Awesome / Black Panther (2018)

All spoilers are unmarked. Proceed with caution.

The revolution will not be televised.
The revolution will be live.

"Wakanda Forever!"

— The tribal heroic battle charge.

---

Trailers and Previews

• The first teaser trailer:
  • During a car chase, T'Challa backflips from a henchman's crashing car directly onto the moving car ahead of him (as shown on the page image).
    • What's more awesome is the fact that that wasn't an explosive device that caused the crash. THAT WAS THE SUIT ITSELF releasing the kinetic energy from taking gunfire.
  • A group of armed terrorists spot T'Challa in a tree, before one of them gets hurled into a truck and his cohorts are taken out with little effort.
• The city of Wakanda◊ looks absolutely gorgeous.
  • This cannot be understated. Afrofuturism, the genre that Black Panther lends its themes and aesthetic to, has long been underrepresented on the silver screen. That Marvel got this going so well and so right for the first time in a long time that Afrofuturism came into a movie would be surprising, if it wasn't a Marvel movie.
  • Furthermore, it looks unique. That can't be understated. Think of how easy it would be to make another Asgard or something generically futuristic, and they went out of their way to make the entire city feel like something that was futuristic, yes, but not only did it look wholly original, it had enough rough edges on it to say "Yes, this could be built by people, instead of some aliens or some kid in his first year of CGI modeling."
• Every shot of the Dora Milaje features them kicking someone's ass.
• T'Challa's sister, Shuri, has been described by various members of the production staff as a tech genius either on par with Tony Stark or even better. At any rate, having a cache of Vibranium at her disposal allows her to make some toys that would make even him jealous. Keeping in mind she's a teenager.
• As Klaue states in the trailer, no one but him has made it to Wakanda and come out alive to tell the truth; think about that for a second.
• The fact that Wakanda managed to avoid the Scramble for Africa and even the Central Intelligence Agency for centuries by passing itself as a nation of few exports deserves some mentioning.
• The music, which is a combination of techno and hip-hop. It's Run The Jewels's "Legend Has It" and with its chorus about stepping into the spotlight, it only serves to highlight one thing: This is T'Challa's moment.
• The sizzle reel shown at Comic-Con was set to Kendrick Lamar's "DNA."
• The Offical Trailer has too many moments to count, but highlights are:
  • The technological beauty that is Wakanda.
    • It apparently also even awestruck Ross, as he quotes:
      "I've seen gods fly...I've seen men build weapons that I couldn't even imagine. I've seen aliens drop from the sky, but I have never seen anything like this."
  • The Wakanda spiritual realm known as the Djalia. It looks surreal and beautiful, like something from The Lion King (1994).
  • Erik Killmonger's Golden Leopard suit and the way it forms around him is just stunning.
    • On a similar note, T'Challa's suit forming around him mid-run and jump in a way that would make Tony Stark jealous.
  • The Dora Milaje continue kicking ass, with Okoye blocking a direct hit from Killmonger in Golden Leopard mode.
  • T'Challa airdrops from the sky and throws spheres that transform into disk that land on individual trucks.
    Okoye: Remember, don't freeze.
    T'Challa: I never freeze.
    • It's even more awesome if you consider it as a not-so-subtle dig at American policemen shooting African-Americans.
  • We finally see Klaue's vibranium sonic emitter hand. And it is awesome. Bonus points for its first impression being Klaue shooting it while hanging on the side of a moving car.
  • In the same scene Klaue uses it to try and blast T'Challa (who is riding on top of a car), only for T'Challa to dodge, run on the side of a nearby building, jump off, and catch Klaue's vehicle and take out the tires with just his claws. (no pun intended)
  • There's also the techno-orchestra mash-up between Gil Scott-Heron's "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised" and Vince Staples' "Bagbak", intercut with Staples' in-character Badass Boast: Show me my respect, and bow down.
• How does Disney promote the movie in Japan? Have Hiroshi Fujioka, AKA Kamen Rider Ichigo search for Vibranium!

Movie

• T'Challa's Badass Boast to Okoye when she warns him not to freeze: "I never freeze..."
  • And not five minutes into the fight, Nakia manages to make the Black Panther, a tall, dark and muscular Marvel Hero, do just that in his tracks.
  • Also Okoye dropping in out of nowhere to take out the last militant standing in the fight; the guy is holding a woman hostage, threatening to shoot her to make T'Challa back down. In drops Okoye, who promptly knocks his gun out of his hand, then spins the spear in her hand and runs the militant through. Best of all? She doesn't even look at the guy when she takes him down.
  • The fact that Nakia willingly put herself in danger in the first place, going undercover to root out human trafficking, also deserves mention. She even manages to stop T'Challa mid-fight from fighting the last militant soldier who was actually a young child soldier also trafficked into the ring.
• Instead of holograms, Wakandans use shapes made of hovering vibranium nanites, which look absolutely stunning.
• Hell, the way M'Baku and the Jabari are introduced, with a bulky tribesman leading a slow march out of a tunnel with a intimidating chant which translated means "Destroy them! Yes!".
  • And when Zuri questions what they are doing there?
    M'Baku: It's challenge day.
• T'Challa manages to defeat M'Baku, a man who is bigger and stronger than him, in ritual combat without his super powers after getting a Heroic Second Wind from Ramonda shouting, "Tell him who you are!" He even takes M'Baku's spear directly to his chest before he fulfills Ramonda's command.
  T'Challa: I am Prince T'Challa... son of King T'Chaka! [pulls spear from his chest]
  • Before they fight, M'Baku doesn't even get through announcing his challenge before T'Challa accepts.
• In a sort of Ironic Echo, Killmonger defeating T'Challa in the same ceremony.
  • The sheer fact that Killmonger, who has likely little to no experience with bladed weapons like swords, manages to utterly trounce T'Challa, a Wakandan native who has been training with vibranium weapons his entire life, in a fight that's only a few shades short of a Curb-Stomp Battle, solely through The Power of Hate and sheer force of will. He fights T'Challa at his own game and wins.
  • T'Challa got one himself in his duel with Killmonger by knocking him down first. Had T'Challa not chosen to offer mercy instead of death, he would have won.
• A small one is the fight scene in the casino in South Korea. Both Nakia and Okoye are wearing long dresses (and presumably heels to match) but during the scene they're kicking ass and doing all kinds of acrobatics (like jumping down to the lower floor) in the process.
  • Okoye is wearing very sensible (and Wakandan) flats. Nakia is wearing heels, but doesn't hesitate to use them as a weapon and ditch them the moment she is better off without them.
• The chase sequence in South Korea. Especially when Okoye uses a device that allows Shuri to hack into a car and remote control it from her lab!
  • T'Challa saves the lives of civilians while in a car chase by using his own claws as a brake.
  • A few seconds later, he leaps over a truck and lands on one of the enemy's cars before blasting the kinetic energy in his suit downwards, obliterating the car and landing effortlessly onto the car Shuri's driving.
  • When Klaue's men shoot at the vibranium-lined car, Okoye's line during the chase is a Badass Boast in itself: "Guns, so primitive."
  • Okoye's next action topples it: she clambers on top of her and Nakia's car (using a spear to keep herself steady), and throws another spear through the back windscreen of the enemy car. The spear goes through the front windshield and jams into the road, causing the car to crash into it.
  • When Klaue blasts apart Okoye and Nakia's car with his arm cannon, Okoye catches the spear she was using to stabilize her balance, and jams it through the front bonnet as she lands, stopping herself without a scratch.
• Killmonger and co.'s rescue of Klaue from custody. In a matter of seconds, Killmonger blows the room wide open and charges right in with gun blazing. For bonus points, he dons his mask from the museum beforehand, apparently just for dramatic effect.
  • After Ross takes a bullet for Nakia, one of Klaue's men tosses a grenade into the small room that would likely kill them all. Panther leaps onto the grenade, the vibranium suit rendering the explosion as merely a muffled "poof".
  • Erik doesn't even blink upon seeing the charging Black Panther and empties his gun into him, and when that doesn't work, he just uses a grenade launcher. One shot from that overloads the kinetic energy in the suit and knocks T'Challa into the wall behind him.
  • T'Challa manages to notice the Wakandan royal signet ring on Eric's necklace during that commotion and instantly deduces his true identity, and then after returning to Wakanda he presses Zuri into revealing the truth.
• Wakanda having the technology to heal a bullet wound in Ross's spinal cord, overnight no less. Ross points out this is impossible. Not in Wakanda.
• "(In Xhosa) I am N'Jadaka, son of Prince N'Jobu! (Switches to English) I found my daddy with panther claws in his chest! You ain't the son of a king, you're the son of a murderer!"
  • The build-up to this line also has to be mentioned. Killmonger spends the entire scene speaking only to the English-speaking T'Challa and Shuri, and at one point W'Kabi even seemingly has to translate something for him. It is only when the River Tribe Elder finally asks who he is that he bellows this out, in Xhosa, no less.
• Nakia witnesses what she believes is her king and the man she loves be murdered. What does she do? Immediately get T'Challa's family out of there and start planning and executing a counterinsurgency. Bonus points for stealing the purple flower almost literally out from under Killmonger's nose.
• M'Baku and his men shouting down Agent Ross and threatening to feed him to his children, causing the CIA agent to noticeably gulp in fear. M'Baku immediately starts laughing at his own joke that they are vegetarians.
  • And after that, when Nakia and Ramonda offer the Wakandan throne and the powers of the Black Panther via the heart-shaped herb on a golden platter, M'Baku reveals that T'Challa isn't dead, and the Jabari have been keeping him alive, albeit in a coma.
• The second time that T'Challa visits the spirit plane, his father's spirit offers that it's time for him to join the Black Panthers before him in the afterlife. But T'Challa refuses to move on, because he won't rest until he's atoned for how Wakanda's isolation has ultimately created its own worst enemy (Killmonger). It also counts as his What the Hell, Hero? speech to his ancestors, and additionally berating T'Chaka for indirectly motivating Killmonger to become king of Wakanda and attempt to destroy the world, by killing his father and abandoning him.
  T'Challa: You were wrong! ALL OF YOU WERE WRONG! To turn your backs on the rest of the world! We let the fear of discovery stop us from doing what is right! No more! I cannot stay here with you. I cannot rest while he sits on the throne. He is a monster of our own making. I must take back the mantle! I must right this wrong.
  • This bears repeating: it takes massive, massive guts to take a stand against your ruler, especially when he's also your father. T'Challa outright defies every single ruler Wakanda has ever had, a fair portion of which had to be his own ancestors. And not once does he even blink.
• Just about everything in the final battle. Highlights include:
  • T'Challa's entrance to combat after Killmonger tossed him off a cliff earlier.
    T'Challa: I never yielded! And as you can see, I am not dead!
    • It's actually even better. Killmonger is moving on with his plans of worldwide invasion, and the first of the aircrafts carrying the weapon supplies for it takes off as Erik watches on jubilantly, and then it suddenly explodes in mid-air and crashes down. As he and his cohorts look on stupified, T'challa emerges from the wreckage, his theme music blaring full force before delivering the above line.
  • Okoye (who had earlier been struggling between "To Be Lawful or Good") finally settles for "Good" when she sees Killmonger send his men to kill T'Challa rather than honorably resume the ritual fight. In righteous fury, she berates Killmonger that he's too filled with hatred to be Wakanda's King.
    Okoye: [disgusted] No! Your heart is so full of hatred, you're not fit to be a king!
  • Killmonger then dons his own Black Panther suit and takes Okoye and the Dora Milaje on by himself, standing up to a combined attack from three of them before using his own kinetic energy burst to send them flying, before taking the rest down and No Selling a sustained assault from Shuri before disabling one of her blasters with his spear and slashing the other apart with his claws.
  • W'Kabi calling in his armoured rhino cavalry to smash through T'Challa and the Dora Milaje. Even better, T'Challa doesn't care. As one charges him, he simply grabs it by the horns, swings around it, and shoulder-checks it to the ground.
  • Just how unstoppable T'Challa truly is. Not only is he physically far superior to everyone else, easily backhanding larger men a dozen feet away, he's also invincible to everything but the most powerful weapons. On multiple occasions, he single-handedly takes down both entire squads of warriors and aircraft.
    • To clarify, he runs straight at them through all the fire, absorbing kinetic energy, blasts them with kinetic wave at point-blank range, catches a spear dropped by one of the insurgents and hurls it at the flyer taking it down with one shot. If that's not badass, I don't know what is.
  • A minor one with one of the Dora Milaje fighter. Knowing that she is about to have her throat slashed by Killmonger, she refuses to cower or beg for mercy right before her death. These ladies who how much danger they endure and are defiant even when faced with death.
    "Wakanda Forever!"
  • Ross choosing to stay in the lab so he can use Shuri's remote-control tech to take down Killmonger's carriers even as one of his ships is on the cusp of blasting through the facility's shielded glass. What's more, it's not a moment of blase badassery: he pauses and takes a moment to understand that yes, if he stays, he will more than likely die. And then he carries on anyway. Because as a former military man and Air Force pilot, in contrast to Killmonger who also was in the military, Ross was willing to lay down his life for others.
    Ross: How long have I got?
    Lab AI: Glass integrity at 50%.
    Ross: Put me back in.
    • And he not only succeeds in stopping all the carriers, he survives the ship blasting the facility just seconds later. Especially because the audience doesn't find out if he made it out in time until he reappears way later in the first stinger.
  • Okoye and two of her Dora Milaje sisters actually do manage to pin down Killmonger and might have saved the day right there if it wasn't for the Attack Reflector properties of his new suit. Shuri also manages to nearly defeat him, and likely would have if she had lasted a few more seconds.
  • T'Challa tackling Killmonger down into the vibranium mines so they can fight without endangering anyone else. A brief, but beautifully shot and tense Free-Fall Fight ensues.
    • And why did T'Challa leap from the battle and tackle him down into the mines in the first place? Because he saw Killmonger was about to murder Shuri. T'Challa is pinned down against a rock and is being pummeled to death by W'Kabi and his soldiers. He looks ready to succumb - and then he sees Killmonger advancing menacingly on a disarmed Shuri. Now, while it is awesome that this gets him back on his feet, it's nothing out of the ordinary for a superhero movie, or indeed an action movie. This is what makes it awesome: when T'Challa rises to his feet, he has his suit convert the kinetic energy from all the blows he's received to send the army flying through the air in slow motion, as he raises his fists above his head and bellows "SHURI!!!". This is an image straight out of a Jack Kirby-style comic panel - the hero gets his Heroic Second Wind and hurls his assailants in all directions, and for bonus points, there is an actual in-universe explanation as to how he did it, rather than simply "he somehow threw them all simultaneously because it looked cool".
  • While the two are separated from each other by one of the vibranium trains, T'Challa rightly calls out Killmonger on what a hypocritical bastard he is:
    T'Challa: You want to see us become just like the people you hate so much! Divide and conquer the land as they did!
    Killmonger: Nah, I learned from my enemies! I beat 'em at their own game!
    T'Challa: You have become them! You will destroy the world, Wakanda included!
  • M'Baku and his tribe ambushing the insurgents during the final battle to provide the aid he claimed he would never give to T'Challa. He makes his entrance by picking up W'Kabi's right-hand man with one hand, and pretty much tosses him away after his one-liner:
    M'Baku: Witness the might of the Jabari...first-hand!
    • Keep in mind, the Jabari have spent centuries in the mountains, priding themselves on not being as technologically advanced as the rest of Wakanda... and they proceed to wipe the floor with W'Kabi's men.
  • Okoye protecting M'Baku from the armored rhino by standing in its path, whereupon the rhino completely stops running and even licks Okoye's face. Earlier in the film Okoye is shown feeding and petting presumably the same rhino, which would explain why it stopped.
    • To add to this, W'Kabi asks her, "Would you kill me, my love?" Okoye unflinchingly answers, "For Wakanda? Without question." W'Kabi, instead of remaining belligerent, stops fighting and surrenders to her. An incredible moment, not only because the fight was won with words rather than blows, but because W'Kabi accepted her - a strong black woman's - guidance.
    • Okoye's lack of hesitation too. Because besides W'Kabi choosing to commit technical treason by continuing to aid Killmonger after T'Challa returns, her own husband also directed his Border tribe men to close in on herself, Nakia, and Shuri for the kill until the Jabari happened to arrive, yet tries to use their love to stop her from fighting him. She adamantly lets him know she won't allow any more of this to continue.
  • How T'Challa ultimately beats Killmonger: as the magnetic train lines' sonic suppressors are switching off the Vibranium in their suits, he kicks Killmonger's spear into the air. It falls down as the train passes and the suppressors deactivate, allowing him to stab it into Killmonger's abdomen just before the Vibranium reasserts itself. Killmonger himself is impressed.
    Killmonger: Hell of a move.
• A subtle but not less awesome one: the Throne room with all five tribes under King T'Challa. Something that hadn't happened ever before.
• During the first stinger, one of the United Nations delegates patronizingly asks what a nation of Wakandan "farmers" can offer the world. T'Challa looks out to the audience to see Ross giving him a smug smirk. T'Challa smirks right back and presumably tells the delegate just what they can offer after the Smash to Black.
• In the second stinger, we see Bucky Barnes awake and well. Last time the audience saw him was in the stinger of Captain America: Civil War requesting to be cryogenically frozen again until a cure could be found to free him from Hydra’s brainwashing tactics. This film is set a couple of weeks after Civil War takes place, which means Shuri and the Wakandan doctors and scientists were able to find a cure and deprogram him within a couple of weeks. (And even if one interprets the Stinger taking place in real time, 2018, it still means a successful cure was found within 2 years at most.)
• Chadwick Boseman's performance in this film became all the more awe-inspiring when it was revealed he was battling Stage III colon cancer at the time, and kept it completely hidden until his death in August 2020. May he find peace with the ancestors.

---