The latest instalment in Marvel’s slowly fizzling cinematic universe is given a lot to do and for the most part, like its recent predecessors, falls flat. Ryan Coogler has proved his talent as a director but in the follow-up to his 2018 smash hit Black Panther he’s given too many balls to juggle, and the film inevitably feels bloated and unfocused.
The film opens with the death of the Black Panther, T’Challa, following the real-life passing of Chadwick Boseman. The funeral scenes are up there with the most powerful moments of the film. It’s easy to understand just how difficult this must have been to film for both cast and crew and it’s handled tremendously.
The main plot centres around the world’s desperation to find other sources of Wakanda’s super weapon, vibranium. A CIA mission on the ocean incurs the anger of the secret underwater nation, Talokan. This causes the nation’s leader, Namor, to approach the Wakandans asking them to bring him the US scientist responsible for tracking down the vibranium in his kingdom.
The scientist turns out to be Riri (Dominique Thorne), a genius college student from Chicago. Thorne bears the brunt of Marvel’s quip quota, responsible for delivering the occasional badly timed joke. It feels her only reason for being here is to set up her new Disney+ show, Ironheart. The same applies to Everett K. Ross (Martin Freeman) and Valentina Allegra de Fontaine (Julie Louis Dreyfuss), if all of their scenes had been cut it’s hard to see how the narrative would’ve been impacted at all.
Namor, the 500-year-old God-king of Talokan is the film’s big bad and is one the highlights. Tenoch Huerta does a good job to separate himself from obvious Aquaman comparisons. His main agenda is to defend his kingdom by invading the surface world, which sets him on a collision course with the Wakandans.
While the Mesoamerican costumes and themes were great to see, the design of what was supposedly an aquatic super kingdom is a complete bust. The scenes were dark, lacked colour and felt like a waste of what could have been the most visually interesting setting. The film wasn’t helped by the trailer for the Avatar sequel beforehand, which felt like the equivalent of seeing the Brazilian football team warmup before watching a Sunday league game.
Letitia Wright as Shuri is a shining light in a film that veers on losing its way many times only for her to wrestle it back on track. It comes as no surprise that Marvel have chosen her as the new Black Panther and after the inevitable CG super battle has occurred between Wakanda and Talokan, it’s down to her to bring a human touch.
Strong performances from the main cast just about keep the film interesting despite shaky visuals and far too much of the nearly three hour run time being spent introducing characters and side plots that further other Marvel projects at the expense of its own story. In many ways Black Panther: Wakanda Forever is indicative of the current MCU: franchise before film.
2/5
Image Credits – The MovieDB
