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I grew up in the 1990s and so the span of Marvel Comics that were part of
my childhood, as well as the several cartoons, were pretty different than
what we have been getting since the first IRON MAN from Marvel Studios.
Marvel was always extremely high on both the melodrama and the social
justice parables, sometimes to the extent of being unbearable. My frame of
reference for the canon therefore is including that stuff. Indeed since
Marvel Studios emerged, it has been pretty obvious that Marvel and DC have
effectively switched roles, now it is DC-based films like the Batman
pictures and Superman with all the pathos while Marvel is pretty bubblegum
in comparison.
Speaking specifically about the Panther titles, Ta-Nehisi Coates has been
writing it for the past several years and the result have been interesting.
--
Best regards,
Andrew Stewart
Date: Wed, 21 Feb 2018 06:41:13 -0800
From: DW <dwalters...@gmail.com>
To: Activists and scholars in Marxist tradition
<marxism@lists.csbs.utah.edu>
Subject: Re: [Marxism] Black Panther: Afrofuturism Gets a Superb Film,
Marvel Grows Up and I Don?t Know How to Review It
Message-ID:
<CAA0cW=-xctn4rz7wmmm8wxsq_kab9rja3kov_uhhzcxss_r...@mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8"
Andrew, one of the better reviews. I *still* think you, like many of us
political types, are taking the film way too seriously. I can't disagree
with what you say but you do fail in one area: trying to rely what the
*comic* book was all about and how this film reflects, or not, the original
idea of The Black Panther. I always judge a work of art (even a cartoon)
based on the canon of that film. You to touch on it be far too briefly. The
Black Panther fits into the Marvel Universe/Marvel Cinematic Universe
franchise (Thor, Avengers, Captain America, Guardians of the Galaxy, etc.
etc. etc.).
These comic books were all conceived as or were eventually integrated into
this universe(s) and in fact our Black Panther character and his general,
played by the wildly popular (because of her starring role in The Walking
Dead as Michonne, the sword wielding and general bad-ass Zombie killer)
Danai Gurira are in the upcoming Avengers film "Avengers: Infinity". Both
characters are part of the ensemble of super-heroes out to save the planet.
The 'social significance' of this I have to assume is irrelevant beyond the
rather flaccid attempt at liberal globalization and "anti-racism" exhibited
in The Black Panther.
Lastly, I enjoyed the attempt to humanize the characters beyond their 2
dimensional presence with cute banter between them. This is not unique to
this Marvel film as they have been doing this in the last few years by
giving the characters a little levity in their lines. Of course the
amazingly wonderful Guardian of the Galaxy serious is *entirely* based on
such banter and it works well (not to mention that the two Guardian films
have simply the best sound track of any film ever made. EVER. :)
David Walters
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