silveradept | /dev/media: Saw Black Panther today.

Have two things to say about it that are non-spoilery:

1) If you happen to have one lying around (or somewhere on the Interwebs), would someone please recommend to me a good guide to understanding Afrofuturism and some authors/artists/media things that would be good to help a newbie get the understanding necessary? Because I recognize that Black Panther is so much an Afrofuturist tale (and picked that up from the opening graphic and typeface choice), and I find myself way under-equipped to understand the major parts, much less what have to be the nuances and subtleties involved in the story. I should probably get a lot better about that before it comes out on disc, so that on a rewatch, I understand a lot more than I did when I went in today.

2) Since I expect Black Panther to prove unequivocally to Marvel that movies made for audiences that aren't cis white men will do just fine at the box office, can we finally get a Black Widow movie? There's going to be a second Deadpool and a second Ant-Man movie that provides The Wasp, and by this point, all the other Avengers have had at least two movies, I believe. And the Guardians of the Galaxy have two. And, and, and. So can we please get the actual Black Widow movie? I promise that it will do very well. If they play the cards right, at least Wonder Woman well, probably closer to Black Panther well.

Oh, wow, was that a nice movie. The parallel storylines, of one person motivated to stay out of the way and protect the people, and one who has seen the world outside and wants them to use their power to make things better, run excellently in tandem. It's a similar parallel line to Wonder Woman's Themiscyra segment - Diana sees the world outside, and wants to help using her power, and the ruling segment want nothing to do with the outside any more. T'Challa doesn't want to intervene in the outside world and use the power that Wakanda has at their disposal (correctly understanding that using martial force to take over is going to perpetuate a cycle), while Killmonger has seen the world outside, and how terrible it is, and what Wakanda is willing to do to maintain their secrecy, and is done with the idea that black people need to be subjugated or discriminated against by anyone at all. For the "got the cursory education about black history" crowd that didn't get more than what their required schools taught them, it would be easy to set it up as a Dr. King versus Malcolm X debate. This doesn't actually work, because Black Panther exists to be the protector and engage in violence on behalf of Wakanda's pacifism. It also doesn't work because Wakanda has soft power they can exercise at any point they want - vibranium, spies, possibly even diplomats. They could choose at any point to engage and use their assets to stop situations before they begin. Or before they get out of hand.

I was also very thrilled with the way that the narrative neatly sidelines T'Challa for most of the movie - not that he's actually unconscious for most of it, but that the three people closest to him -- his general, his inventor sister, and his ex -- do most of the lifting, acting, and doing during the game, including in the action sequences. Wakanda's elite guards are spear-wielding women. And eventually the men yield to the women in the inter-tribal fight. The movie explicitly points out the women everywhere - Queen, Councillor, General, Genius, and beyond -- and points out that in a society where everyone has had power from the beginning, a much more equal society developed. The Afrofuturist future is feminist.

Yeah. That was a good movie. I enjoyed it immensely, without knowing nearly as much as I should have to enjoy it more deeply.