By Christian Maxey
King T’Challa (the late Chadwick Boseman) passes away off-screen from a mystery sickness in BLACK PANTHER: WAKANDA FOREVER that not even his bright little sister Shuri (Letitia Wright) can diagnose and treat. A new Black Panther cannot be named after T’Challa because Erik Killmonger (Michael B. Jordan) had all of the precious heart-shaped herb destroyed in Black Panther. A year later, Queen Ramonda (Angela Bassett) addresses the world, claiming that T’Challa’s absence does not provide Wakanda the opportunity to be undermined or destabilized by renegade mercenary or envious superpowers seeking to acquire vibranium. So the CIA believes Wakandans are the assassins after an American military effort to extract vibranium underwater results in the death of everyone involved. The Talokanil, a mystery race of blue-skinned underwater mutants derived from Mesoamericans, are the real culprits, though. Namor (Tenoch Huerta Mejia), their leader, has elven-like ears, is able to fly, and unlike his people, is able to breathe underwater. In addition to opposing the sharing of vibranium, he tries to persuade the queen to side with him. He also covertly hands over the American scientist who created a device that can detect vibranium underwater. However, it transpires that the scientist is actually merely a 19-year-old M.I.T. undergraduate called Riri (Dominique Thorne), who reminds Shuri of herself, when she is located by General Okoye (Danai Gurira) and Shuri. The Wakandans must get ready to confront the Talokanil whether or not a new Black Panther appears since they are unwilling to relinquish Riri to Namor. Overall I thought that the movie was very good! I personally wanted more music from the first Black Panther, but I understand that the tone of the movie is completely different from the last one. This is the second to last project of Marvel’s Phase Four with it coming to an end with the Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special in November. After the holiday special we open Phase Five with Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania.
