Selling Diversified Superheroes

Here's producer Kevin Feige on the direction of the Marvel Cinematic Universe:

So, the notion of representation onscreen, in front of and behind the camera, somebody asked me once, so is Black Panther a one-off? I said, no, it’s not a one-off. This is the future. This is the way the world is, and the way, certainly, our studio’s going to be run going forward, because it brings about better stories. The more diverse the group of people making the movie is, the better the stories.

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To which I respond:

OK, so all you need to do to make better stories is to make the characters more diverse? It has nothing to do with thinking out the characters in greater detail, right? Like why Black Panther is so torn up by learning of his uncle's death, when the people watching the movie have no reason to believe there was any particular tie between T'Challa and the uncle?
Yeah, that's not the way good storytelling works.

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These superhero stories never seem to be in chronological order. So maybe the next movie will tie up the loose ends and develop the character's history more.

Ouroboros said:

Here's producer Kevin Feige on the direction of the Marvel Cinematic Universe:



To which I respond:

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He found out his father killed his uncle and left his cousin orphaned and alone. Pretty sure that’s something most people would have a reaction to regardless of whether they knew the uncle.

Don’t really have a desire to respond to the rest of your post, but I think you’re off the mark there.

Black Panther came out in the 1960's, over 60 years ago.

What drove diversification among super heroes back in the 1960's was that comic book companies where hoping to reach new markets and make more money.

What's happening today is different. Comic book companies lost a big chunk of their readership. How? Their readers switched from comics to playing computer games.

Things looked pretty grim at the comic book companies. They'd have to lay workers off, maybe even shut the doors. So they started reaching out to new audiences.

And that's all there is to it. Nothing sinister.

Anagram said:

He found out his father killed his uncle and left his cousin orphaned and alone. Pretty sure that’s something most people would have a reaction to regardless of whether they knew the uncle.

Don’t really have a desire to respond to the rest of your post, but I think you’re off the mark there.

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And the uncle was guilty of endangering Wakandan security by smuggling guns to some unspecified group, so he was a traitor. I wouldn't mind if the script chose to portray T'Challa as valuing his personal relationship to the uncle over state security, but the writers didn't even seem to factor that in. I mean-- it's like they knew no one would look at these things too hard, so they could get away with crap motivations.

Granted, that's not an unusual attitude in Hollywood. But my particular point is that "diversity" did not make that particular script any better than any other BS Hollywood script, as Feige implies that it ought to.

Ouroboros said:

And the uncle was guilty of endangering Wakandan security by smuggling guns to some unspecified group, so he was a traitor. I wouldn't mind if the script chose to portray T'Challa as valuing his personal relationship to the uncle over state security, but the writers didn't even seem to factor that in. I mean-- it's like they knew no one would look at these things too hard, so they could get away with crap motivations.

Granted, that's not an unusual attitude in Hollywood. But my particular point is that "diversity" did not make that particular script any better than any other BS Hollywood script, as Feige implies that it ought to.

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I see you basically ignored the part about how his father left his innocent cousin a street orphan.

You're acting like T'Challa is all worked up over his uncle. He found out his father, the man he looked up to his whole life as his idealistic role model, orphaned his cousin and left him their alone.

Anagram said:

I see you basically ignored the part about how his father left his innocent cousin a street orphan.

You're acting like T'Challa is all worked up over his uncle. He found out his father, the man he looked up to his whole life as his idealistic role model, orphaned his cousin and left him their alone.

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I didn't get the sense that T'Challa was all that worked up about the orphaning of the future Killmonger either. Maybe you recall some specific dialogue that I ought to check out?

swing_voter said:

Black Panther came out in the 1960's, over 60 years ago.

What drove diversification among super heroes back in the 1960's was that comic book companies where hoping to reach new markets and make more money.

What's happening today is different. Comic book companies lost a big chunk of their readership. How? Their readers switched from comics to playing computer games.

Things looked pretty grim at the comic book companies. They'd have to lay workers off, maybe even shut the doors. So they started reaching out to new audiences.

And that's all there is to it. Nothing sinister.

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The '60s was not over 60 years ago.

Wrote this on a blog--

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Though my post didn't generate a lot of debate on DEBATE POLITICS, one guy seemed to think that the Panther's crisis of confidence didn't come about not because of the death of his uncle, who committed treason by becoming "radicalized" and trying to sell Wakandan super-weapons to terrorist groups sponsoring Black Liberation. Rather, the poster thought the Panther's crisis evolved because the uncle's kid was left behind in America, rather than being taken to Wakanda-- which led to said kid growing up to become the murderous Erik Killmonger, who challenges the Panther for the Wakandan throne. Now the main scene that sets up T'Challa crisis of confidence is one that takes place shortly after Killmonger has issued his challenge, with the Panther confessing his doubts to his mother. His first words on the subject are as follows:



He killed his own brother and left a child behind with nothing. What kind of king-- what kind of man does this?


So in this section, the killing of the uncle and the orphaning of T'Challa's cousin are on an equal plane. But the future Killmonger is not mentioned again as an object of pity. After the mother says that her late husband was not "perfect," T'Challa goes back to talking about the uncle:



[My father] didn't even give [my uncle] a proper burial. My uncle N'Jobu betrayed us, but my father, he may have created something even worse.


Presumably T'Challa means Killmonger, though the villain shares the same goal as his late father: to put Wakandan super-weapons into the hands of radicals. Killmonger is only different in scope, since he implies that he has terrorist cells all over the world, ready to liberate black people from bondage-- though the nature of that bondage is never spelled out, except with reference to the status of black people in the United States. The mother then reinforces her condemnation of her husband's actions by telling T'Challa: "You can't let your father's mistakes define who you are"-- at which the scene shifts to other concerns.



The strange thing about this scene is that a few scenes previous we've seen a flashback in which one of T'Challa's courtiers, Zuri, reveals that he was present when the father killed N'Jobu, and that he did so to keep N'Jobu from killing Zuri. T'Challa is horrified by the revelation, but like his mother in the later scene, he doesn't seem to think protecting old Zuri's life holds much importance beside the killing of Uncle N'Jobu. Given that no one forces N'Jobu to attack Zuri-- and that T'Challa is quite aware that N'Jobu has betrayed his nation-- there seems to be no real reason as to why the uncle's death rates as such an enormity.



T'Challa's speech with his mother suggests that he may have felt young Killmonger should've been brought back to Wakanda, though he doesn't precisely say so at that point. I rather wonder whether the child, given his vengeful tendencies, would have simply forgiven and forgotten his father's death even if he'd had the benefit of a Wakandan upbringing, but the film doesn't address this possibility.



This raises for me the likelihood that although the real "mistake" of T'Challa's father is that of fratricide, the specific fate of Young Killmonger is less significant than what Killmonger symbolizes: the exile of Black Africans to the land of white devils, specifically because people of their own race sold them for profit. I say "symbolizes" because not once in the film does anyone address the fact that Black Africans made a lot of money selling off the people of neighboring tribes. Yet, if there's any real-world counterpart to Wakanda's fantasy-land of endless wealth, it might well be the empires of such nations as Mali, Ghana, and Songhai, which made themselves rich catering to the Atlantic Slave Trade.

Anagram said:

He found out his father killed his uncle and left his cousin orphaned and alone. Pretty sure that’s something most people would have a reaction to regardless of whether they knew the uncle.

Don’t really have a desire to respond to the rest of your post, but I think you’re off the mark there.

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That's fine; no one here owes anyone a response.

I'd always heard it said that a lot of movies, even good ones, often get by with audiences because audiences get involved enough to fill in gaps for themselves. Hence Hitchcock and his "refrigerator effect."

I'm just stating that from my POV the movie did a bad job with that particular characterization gap.

Ouroboros said:

Here's producer Kevin Feige on the direction of the Marvel Cinematic Universe:



To which I respond:

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When can we see a transgender superhero? Have we had an Asian or Hispanic superhero yet?

Outlook said:

When can we see a transgender superhero? Have we had an Asian or Hispanic superhero yet?

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I know you're spoofing, but there was a trans-hero in the SUPERGIRL series last season.

The first Hispanic superhero is also one of the first superheroes, "the fox so daring and free," as Disney called him. Google the reference if you don't get it.

I guess no one will accept Fu Manchu as a superhero, even if he was a hero in his own mind. So, probably Kato.

Ouroboros said:

I know you're spoofing, but there was a trans-hero in the SUPERGIRL series last season.

The first Hispanic superhero is also one of the first superheroes, "the fox so daring and free," as Disney called him. Google the reference if you don't get it.

I guess no one will accept Fu Manchu as a superhero, even if he was a hero in his own mind. So, probably Kato.

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OMG. You gotta get out more.

Outlook said:

OMG. You gotta get out more.

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If you're so totally uninterested in the topic, what are you doing here?

Oh, yeah. Showing everyone how woke you are.