would have liked to see more of the in between him be little kid and than showing up has killing machine. He would need his own movie really to please me here I understand, can't make 5 hour movies. Jordan is great and I wanted more.
I thought the end wasn't great. I don't know the names but it's basically men vs women at end. I thought the guys too easily jumped sides and than gave up a minute later, are we fighting to the death or just killing time? Marvel has a terrible time ending a lot of their movies so this is nothing new. One of my favorite MCU movies is first iron man but that end fight is stupid. Marvel seems to forget that in a lot of comics the bad guy slips away to fight another day. However, movie goers want to have everything wrapped up when credits roll. If I were to change Black panther I would have fight at end of movie conclude with killmonger slipping away and than rest of fighting ends has guys see him run away.
I did really like Black Panther.
I liked it well enough. It followed the marvel formula and never really strayed far from it. For me it was some where in the middle, quality-wise, like Age of Ultron nothing to make it stand out but nothing that holds it back. My biggest complaint would be the over long ritual combat scenes, they got really repetitive. Killmonger was the best part of the movie, he is one of the best MCU villains along with Loki and Michael Keaton.
@bofooq said:
I think black panther fell into a trap of too much hype for me. I really liked the movie but going in hearing nothing but praise and 98% on rotten tomatoes, I think I got over hyped. I would have liked more Klaw, more Wakanda, and more killmonger back story. I normally don't like origin stories cause they are just retelling things I already know, I've seen batman's parent killed dozens of times. I liked how black panther picked up bombing story for civil war to quickly make T'challa king. I would have liked more of the bad guys side of this cause in civil war there was random bad guy I forget name of now and its Klaw is the master mind. When did that happen? Maybe I missed something but it seemed to easy a tie and than they dismissed him just has fast when I was getting interested.
Wakanda didn't seem real to me in any way. The whole city was hide in a forest, but there isn't a forest. There are great plains were they seem to be farming and raising rhinos, there's ceremonial waterfall, and street markets, but the bulk of movie was underground base.
Killmonger's back story was great, and my only real complaint here is I would have liked to see more of the in between him be little kid and than showing up has killing machine. He would need his own movie really to please me here I understand, can't make 5 hour movies. Jordan is great and I wanted more.
I thought the end wasn't great. I don't know the names but it's basically men vs women at end. I thought the guys too easily jumped sides and than gave up a minute later, are we fighting to the death or just killing time? Marvel has a terrible time ending a lot of their movies so this is nothing new. One of my favorite MCU movies is first iron man but that end fight is stupid. Marvel seems to forget that in a lot of comics the bad guy slips away to fight another day. However, movie goers want to have everything wrapped up when credits roll. If I were to change Black panther I would have fight at end of movie conclude with killmonger slipping away and than rest of fighting ends has guys see him run away.
I did really like Black Panther.
It being men vs women at the end felt pretty organic to me given the rules setup in the movie and comics, plus I'm pretty sure there were some women in the blue border patrol, plus most the people in the white fur tribe were men (with some women too). Even if it was men vs women I don't see the problem. I think the hype is pretty accurate. It's right below The Dark Knight and Logan IMO. It beats all the other MCU movies since it's funny, plus, has real drama and a message. I think Civil War is the only other MCU with real drama to me. Some of the other movies are kinda corny (Cap 1) or the comedy takes away from the drama (GOTG and Thor). Black Panther isn't perfect, the action could be better, but it is very good IMO.
I think every character around Black Panther was more interesting than Black Panther himself. You really don't get an idea of who T'challa is. Does he want to keep the isolationist Wakanda or does he want to break tradition and reach out to the world? I know that's his core struggle throughout the movie, but those sides seem more informed by his father and Nakia with very little of T'challa in between. His characterization seems weak to me. And even the superheroing seems weak as well. I think the movie doesn't showcase his powers and abilities all too well. I never felt impressed by what he was doing and I never felt hyped when he arrived on the scene to save the day. Again, I thought Nakia and Okoye were more interesting and badass to me than Black Panther. Even Shuri's gadgets seem to be doing most of the work for him. And that's kind of the core problem here that Captain America and Iron Man solved in their first movies. You get an idea of who those characters are without the super soldier serum and without the suit of armor. Cap before the super serum was an earnest kid who wanted to do some real good and would even jump on a grenade to save his platoon. Tony Stark when deprived of his money, used his ingenuity and created his way out of danger with a box of scraps in a cave. T'challa without the purple flower power and his sister's gadgets can...fight pretty good? I think Black Panther needs his "Winter Soldier" or "Ragnarok." Cap 1 was really average, but you got a good sense of who Cap is as a character. He's idealistic and almost comically patriotic. But then Winter Soldier flipped that on its head and made Cap question loyalty whether loyalty to his country meant loyalty to his government. That's when Cap was really solidified as a character. Same with Ragnarok when they figured out that Thor's characterization was better as a comedic character rather than a tragic romantic Shakespearean character. Killmonger, Shuri, Nakia, and Okoye are all better characters than T'challa. It's a shame they killed Killmonger because he's one of the most interesting and sympathetic villains Marvel has created thus far. We know and sympathize more about our villain than our hero.
I think the movie needed to be an epic more than a superhero action film. Make it about T'challa's reign and having the responsibility of kingship fall prematurely into his hands as he struggles to rule a country and its many tribes. Then when he is overthrown, show some time pass and what a shitty king Kilmonger is and show why people really need T'challa on the throne more than anyone else. We shouldn't be spending as much time in South Korea as we do in Wakanda. But since the movie exists on a tight schedule, they really can't do a sweeping epic of long reigns and coups. Hopefully in Black Panther 2, they really nail down who T'challa is.
@minipato: I get what you're saying but I got a sense of T'challa's motivations pretty clearly. He wanted to keep tradition and the status quo until Killmonger showed him his point of view. T'challa put his father on a pedestal and thought he was an ideal/perfect leader and he wanted to be like him, which is what made him telling his father that he was wrong a very powerful scene. I can see why someone thinks Killmonger was more interesting, maybe his little sister too, but I didn't find Nakia or Okoye to be THAT interesting. They were very well done for supporting characters, better than Marvel's other supporting characters, but I wouldn't want them to have more screentime or be the leads. I do think they could've done a better job at showing T'challa's skill-set, since from what I've been told by friends and Youtube videos, he's supposed to be one of the very best fighters and smartest (on a tech and strategic level) in all of Marvel, but I didn't see that in the movie.
I liked it a lot, i wish they had more focus on killmonger though. He needed more screen time with T'challa as they never really built any kind of real relationship between the two so when they fight the impact isn't as big as it should be. His character was at it's best when they highlighted his motivations but they didn't do it enough. As much as i loved andy serkis in this they should have either made him the main villain or used his time to highlight killmonger more. Like the whole scene where he kills his girl(i guess) is left kinda mute because they never built anything around it(besides the couple scenes of them kissing). All around i really liked it though.
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