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Welcome to the main discussion thread for the Marvel Cinematic Universe! This pinned post is here to establish some basic guidelines. All of the Media Forum rules still apply.

  • This thread is for talking about the live-action films, TV shows, animated works, and related content that use the Marvel brand, currently owned by Disney.
  • While mild digressions are okay, discussion of the comic books should go in this thread. Extended digressions may be thumped as off-topic.
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If you're posting tagged spoilers, make sure that the film or series is clearly identified outside the spoiler tagging. People need to know what will be spoiled before they choose to read the post.

    Original post 
Since Thor and now Captain America came out this year, I wanted to get what Tropers thought of the concept and execution of the Marvel Cinematic Universe in general. Personally I love the idea and wonder why this idea hasn't been seriously tried before. It sorta seems to me like the DCAU in movie form (And well, ummm, with Marvel), and really 'gets' the comic book feel of a shared universe while not being completely alienating.

Edited by Mrph1 on Jul 29th 2024 at 3:09:00 PM

Gaon Smoking Snake from Grim Up North Since: Jun, 2012 Relationship Status: Above such petty unnecessities
#85651: Apr 26th 2018 at 5:24:56 AM

'Cause nothing says "Africa" like traditional ancient ceremonies involving murders! Like uuuuurgh you've got you be fucking kidding me..

Disregarding the fact the ritual combat for the throne is a key feature of the comics and taking it out would be tantamount to taking out the shield Captain America uses, ritual combat to settle political debates was said to have happened in ancient Egypt, with artwork of the time of Ramses III featuring Egyptians and Nubians competing for sovereignty via wrestling challenges, complete with one artwork featuring Ramses III himself fighting against a Nubian wrestler. Whether this is factual, political propaganda or metaphor is unknown but it is known that ancient Egyptians practiced wrestling as a political activity to compete for the Pharaoh's favor and given that Wakanda worships a variation of the Egyptian pantheon...

The other source for the ritual Wakandan combat is the Angolan martial art of Engolo used for ritual combats, sometimes for fun, sometimes for religious reasons, and sometimes as a rite of passage.

At any rate, in the film itself it is very clear the ritual combat is an old tradition that stuck around in a mostly ceremonial manner. When M'baku arrives to challenge T'challa everyone is stunned, with T'challa himself being confused to the point of asking "What are you doing here?" (to which M'baku answers the obvious: to challenge him), because it's clear no one has invoked that right to challenge in a long time. When Killmonger challenges T'challa his entire tribal council apart from W'kabi protests and one of them tells him to tell Killmonger to go fuck himself (in essence). It's T'challa's Honor Before Reason that makes him give in and accept the challenge.

"All you Fascists bound to lose."
wisewillow She/her Since: May, 2011
She/her
#85652: Apr 26th 2018 at 5:35:18 AM

I think of it like the “speak now or forever hold your peace” thing at weddings. No one ACTUALLY uses it to crash the wedding (except in crappy romcoms). M’Baku showing up completely throws everyone off, and T’Challa agreeing to Killmonger’s challenge was neither mandatory nor smart.

CharlesPhipps Since: Jan, 2001
#85653: Apr 26th 2018 at 5:40:12 AM

Also, it's a plot point that Wakanda is not a perfect Marysuetopia but has flaws.

Oh and is not a WESTERN government.

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.
Sigilbreaker26 Serial Procrastinator Since: Nov, 2017
Serial Procrastinator
#85654: Apr 26th 2018 at 5:44:53 AM

[up][up] Well, if he refused it would have made him look weak.

"And when the last law was down and the Devil turned round on you, where would you hide, the laws all being flat?"
Gault Laugh and grow dank! from beyond the kingdom Since: Feb, 2010 Relationship Status: P.S. I love you
Laugh and grow dank!
#85655: Apr 26th 2018 at 5:45:59 AM

[up] It might have... But Eric is technically a foreigner, and we know that most Wakandans don't have a particularly high opinion of foreigners. T'Challa probably could have played off that if he had wanted to.

edited 26th Apr '18 5:46:20 AM by Gault

yey
TheAirman Brightness from The vicinity of an area adjacent to a location Since: Feb, 2011 Relationship Status: Historians will say we were good friends.
Brightness
#85656: Apr 26th 2018 at 5:54:34 AM

Better to look weak than to be dead, at any rate.

PSN ID: FateSeraph | Switch friendcode: SW-0145-8835-0610 Congratulations! She/They
wisewillow She/her Since: May, 2011
She/her
#85657: Apr 26th 2018 at 5:56:48 AM

Yeah, I think T’Challa underestimated Killmonger’s fighting skills. Maybe he figured he was a guns guy, not a hand to hand fighter? Oops.

CharlesPhipps Since: Jan, 2001
#85658: Apr 26th 2018 at 5:59:20 AM

T'Challa isn't going to think some random dude off the street is going to kick his ass.

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.
wisewillow She/her Since: May, 2011
She/her
#85659: Apr 26th 2018 at 6:00:43 AM

Shuri and Ross briefed him on Killmonger’s history as a freaking soldier/CIA operative. That shoulda been a warning.

...then again, maybe T’Challa thought Killmonger was a CIA agent like Ross; decent with guns but otherwise not a problem.

Sigilbreaker26 Serial Procrastinator Since: Nov, 2017
Serial Procrastinator
#85660: Apr 26th 2018 at 6:19:40 AM

CIA agents are generally not trained in ritual combat with assegai and knobkieries as far as I am aware.

"And when the last law was down and the Devil turned round on you, where would you hide, the laws all being flat?"
Swanpride Since: Jun, 2013
#85661: Apr 26th 2018 at 6:20:22 AM

I don't think that it made a difference. This was about a judgement by the gods.

Gaon Smoking Snake from Grim Up North Since: Jun, 2012 Relationship Status: Above such petty unnecessities
#85662: Apr 26th 2018 at 6:21:42 AM

It's also often forgotten T'challa actually beats him down early on in the fight, but T'challa (being T'challa) tries to get him to yield rather than go for the killing strike, which gives Killmonger time to recover. Meanwhile Killmonger is always going for the kill.

"All you Fascists bound to lose."
Sigilbreaker26 Serial Procrastinator Since: Nov, 2017
Serial Procrastinator
#85663: Apr 26th 2018 at 6:27:12 AM

One thing that really rankles me about Black Panther is the bit where Killmonger dies and says "like my ancestors who jumped from slave ships" or something and I wanted someone to tell him to shut the hell up.

How is your situation similar in the slightest? Yeah, you had a bit of a rough upbringing but you tried to declare war on the entire world. Do not act like you're the injured party here.

Like, Black Panther acts like Killmonger's got a point and he really, really doesn't. He's just a psycho, and worse acts smug and superior to everyone else he meets in the film.

edited 26th Apr '18 6:28:26 AM by Sigilbreaker26

"And when the last law was down and the Devil turned round on you, where would you hide, the laws all being flat?"
Gault Laugh and grow dank! from beyond the kingdom Since: Feb, 2010 Relationship Status: P.S. I love you
Laugh and grow dank!
#85664: Apr 26th 2018 at 6:28:35 AM

[up] Yup. That was perhaps one of the most unintentionally funny bits of dialogue in the movie.

edited 26th Apr '18 6:30:17 AM by Gault

yey
NativeJovian Jupiterian Local from Orlando, FL Since: Mar, 2014 Relationship Status: Maxing my social links
Jupiterian Local
#85666: Apr 26th 2018 at 8:51:53 AM

Okoye wouldn't betray Killmonger because he legally became king by seemingly killing T'challa. Once it was revealed T'challa was still alive, then she could switch loyalties without breaking her oath because this means Killmonger did not win the right to the throne.
It meant that the challenge was still ongoing as neither combatant had died or yielded, so she was theoretically duty-bound to stand aside and let it conclude without interference. Instead she attacks him. Maybe the idea was that he was cheating by having his warriors attack T'Challa instead of sticking to one-on-one combat? I could totally see that as a Bothering by the Book sort of thing where she's both strictly adhering to tradition and supporting her preferred king, but the movie never actually says that.

It's a great movie about the fragility of institutional norms and about how what may have once been a decent way for a small union of tribes to balance power, eventually becomes outdated and exploitable as the nation grows larger and more advanced.
They could have made that point a whole lot of ways that don't run afoul of Darkest Africa tropes. For example, instead of having the throne usurped being legitimately and legally dethroned by losing a ritual combat challenge, have T'Challa make some well-meaning but really bad decisions over the objections of his advisors, then have the rest of the movie be dealing with the fallout of those really terrible decisions, then have the end be T'Challa instituting political reforms and making Wakanda a constitutional monarchy with legal limits on the power of the throne instead of an absolute monarchy where the king's word is law.

Especially because, as far as I know, they don't actually reform the domestic political system of Wakanda at all, they just change their foreign policy. So there's nothing keeping this whole situation from happening all over again next time someone of royal blood shows up who's better at stabbing than the current king.

"I haven't seen anybody complaining that the advanced societies in DUNE used feudalism and hand-to-hand combat for political decision-making."
Because Dune was a Feudal Future where the whole galaxy was run like that. Black Panther takes place on modern-day Earth, where nothing is run like that. The context is very different.

It's almost as if the point was that Killmonger, for all of his villainy, was ultimately a product of the mistakes of Wakanda's past and had a damn point to what he was saying that T'Challa listened to.
What I'm saying is, maybe don't make the main advocate for racial justice also be a psychopathic murderer who wants to rise up and kill the white man? Even if you see him as a Well-Intentioned Extremist (which is questionable, given that he focuses on revenge against Wakanda and the rest of the world far more than he does on helping the downtrodden and the oppressed), as Sigilbreaker points out, his targets also include places with neither histories of African colonialism nor sizable ethnically African populations, so it seems more like he wants to rule the world than help people or seek justice.

Killmonger is a villain, but he is given the most sympathy the film can give him, from the expounding on his past, to the focus on him as a child, and then to T'challa even offering him a chance for forgiveness. And ultimately the characters come to admit his cause is right, even though his methods are not and will just cause more imperialism.
While this may have been the intention, I don't think the execution was very good. His backstory is sympathetic, but his actions as an adult come off as self-centered and insincere. He clearly has no respect for Wakandan culture or tradition (though he's happy to exploit it in order to assume the throne), and — in contrast to Nakia — sees the value of Wakanda entirely in terms of "weapons to kill people I don't like" rather than "tools to help improve the lives of people I do like".

on a cursory read this sounds eerily close to prior claims by other reviewers expecting Wakanda to look more "Western". Equating a Western society look with being advanced, and viewing the African trappings as "primitive". When much of the film's aesthetics is about showing that tribal imagery can be viewed as modern and beautiful. Like Nakia's father in a lip plate and sweet suit, or Dora spears making guns look like cheap toys.
What I was pointing at with this statement wasn't things like the lip plate or African fashion, the spiritualism invoking Egyptian gods and ancestor worship, or even organizing internal Wakadan politics along tribal lines. All of that is fine.

I'm talking about things like the fact that the have tech for energy weapons and nanotech armor, but their warriors use spears and shields. There's a huge disconnect between their high tech stuff (they have aircraft with what seems to be Stark-style repulsor tech, optical camouflage, and energy cannons), and their "African" stuff (their warriors fight with spears and knives — but they're super advanced highly technological spears and knives, trust us!). I can't think of any reasonable Watsonian reason for their warriors to use traditional dress and melee weapons (but vibranium, so that makes them high tech!) instead of vibranium armor and energy guns, and the only Doylist reason for it is "so it feels more African".

That's my complaint. Not that "it feels too African, so it can't be advanced", but "it feels like they're deliberately using less-advanced tech than they have available so that they can match African stereotypes instead". Like, they have war rhinos. Why the hell do they have rhino cavalry? They can build repulsor-tech gunships with energy cannons and optical camo. They can build bulletproof vibranium cars that are indistinguishable from conventional vehicles. They can build friggen hoverbikes (though that may just have been trolling). But they still have dudes riding around on rhinos? How does that make any sense?

As for Black Panther getting angry at his dad, I want to point out that while killing Killmonger's dad was probably the right decision, leaving Killmonger's child in America - abandoning the nephew you've just orphaned- was simply a moral failure, a decision solely taken to avoid making the royal family look bad. I think he has every right to second guess that.
Oh sure, I absolutely agree. I didn't mean to imply that he should have just accepted everything his dad did without question. I mostly meant the "my father killed his brother (for betraying Wakanda and then drawing a weapon on him)!! How could anyone do such a thing?!?" It came across as oddly naive for 1) royal politics, which are often bloody and ugly, and 2) a guy who's basically a special forces operator for his country, especially since it's implied that Wakanda has no problem killing people to protect their secrets.

Roger Ebert disagrees because he hated the fact they had an actual plot to kill the President of Malaysia in Zoolander because it was grossly disrespectful to the nation. Similarly, I had a problem with Ghost Recon: Wildlands turning Bolivia into The Cartel controlled place. If you're going to use a nation you plan to destroy or utterly change to be controlled by robots or Nazi terrorist organizations, don't use a real nations.
I agree that it's a complicated issue, but my response would be "maybe just don't use other cultures for cheap throwaway plots". If a storyline would be offensive when set in a real country, I don't think that using a fictional stand-in that's clearly meant to be the in-universe equivalent of a real place is any less offensive, it's just less likely to be called out.

[Shuri]s not talking down to everyone; she just makes fun of her big brother. I found their dynamic very real and enjoyable.
It wasn't her dynamic with T'Challa that bothered me — I agree, that was mostly fun and felt natural (though stuff like filming him while tricking him into getting knocked on his ass by the new version of the armor I wouldn't call "nice"). But Shuri treats Black Panther missions like a fun game for playing with the cool toys she built, and never displays any awareness that these are serious situations where the lives of innocents are on the line. She's also pretty much nothing but a dick to Ross — the guy who took a bullet for Nakia and immediately and unreservedly offers to help them when they need it, even though it's not his fight. She dismisses his injury as "another broken white boy", scoffs at his confusion regarding Wakanda's advanced tech (even though his confusion is a result of a centuries-long disinformation campaign, not simply him being ignorant), and leaves him hanging when he asks very reasonable questions (like "what's going on?" and "what do you need me to do?") about the plan to stop Killmonger's weapon shipments from getting out, because it's apparently more fun to watch him squirm.

The impression I'm left with is that Shuri basically doesn't give a shit about non-Wakandans. I'm certain that this wasn't intentional — she's supposed to be irreverent and snarky, not callous and self-absorbed — but the way she treats Ross and the way she treats the outside world as an opportunity to play with cool tech rather than a place filled with real people with real lives that are affected by her actions made me dislike her. That could have been a good starting point for some solid character development (have her dismissive of the "primitive" outsiders, flip the whole condescending "starving children in Africa" attitude on its head, and eventually have her realize that hey, maybe she shouldn't be down on a group of people whose problems are partially a result of her own nation's actions), but they didn't do anything like that. Yes, she's excited to do science outreach stuff at the end of the movie, but again — she's excited because she gets to do science stuff, not because she gets to help improve people's lives.

Okoye- the general who is firmly on the side of tradition learns that tradition is flawed. She's very much a rule follower throughout the film. She doesn't want Ross brought back; she obeys tradition during and after the Killmonger fight because even though she knows he's awful, she's loyal to the throne. When T'Challa comes back, she uses that as an excuse to turn on Killmonger immediately.
Fair enough — I shouldn't have called her an asshole, because she's not. But I don't find her very sympathetic, either. Like Shuri, she has no regard for outsiders, and when she faces a To Be Lawful or Good dilemma, she picks "lawful"... and then arbitrarily changes her mind later, which I talked about earlier in the post.

M'Baku- he's the most extreme traditionalist and isolationist. He accepts defeat with honor, and returns T'Challa's mercy by saving him. At the end, he overcomes his isolationist tendencies by coming to T'Challa's/Wakanda's aid.
M'Baku I didn't have a particular problem with, though honestly I was confused by the whole "exile tribe" thing. Do they have vibranium hypertech or not? It doesn't seem like they do, but they're considered part of Wakandan culture and are able to fight effectively against Killmonger's loyalists in the climax, so wouldn't they have to? I don't really know.

W'Kabi- a traditionalist, but one willing to intervene in other countries. His betrayal of T'Challa is heavily foreshadowed by his desire for vengeance against Klaw. That motivates him above all else; when Killmonger drops that body at W'Kabi's feet, his turn was almost guaranteed. W'Kabi is an echo of Killmonger. His desire for vengeance leads to Wakanda's potential destruction- at the very least, he gets a lot of people hurt in the border tribe versus Dora Milaje battle.
W'Kabi is basically Killmonger with a weaker Freudian Excuse. He wants to put Wakanda's power to imperialist goals and doesn't even pretend that it's for their own good. He's definitely an asshole.

Nakia- she gets plenty of focus; her point of view wins, in the end.
She gets a lot of screentime, but not much focus. She's a Satellite Character for T'Challa; her only plot relevance is her relation to him. I like her as a person (which I can't say of any of the other characters), since she wants to help the outside world without wanting to rule it, but as a character I thought she was weak. She's entirely reactive and has little agency as a character — everything she does is in response to other character's actions, rather than something she does in her own right.

Disregarding the fact the ritual combat for the throne is a key feature of the comics
A bad element doesn't deserve to stick around just because it's always been in there. Either fix it, or get rid of it. If you can't get rid of the bad element without ruining the entire character, then maybe the character isn't worth using. (For the record, I don't think that "ritual combat" is in an way necessary for Black Panther's character. You can come up with another way to put Killmonger on the throne pretty easily.)

[real-life history of ritual combat]
While interesting, I don't think it's relevant. As you point out, a lot of the history is speculative, and even if Wakandan culture used it in the past, that doesn't mean they still have to use it now. I'd have zero problem with "Wakandan kings used to be chosen by ritual combat among eligible heirs, but now we do something less likely to give us a ruler who's good at stabbing but bad at ruling."

At any rate, in the film itself it is very clear the ritual combat is an old tradition that stuck around in a mostly ceremonial manner.
I didn't get that impression at all — they clearly took it very seriously, and there was no question that M'Baku or Killmonger winning the combat would have made them the rightful king. It may not have been used very often (it seems like the other tribes can only challenge during the coronation of a new king, and Killmonger was only allowed to do it later because he had royal blood), but no one said "you can't seriously expect us to give you the throne just because of some old, purely ceremonial tradition, can you?" I read the reason the council objected to accepting Killmonger's challenge was because they didn't actually think he was royal blood — but T'Challa knew he was, so accepted the challenge without question.

One thing that really rankles me about Black Panther is the bit where Killmonger dies and says "like my ancestors who jumped from slave ships" or something and I wanted someone to tell him to shut the hell up.

How is your situation similar in the slightest?

He's saying that he'd rather die free than live in captivity. I actually liked that line — it showed that Killmonger at least has enough conviction that he's willing to stick to his ideals even when it means suffering the consequences, rather than rolling over and abandoning them as soon as things go against him. You could argue that Killmonger, being Wakandan, didn't have any ancestors on the slave ships, but that feels like quibbling to me.

Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.
Bocaj Funny but not helpful from Here or thereabouts (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Pining for the fjords
Funny but not helpful
#85668: Apr 26th 2018 at 9:06:26 AM

Half Wakandan on his dad's side

Forever liveblogging the Avengers
Sigilbreaker26 Serial Procrastinator Since: Nov, 2017
Serial Procrastinator
#85669: Apr 26th 2018 at 9:17:38 AM

Shuri cheesed me off as well, but more when she makes a wisecrack at the coronation which is... I can barely imagine how monumentally disrespectful that is, not just because it's an old ceremony of national importance but because it's her brother being made king. That's like interrupting a wedding ceremony, this is one of your sibling's most important days in their life, just shut up for ten minutes for goodness sake.

"And when the last law was down and the Devil turned round on you, where would you hide, the laws all being flat?"
Bocaj Funny but not helpful from Here or thereabouts (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Pining for the fjords
Funny but not helpful
#85670: Apr 26th 2018 at 9:18:45 AM

I love meme lord Shuri

Forever liveblogging the Avengers
wisewillow She/her Since: May, 2011
She/her
#85671: Apr 26th 2018 at 9:24:40 AM

Shuri’s lack of respect for tradition is a deliberate character trait, one which she shifts on by the end of the film.

PushoverMediaCritic I'm sorry Tien, but I must go all out. from the Italy of America Since: Jul, 2015 Relationship Status: watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ
I'm sorry Tien, but I must go all out.
#85672: Apr 26th 2018 at 9:25:46 AM

The plot of Black Panther is basically:

Killmonger: "This country of yours, beautiful and majestic it may be, is kind of fucked up and has some damn problems, specifically with its isolationism. I'm gonna take over and end that by declaring war on the world."

T'Challa: "You're going too far, but the basic gist of what you're saying is right."

Bocaj Funny but not helpful from Here or thereabouts (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Pining for the fjords
Funny but not helpful
#85673: Apr 26th 2018 at 9:25:49 AM

She was also disrespecting the tradition that everyone has been calling out as stupid so in a way she's the voice of the internet people

edited 26th Apr '18 9:26:02 AM by Bocaj

Forever liveblogging the Avengers
Sigilbreaker26 Serial Procrastinator Since: Nov, 2017
Serial Procrastinator
#85674: Apr 26th 2018 at 9:25:57 AM

[up]x3 I... don't think she does? At least, I don't think I remember a moment where she does.

[up]x2 The thing is Killmonger's means and ends are both so evil that I can't buy "but he has a point!" at all.

[up] The fighting bit aside she also disrespects the actual ceremony, which is really important and just makes her look selfish and childish.

edited 26th Apr '18 9:30:09 AM by Sigilbreaker26

"And when the last law was down and the Devil turned round on you, where would you hide, the laws all being flat?"
wisewillow She/her Since: May, 2011
She/her
#85675: Apr 26th 2018 at 9:30:32 AM

Shuri says “we didn’t even get to bury him” after T’Challa’s death, while looking absolutely devastated. Burial is brought up multiple times as significant/important to Wakandan tradition. She makes an attempt to interrupt M’Baku, but then holds her peace. She offers to take T’Challa to her lab (modern/not tradition), but when that isn’t feasible, she joins her mother in the ritual chant to the ancestors to revive T’Challa using the heart shaped herb.


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