“Black Panther: Wakanda Forever”The movie is now available and many have already seen it, according to the Thursday box office.
The super-sized sequel, which investigates what happens to Wakanda in the wake of King T’Challa’s (the late, great Chadwick Boseman) death is a unique experience, full of heartache and triumph. As we watch the various characters, including Nakia (Lupita Nyong’o), Shuri (Letitia Wright) and Okoye (Danai Gurira) mourn the passing of their king, we see that grief mixed with outrage as they deal with a new threat from below the surface, in the underwater kingdom of Talokan. That’s where Namor (Tenoch Huerta Mejía), a vengeful, ageless entity, rules. He’s interested in taking revenge against the surface world, with or without Wakanda’s help. And if they’re not a friend, they might as well be an enemy.
But how do they all come together? Is Wakanda now home to a Black Panther? How about a new King. Read on to learn more.
ALERT! This is an ending explainer so please, if you haven’t seen “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever,”Don’t look back! Seriously, we’re going to spoil it all. It’s playing literally everywhere. The article will be there when you return.
A New Panther Rises
If you’ve been paying attention to the marketing materials for “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever”You probably already know the identity and origin of the Black Panther. It’s not exactly a secret. But it’s not front-and-center in any of the pre-release materials either and the story of how it goes down is worth getting into.
Shuri, in short, is the new Black Panther.
To explain: At the beginning of the movie we see her as she struggles to save T’Challa’s life; she’s convinced that the secret lies in the magic herb that Killmonger (Michael B. Jordan) destroyed in the first movie. She can’t quite synthesize a new flower and T’Challa dies. It is something that bothers her. It’s also what is keeping Wakanda from naming a new Black Panther since consumption of the herb is key to giving the new Black Panther their powers (it also has hallucinogenic properties, as it sends the eater on a magical vision quest through their ancestral past).
Shuri eventually realizes that the planet that gave Namor his powers (intaken by his mother) may be the solution to her problems. Namor had given Shuri a bracelet made from the same plant her mother ate. Analyzing the strands she has analyzed, she can complete her synthesis and create another version of this herb.
Shuri takes the herb, and she continues her journey. But instead of seeing T’Challa or her father or her mother Ramonda (Angela Bassett), who had just been killed by one of Namor’s attacks, she sees … Killmonger. He asks her if it is her desire to be as timid as her brother or to do the same thing. This scene might be the most powerful in a film that is almost entirely composed of powerful scenes. Is she capable of being the Black Panther?
A Uneasy Truth
The culmination of “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever”This is a two-pronged approach.
The Wakanda forces lured them with a huge vessel to try and get them out of Wakanda. That’s where most of the battle takes place, between the Talokan forces and the Wakanda warriors, this time amplified by new, high-powered suits that dub some of the women fighters the Midnight Angels. While all this is happening, Shuri abducts Namor and crashes on a nearby shore, where they start to fight.
The battle escalates when the Wakandan ship gets destroyed by Talokan forces. There doesn’t seem like there’s a victory in the cards as much as there is mutually assured destruction. On the beach, it’s getting very violent. In a startlingly violent move Shuri, in her new Black Panther garb, rips the feathered wings from one of Namor’s ankles.
Eventually, both battles reach an impasse, and an agreement is made: should further surface dwellers come for Talokan’s vibranium, then Wakanda will protect them. Namor claims that they will be next coming for Wakanda, and may need to seek out assistance from the underwater tribe. Namor has for his part retreated from his desire to kill all surface dwellers. Tempers have cooled … for now.
It’s an interesting moral place to end the movie on because Namor hasn’t fully been redeemed. He’s not an Avenger yet. He’s not even an X-Man (although he does refer to himself as a “mutant”). And Shuri hasn’t gone through the grieving process to the point where she has reached a calmness with herself. There’s still a lot of hate and a quest for vengeance within her. While catharsis has been achieved on both sides, it is not yet known if either side has reached peace.
The King to Come
There are some things that will happen right at the end “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever.”
First, Riri Williams (Dominique Thorne), an American whiz kid who much of the plot mechanics fulcrum around but whose ultimate role remains slightly obscured, is set back to Boston – without the high-tech Stark-like suit of armor that she developed in Wakanda. (Don’t worry, she already has her own Disney+ spin-off series shot. You can find it here “Ironheart”Soon, you’ll be able to access the platform.
Secondly (and, judging from the number of text messages I’ve received about this, more confusingly) is the question of who will actually lead Wakanda. This question should be resolved with Shuri’s appointment as the new Black Panther. But things are not as simple as they seem. She doesn’t seem that interested in the job and towards the end of the movie, we see the tribes of Wakanda gathered at the ancestral waterfalls; the place where T’Challa proved himself worthy in the first movie. Only this time … Shuri isn’t there. And in her place, M’Baku (Winston Duke, Lupita’s old Yale classmate) says that he wants a challenger. Could he become the next Wakanda king? This question is deliberately left open-ended. Our guess is that Wakanda’s next visit will see a new leader. And that leader is M’Baku.
And then there’s the very end of the movie and the sequence that the entire enterprise has been building towards: Shuri is back in Haiti, visiting Nakia. She finally tosses her funeral robes and signals that she is ready for the next step. She sobs, gazing out at the ocean. She is ready for growth. If not completely replaced, the hatred and disappointment in her heart have been pushed aside to allow acceptance.
“Black Panther: Wakanda Forever”It is now in theatres