EVERYTHING Black Panther - Part 3

[tdeverea]

Yeah so this is a bit random but I hope they bring Black Panther to the big screen sooner rather than later.

Last night while watching The Avengers (for about the 5th time), my 7 year-old asked me why none of the heroes were Black. I'm usually prepared for this type of ***** because I shoot straight with my son but it really took the wind out of me. I collected myself and made him feel a bit better by saying that Nick Fury was Black and he was the 'leader' of them all.

I even tried to explain how the characters were created during a time when Black heroes weren't common in various forms of media. It was a messy explanation and he didn't seem to feel much better until I reeled off a nice list of Black superheroes that MIGHT show up in a movie. I could barely sleep last night. Anyway, CA: The Winter Soldier is coming (with Falcon! t so I have a little hope. Sorry for the early randomness.

Carry on.

 

[KRYPTON INC.]

Yeah so this is a bit random but I hope they bring Black Panther to the big screen sooner rather than later.

Last night while watching The Avengers (for about the 5th time), my 7 year-old asked me why none of the heroes were Black. I'm usually prepared for this type of ***** because I shoot straight with my son but it really took the wind out of me. I collected myself and made him feel a bit better by saying that Nick Fury was Black and he was the 'leader' of them all.

I even tried to explain how the characters were created during a time when Black heroes weren't common in various forms of media. It was a messy explanation and he didn't seem to feel much better until I reeled off a nice list of Black superheroes that MIGHT show up in a movie. I could barely sleep last night. Anyway, CA: The Winter Soldier is coming (with Falcon! t so I have a little hope. Sorry for the early randomness.

Carry on.

Can't say I blame your reaction. I am Hispanic, so imagine how I must feel. Then think of your Asian friends/co workers and think how they feel as well.

I always felt that BP was a great fantasy character for young African-Americans. More so than Cage, whom I love. But lets look at things a little critically. Cage comes from "the streets" and did some time on the inside. I know he is perhaps more relatable for some, but his story, not the character, has this arc that's too common for inner city youths of all stripes, not just black youths. When I was growing up in Sunset Park, Brooklyn NYC, I looked around at my extended family and thought, "damn, if I did not have two hard working and stable parents I might think that you had to go to prison first before being allowed to have a baby." Way too many of the young women who were my general age group seemed to just love a guy who would end up behind bars. And this was not about criminal activity to survive or unfair racism in the system (though I am not denying it's there). In those instances it was the embracing of a street/thug mentality, period. That's why I kind of wince a little thinking about Cage being brought to screens, a little any way. Being in prison is way too common an occurrence for people of varying "color" in America. To the point it is almost celebrated. Chris Rock had a bit about this. He talked about how he saw how people treated a dude coming out of prison as opposed to someone furthering their education.

To me, yes as a fantasy character, BP says to kids that your dreams can be so much bigger. That brains is the path to empowerment and self fulfillment in this world. That you can be a "King". The MCU needs this kind of character, along with a dose of color from across the spectrum. The characters are there. They just need to utilize them.

 

[Endeavor]

Can't say I blame your reaction. I am Hispanic, so imagine how I must feel. Then think of your Asian friends/co workers and think how they feel as well.
...
To me, yes as a fantasy character, BP says to kids that your dreams can be so much bigger. That brains is the path to empowerment and self fulfillment in this world. That you can be a "King". The MCU needs this kind of character, along with a dose of color from across the spectrum. The characters are there. They just need to utilize them.

X 10

 

[Incrediblejeff]

now they need this guy to play t'challa:

god yes


Oh so the pic wont work me eh?

 

[chamber-music]

Personally I never really understood the whole I need to see another black person do something mentality before I attempt to do it myself.

Everyone is a pioneer at some point. Teach your kids to believe in themselves rather than wait around for someone else to prove something is achievable.

 

[tdeverea]

Personally I never really understood the whole I need to see another black person do something mentality before I attempt to do it myself.

Everyone is a pioneer at some point. Teach your kids to believe in themselves rather than wait around for someone else to prove something is achievable.

Yeah I agree with this but my son knows what I'm capable of. What I'm NOT capable of is having a suit made of vibranium, superior martial arts skills (this is the most attainable thing, but I'm a realist), and mingling with the greatest superheroes ever. I know this was mostly a response to KRYPTON INC. but I thought it was funny.

Also, I'd like to point out that you're really (unfairly) diminishing the power of fantasy characters. You know at some point during your childhood, you were inspired by a fictional character. Don't pretend you weren't. Even if it was Elmo or some s.h.i.t.

 

[chamber-music]

My post wasn't aimed at you in particular it was just my general thoughts on the subject by the way.

I liked frictional characters but I always knew they were not real or in anyway realistic. The only inspiration I took from fictional characters in books, comics, films, cartoons, ect when I was a kid was some of moral the values.

If a child wants to take up martial arts or develops an interest in Africa or science from reading Black Panther books then that is great but ultimately it is all just entertainment.

 

[T"Challa]

Yeah, and lets remember, a lot of kids process things on a surface level. i was about 9-10 yrs old when i saw the first X-Men movie and i won't lie, as much as i remember enjoying it, i was somewhat disheartened that none of these kickass people looked like me.

And i don't know if you guys remember when Disney released the Princess and the Frog, it was a huge deal within the black community especially single moms with daughters. These things really do matter, and they have an effect. A well done Panther movie showing a highly educated, regal and badass T'Challa would mean a lot more than people realize.

 

[tdeverea]

Yeah, and lets remember, a lot of kids process things on a surface level. i was about 9-10 yrs old when i saw the first X-Men movie and i won't lie, as much as i remember enjoying it, i was somewhat disheartened that none of these kickass people looked like me.

And i don't know if you guys remember when Disney released the Princess and the Frog, it was a huge deal within the black community especially single moms with daughters. These things really do matter, and they have an effect. A well done Panther movie showing a highly educated, regal and badass T'Challa would mean a lot more than people realize.

^^^ thanks for saying this better than I could.

 

[MessiahDecoy123]

I think seeing superheroes that are black are reasonably important to kids. All kids.

It may not offer a realistic goal for anyone to be a superhero but it does suggest blacks are worthy of being mythological idols just like whites and it also suggest society in general believes in black heroes along side white heroes.

That means alot when segments of society still imply blacks are inferior in various ways.

 

[H.U.S.T.L.E.]

Another thing to add about Black Panther - I'm struggling to think of many portrayals of fictional black heroes that could be considered family friendly. Some of Will Smith's roles come to mind, like the MIB movies or Hancock, but I can't come up with too many off the top of my head. The movies that stand out, like Django Unchained or the Blade franchise, are most certainly not in that vein. BP could step in the family friendly direction a bit more than those and I think it would be well-received due to Marvel's success so far.

I don't think that Black Panther has to be anything earth-shattering in terms of breaking racial barriers, but I do feel it's a really important movie for Marvel to make. We live in a world that is increasingly multi-cultural and they should not run from that.

 

[Dr. Evil]

Yeah, and lets remember, a lot of kids process things on a surface level. i was about 9-10 yrs old when i saw the first X-Men movie and i won't lie, as much as i remember enjoying it, i was somewhat disheartened that none of these kickass people looked like me.

And i don't know if you guys remember when Disney released the Princess and the Frog, it was a huge deal within the black community especially single moms with daughters. These things really do matter, and they have an effect. A well done Panther movie showing a highly educated, regal and badass T'Challa would mean a lot more than people realize.

I envision two sides of Wakanda. Because it's in Africa, one side would obviously be the poor villages. I do not see the major cities though along the vein of major African cities. I see the major cities being similar to Doha, Dubai and Singapore. Those three cities are highly advanced.

I don't know if having parts of Wakanda look like Singapore, Doha and Dubai is progress, but who knows.

The issue though is if the film shoots in South Africa.

 

[MessiahDecoy123]

I envision two sides of Wakanda. Because it's in Africa, one side would obviously be the poor villages. I do not see the major cities though along the vein of major African cities. I see the major cities being similar to Doha, Dubai and Singapore. Those three cities are highly advanced.

I don't know if having parts of Wakanda look like Singapore, Doha and Dubai is progress, but who knows.

The issue though is if the film shoots in South Africa.

lolwut?

Anyway, Wakanda has tribal customs but none of them are destitute.

 

[bubbadoom]

Yeah so this is a bit random but I hope they bring Black Panther to the big screen sooner rather than later.

Last night while watching The Avengers (for about the 5th time), my 7 year-old asked me why none of the heroes were Black. I'm usually prepared for this type of ***** because I shoot straight with my son but it really took the wind out of me. I collected myself and made him feel a bit better by saying that Nick Fury was Black and he was the 'leader' of them all.

I even tried to explain how the characters were created during a time when Black heroes weren't common in various forms of media. It was a messy explanation and he didn't seem to feel much better until I reeled off a nice list of Black superheroes that MIGHT show up in a movie. I could barely sleep last night. Anyway, CA: The Winter Soldier is coming (with Falcon! t so I have a little hope. Sorry for the early randomness.

Carry on.

I would think the Nick Fury answer should satisfy him - it is a fact - he is one of the heroes [one of seven] and he is black.
If it makes him feel any better, the real villain of the story - Thanos - is played by a black man, too - so both the head good guy and head bad guy are both black - a pretty good average I would think.

 

[bubbadoom]

Yeah so this is a bit random but I hope they bring Black Panther to the big screen sooner rather than later.

Last night while watching The Avengers (for about the 5th time), my 7 year-old asked me why none of the heroes were Black. I'm usually prepared for this type of ***** because I shoot straight with my son but it really took the wind out of me. I collected myself and made him feel a bit better by saying that Nick Fury was Black and he was the 'leader' of them all.

I even tried to explain how the characters were created during a time when Black heroes weren't common in various forms of media. It was a messy explanation and he didn't seem to feel much better until I reeled off a nice list of Black superheroes that MIGHT show up in a movie. I could barely sleep last night. Anyway, CA: The Winter Soldier is coming (with Falcon! t so I have a little hope. Sorry for the early randomness.

Carry on.

Don't forget we have had War Machine in the last two Iron Man movies - that's nothing to sneeze at either - have you shared those with your child?

 

[bubbadoom]

I envision two sides of Wakanda. Because it's in Africa, one side would obviously be the poor villages. I do not see the major cities though along the vein of major African cities. I see the major cities being similar to Doha, Dubai and Singapore. Those three cities are highly advanced.

I don't know if having parts of Wakanda look like Singapore, Doha and Dubai is progress, but who knows.

The issue though is if the film shoots in South Africa.

You have missed the entire point of Wakanda - do to the Vibrainum they have no poor villages - the tech and its benefits is shared by the entire country.

 

[bubbadoom]

Yeah, and lets remember, a lot of kids process things on a surface level. i was about 9-10 yrs old when i saw the first X-Men movie and i won't lie, as much as i remember enjoying it, i was somewhat disheartened that none of these kickass people looked like me.

And i don't know if you guys remember when Disney released the Princess and the Frog, it was a huge deal within the black community especially single moms with daughters. These things really do matter, and they have an effect. A well done Panther movie showing a highly educated, regal and badass T'Challa would mean a lot more than people realize.

Pardon me as I do not know "what you look like" - but I am assuming you are black - are you saying that Storm was not "black" enough?

 

[bubbadoom]

For what its worth - I was a white kid in the '60's when Kirby debuted the Panther in the FF and I loved him! I was happy to see him where ever he next appeared - teamed with Cap or DD or as a member of the Avengers.

I always found him to be a much more positive role model that any of the black heros from the '70's.

 

[bubbadoom]

For what its worth - since Marvel [as a studio or pseudo-studio] started making movies in 1998 [with BLADE] they have made 30 films - 3 of which have featured a black hero. That's 10% of the Marvel movies, which coincidentally is roughly the percentage of the American population that is black, so that seems to be a representative average.

Just sayin'...

 

[Breogan]

Who Should play ...White Wolf?

Just stumbled on this, something to keep in mind.

Lastly, we needed a doppelganger. A Reverse Flash. We needed a mirror image of Panther. A man who is, himself, completely enigmatic, and whose powers of reason and deduction rivaled (if not surpassed) Panther's own. The White Wolf was, obviously, his name, but I stumbled around looking for a hook for this guy until I saw Clint Eastwood's film Midnight In The Garden of Good and Evil. Of the many, many wacked-out characters in that very odd film, there was Kevin Spacey, playing a kind of southern gentleman with a raft of secrets. I called Joe and said, "That's the guy. That's the white wolf— he's, literally, a white guy. He's Kevin Spacey."

Joe's original sketches for the Wolf were brilliant. I taped that face up on my computer monitor, and constructed the character (a child orphaned in a plane crash and adopted by King T'Chaka, Panther's father) from the visual. .... - Christopher J. Priest

Depends on if they use him who resembles and can act a young more fit Kevin Spacey?

 

[DrCosmic]

When I was much younger I was more attracted to the Power Rangers than X-Men or any superheroes, and part of it was that I could visually identify with one of the characters all the time. That idea of visual identification with awesomeness is so important for kids, and someone who is white never experiences a lack of personal identification with superheroes, or other types of awesome individuals, so they can't rely on their personal experience to gain an understanding of these concepts. Someone who has always had a plentiful supply of something can't objectively certify that they don't need it at all.

What first got me into comics was Generation X, an X-Men offshoot team. I was in the comics store and I saw a team with two black people. It fracking Blew. My. Mind. There was no limit to the number of black people allowed to be awesome!? How could this be? I had to know more... and know more I did. From there, as I got older and more abstract in my thinking, it became much more natural for me to identify with the ideals behind Batman and Superman and others.

I think what first attracted me to Black Panther was that I was looking for a black superhero. I said, "There must be some cool black superheroes in existence somewhere!" And I kinda went through the list, and a lot of them were sidekicks to a better hero, and then there were the guys who were jailbirds and really really tragic figures, or simply women. None of that really spoke to me, to who I was. I don't want to be a sidekick. I don't see black people generally as sidekicks and tragic figures. Then I found out about the Black Panther, and so he had my respect. I still hadn't read any comics though, but I made a website in tribute and put up some of his feats and awesomeness. He was more of a badge of honor in the fictional world than a beloved character though.

It wasn't until the Storm marriage/crossover thing started that I actaully started looking into this character and reading some of his stories. I realized that Black Panther is, quite simple, off the chain. He is that guy, every day of the week. The Animated Series pretty much sold me from there on out. There's not much anyone could say to malign old T'Challa at that point, and I've read a lot of the stuff he's been in since, and some stuff he's been in historically. For instance, I bought the Essential BP with the old Kirby and Jungle Action stuff. Character is off the chain.

Not really sure where I'm going with this, but hope it was a nice story.

 

[DrCosmic]

Depends on if they use him who resembles and can act a young more fit Kevin Spacey?

I don't know about resembling Kevin Spacey but James Franco would be a rocking awesome White Wolf.

 

[Paradox1]

For what its worth - since Marvel [as a studio or pseudo-studio] started making movies in 1998 [with BLADE] they have made 30 films - 3 of which have featured a black hero. That's 10% of the Marvel movies, which coincidentally is roughly the percentage of the American population that is black, so that seems to be a representative average.

Just sayin'...

It's not,Nick Furry is somewhat the leader of the Avengers but he hasn't done anything to make him awesome. To you use a sports analogy he's the coach, and players get all the fame. There are not gonna be many people who admire a coach compared to players. They actually do something you see and is tangible so to speak.

 

[bubbadoom]

When I was much younger I was more attracted to the Power Rangers than X-Men or any superheroes, and part of it was that I could visually identify with one of the characters all the time. That idea of visual identification with awesomeness is so important for kids, and someone who is white never experiences a lack of personal identification with superheroes, or other types of awesome individuals, so they can't rely on their personal experience to gain an understanding of these concepts. Someone who has always had a plentiful supply of something can't objectively certify that they don't need it at all.

What first got me into comics was Generation X, an X-Men offshoot team. I was in the comics store and I saw a team with two black people. It fracking Blew. My. Mind. There was no limit to the number of black people allowed to be awesome!? How could this be? I had to know more... and know more I did. From there, as I got older and more abstract in my thinking, it became much more natural for me to identify with the ideals behind Batman and Superman and others.

I think what first attracted me to Black Panther was that I was looking for a black superhero. I said, "There must be some cool black superheroes in existence somewhere!" And I kinda went through the list, and a lot of them were sidekicks to a better hero, and then there were the guys who were jailbirds and really really tragic figures, or simply women. None of that really spoke to me, to who I was. I don't want to be a sidekick. I don't see black people generally as sidekicks and tragic figures. Then I found out about the Black Panther, and so he had my respect. I still hadn't read any comics though, but I made a website in tribute and put up some of his feats and awesomeness. He was more of a badge of honor in the fictional world than a beloved character though.

It wasn't until the Storm marriage/crossover thing started that I actaully started looking into this character and reading some of his stories. I realized that Black Panther is, quite simple, off the chain. He is that guy, every day of the week. The Animated Series pretty much sold me from there on out. There's not much anyone could say to malign old T'Challa at that point, and I've read a lot of the stuff he's been in since, and some stuff he's been in historically. For instance, I bought the Essential BP with the old Kirby and Jungle Action stuff. Character is off the chain.

Not really sure where I'm going with this, but hope it was a nice story.

If you have not read the Panther's first appearances in the MU - do your self a favor and pick them up. His intro in the FF, his second appearance in FF annual 5, his return in Tales of Suspense [around #98-100], his joining the Avengers and guest staring in Dare Devil were all great must haves!

If Marvel can capture the presence he projected in FF 52-54 they will have another hit on their hands!

 

[bubbadoom]

It's not,Nick Furry is somewhat the leader of the Avengers but he didn't hasn't done anything to make him awesome. To you use a sports analogy he's the coach, and players get all the fame. There are not gonna be many people who admire a coach compared to players. They actually do something you see and is tangible so to speak.

The 10% I spoke of was the three Blade films. Seems like Fury did his share in the Avengers, and War Machine did a bit of the heavy lifting in IM2 & 3, but I guess that's open to interpretation...