Is Black Panther's Message Bigger Than The Hype?

Diversity in film and television is a conversation that predates

"Black Panther" (Marvel Studios). Click here to see what

Hollywood has to say about itself relative to diversity. 

Despite "Black Panther" being a very difficult film to fully digest after one viewing, I will spit out my half chewed cud and share my feelings about a film many had to view more than once, just for digestive purposes.

Although it could take a couple more viewings to give you the cinematic evaluation of the films artistry, complete with metaphoric comparisons and fancy superlatives , I intentionally waited to watch Black Panther because I did not care about the films artistry when it came out in ads, or when I sat down to see it myself. For me, there was a strong and obvious message in the casting alone, so the artistic brilliance of the actual production was an absolute bonus.

Black Panther is extremely artistic in its fashion and form with an engaging plot and visuals to match. It is a Marvel origin film (of sorts), but it is also jam packed with scientific geeky stuff that any Marvel movie lover anticipates as a lifeblood of the genre. Although we are meeting an ancient civilization as we watch Black Panther, we are not traveling back in time to do it, which makes this film a lot more about the origin of life and all of us and less about the origin of the hero whose name is on the banner.

You could say that this was a film about a super hero, but there's an entire cast of heroes that serve a vital role in understanding and forming the central character, including a few highly relatable villains. You will probably leave this film either affirmed, or reaffirmed that women are the true super heroes in the real world just as they clearly are in this films unfettered world of humanities origin.

You could  say that this film was about gender, race, colorism, politics, religion and a few other social issues that derive from the animus of humans on this planet, but you would be narrowing the movie into a central message and there are too many messages intentionally laced within this film to bog down on one or another.

The strongest message I saw for black people and women is one of a life and a world without stigma. Despite a black cast full of powerful male and female characters, you will only make significant notice of those things if you are one of those things and unaccustomed to seeing yourself free from a world of stigma: a world like Wakanda (the fictitious land of Black Panther's origin).

In recent anthropological discoveries, women and black people are actually just people who would love for their race or gender to be ignored like it usually is with white men. For a couple of hours in the comforting movie theaters of Wakanda, stigmatized people get to take a break. I quietly suspect that some of the multiple return visits to see this movie are more about mental health and relaxation than searching to find that plot nugget you missed, because the plot isn't that deep, even if some of the messages are. For a few hours in a movie theatre, certain people in the audience will get to shed their inferiority.

From that perspective alone,  Black Panther achieves a first. It is not the first black cast or the first subject to need one, but it is a first for reasons perfectly obvious to the stigmatized- slightly unclear to "the rest".

In fact, some of "the rest" will not appreciate the degenerate stigma towards white men as thieves and colonizers on the edge of societal ruin if not for the intervention of Black Panther and the nation of Wakanda. While it's not uncommon to call white men colonizers that are ruining their own world, it is uncommon to see a nation of black people (not just Will Smith) as the hope to fix a problem that we, the original people, probably created.

This is likely where the actually stigmatized among us will depart from Black Panther, as few blacks seem willing to accept our distinction as the original people as well as being the probable cause for our wayward, melanin deficient offspring.

Black Panther goes in on this and several other aspects of the challenges of race without making any of its less-than-subtle digs bigger than the cinematic achievement. Some people will make a fuss about one touchy dig or another, but those people typically make a fuss about every touchy subject, and lies rarely bring out the fuss in us, so those people are not really a fair measuring stick.

That is my review of the film as a film, because, as a film alone, Black Panther deserves to be reviewed and evaluated on the merits. The phenomena is real mostly because this film is great.

As a statement of social impact, the phenomena makes much more sense to me because this movie is transformative.

I wasn't personally anxious to see the film for the review aspects because modern films are what they are; stuck in a space between technological ability and the long-standing demands of good film making. In reality, humans have never needed all the tricks of cinematography that filmmakers think we need. When done well, movie tricks are amazingly cool but they always require time, money and a reason for being in the film in the first damn place to not become a waste. Getting to know people, characters and why humans do the things we do has never needed technology beyond what cameras, actors and film already provide.

It will always be hard for me to have a favorite movie like "Citizen Kane" and still fully love everything about "Black Panther" or any modern movie. I didn't hurry out to see the film because I wanted to do a review without fear of spoilers, but mostly, I just don't hurry to see movies anymore.  They all come out on DVD too soon for me to wonder if I would have preferred seeing it for $25 with my wife amidst an obnoxious crowd of people instead of $4.99 plus whatever we find in the fridge. Stovetop popcorn is better anyway.

That last paragraph is important to understand because I will go back a few more times to see Black Panther before I can get it cheap and watch it at least as many times as I've seen Coming to America or all of Tyler Perry's stuff. I always knew I would watch it again and again even before it came out. I never knew I would watch Good Times over and over and over, especially when I think about how obnoxious JJ (Jimmy Walker) was at a time when I hated the stigma he seemed to perpetuate against us black boys. Nonetheless, I will watch me some Good Times every chance I get because I now embrace it for everything it stood for at the time, including being  a black first like Amos and Andy, and for being something white people needed as much as me, just like Black Panther.

Some things in this world are bigger than themselves, and Black Panther joined those ranks long before the film was even released. Fortunately, the filmmakers of Black Panther knew the gravity of this project and did their job with full recognition of what they would be adding to the social construct of society. Black Panther makes no apologies for addressing the matters of blackness while, at the same time, making blackness hardly matter somehow.

Black Panther offers the kind of pride some of my people have never seen in themselves. I specify some of us because I  left Aurora, Colorado at 18 and found myself at Morehouse College in the heart of the Atlanta University Center which encompassed Morris Brown, Clark College, Atlanta University (Clark and AU merged), Morehouse and Spelman. Watching the Morris Brown marching band or my first fashion show event on the campus of Spelman felt much like Wakanda to me. Every time I return to visit that beautiful city and campus, I see Wakandan roots through and through even though no one has shown me their secret mark yet. I thoroughly enjoyed Black Panther, but I did not view the film with my spirit in utter amazement as did my immediate family who did not attend an HBCU for college.

One of my 5 daughters did attend an HBCU. She enjoyed Black Panther enough to see it three times already simply for the connection it gave her to college life in Atlanta .  The rest of  my family left the film with salty tears dried on their face. All of us made plans to see it again even though our reasons were different.

In fact, a 7 year old white male family friend shared his review of the movie saying that "the Panther was cool and the women were really awesome". Whether he didn't notice the black part or had been taught to refrain from saying the words 'black people', he could not refrain from recognizing the elevated view depicted of women in this movie. Women will embrace this film as if it was made by them and for them, even though the central character is a man they all serve.

If I had to decide on the movies greatest achievement, it is that Black Panther truly allows you to enjoy an epic Marvel film experience and ignore the issue of race even while race is thoroughly in your face. As I reflected on this article it came to me that the entire production could be symbolic of the name of the main character.

You see, a panther is not really a thing at all. It is a description of a leopard (or jaguar) with a black (melanin rich) outer coat that hides the exact same spot pattern that you would see in their sister or brother leopards.

Whenever they cut open Black Panther in this movie, he always bleeds red.

Did U know? Two spotted leopards

can't produce a black leopard (panther)

Furthermore, the word black is used to attempt to describe a color, when in essence blackness is the absence of color. If you peel back the layers on Black Panther- and maybe even the layers of Stan Lee's vision when creating the comic hero- they are majestic,
regal and misunderstood creatures that encompass every color even as they appear to represent just one.

Normal Voters Really Want Normalcy To Return

Apparently, denying something happened
is all that matters to Donald Trump.

It used to be normal that we defend the actual victims of domestic violence.

Not the accusers! Those liars remain exactly what they were ten years before the #metoo movement decided to be. I know we would like to pretend that WE are a new America poised to give a damn when women insist we should, but this is Real Talk...For People Who Need It (SquareBiz), and I'm not convinced that enough abusers or women are ready to vote for a woman or believe her claim of abuse.

This matter of America's foremost leader being an unrepentant misogynist works because plenty of men remain just like him and plenty of women voted for this man with complete knowledge of his history with women. Those women- who shall primarily remain anonymous, for obvious reasons- are excused for their support of president Trump because the bulk of the evangelical community has also joined him and are clearly going to vote for him again if given the chance to do so.

It used to be normal that we'd fight against the efforts of the Soviet Union.

That nation is now simply called Russia because they fought the United States beyond their ability to afford the war, and it cost them an entire union. Yes, that Russia is the same Russia that is now happily fighting us in other ways, including automated bots that disseminate spoon fed information to the same list of people that I mentioned above:  my oldest brother, women who question #metoo and other women but not Trump, prominent evangelicals and the Trump base, aka, the Trumpians.

It used to be normal that certain standards of operation like having a presidential staff with security clearances or obvious obstruction efforts of an ongoing investigation would draw the ire of a Congress that most of us were raised as children to understand had an equal balance of power within the three branches of government. It used to be normal that Congress eagerly jumped upon opportunities to show the president their equal level of power like they did when overwhemingly voting in favor of sanctions against Vladimir Putin and Russia.

This Congress wont even force Trump to enact those sanctions that were voted upon with a veto proof majority, further conceding their equal level of power to a president that wants our military to give him a parade.

If you've seen this meme, maybe normal is just an illusion
Click here to compare the actual 1956 platform to this meme

It used to be normal that going through background checks, vetting, bonding or anything of the sort was considered "due process".

Now we have presidents- and supporters of the president- willingly defending a man who can't get permanent security clearance due to domestic violence issues. Instead of questioning why he remained in that job and who gave the call to keep him there every time his interim clearance lapsed over the past year (they last for 180 days with an option for another 180 days), this conversation has devolved into a question of due process with no trial under way and no reason to invoke the idea of due process unless you are confusing Rob Porter's issues with your own, Mr. President.


Even with acknowledgement for the sharing of platforms planks when politics demand, it used to be normal that Republicans behaved like Republicans and Democrats like Democrats.

Now, we have  a president that has control over both houses of Congress and is embroiled in a debate with his own party over immigration and increasing the deficit. If the signs of the death of political normalcy aren't clear enough, what more do you need?

I am personally a bit weary of those who keep seeing the obvious but continuously ask themselves the most obvious, thus rhetorical questions imagined. Yes, there are plenty of people that continue to support this man despite all the reasons "you" think they shouldn't. His issues with style, delivery, focus, empathy and a history twice as bad as his present gaffs are not enough to run off prominent preachers who either see something beyond the ability of the rest of us, or they see a puppet who they can get stuff from. Either way, they are with him and by default against you, Bob Mueller and normalcy.

They are also not against Russians because they are not dumb. What most of you people wishing for your normal back don't quite get is that smart people don't discount the fact that Donald Trump probably did benefit from the Russian intrusion into our election. They also don't automatically look at the polling numbers and tell themselves that he could win again without Russian involvement.

What you people who need your normal back also don't quite realize is that these are the same people who willingly gerrymander as well as obstruct voters for the sake of keeping their slipping grip on power, so why not Russians?

I still think exiling the spiritual understanding of forgiveness and Grace away from our schools because it offended people while letting everything else in was stupid. But that's the conservative me talking. Mostly, I am too proudly Socialist and too against the two-party hustle to care that the Democrats could be begging for a problem if they keeping frowning in disbelief over the notion that people support Trump.

Get over it and get over your wish for normalcy. If our lazy voters had a chance to do it all over again, they would have voted Bernie Sanders into office. I would be dancing, but we would all be trying to figure out how a Socialist will govern without any Socialist driven legislation coming out of either branch of Congress. While people like @RachelMaddow try to keep a calibration of what normal used to be so that we don't allow this administration to confuse us when normal finally returns, I say she and everyone else is dazed and confused and probably won't see things clearly until their concussions symptoms clear.

Our old normal only involved the participation of less than half of the country, and that was at the best of times, not mid-terms when turnout is significantly less. Several citizens have to watch, listen or actively ignore our embarrassment of a president while they rethink their previous belief that their vote didn't matter, but many citizens turn on this circus and feel more than justified of their decision to wash their hands of all of it. Whether we have an electorate more motivated to do their civic duty is still a wait and see proposition that has apathy, gerrymandering and suppression efforts it still must overcome.

Mitch McConnell looked flabbergasted as he stared into the camera and tried to explain to a section of Trump's current support how Barack Hussein Obama became our 44th president. His only recourse was to promise them that he would block Obama at every turn and make his effort to preside over this country as difficult as one human being possibly could. Now, all of that energy is being recalled and renewed against Trump, except Republicans have a political majority so the parallel isn't quite the same even if the sentiment is.

The new normal is likely being evidenced at anti-Trump protest rallies and with recent special election results. Governor Scott Walker, in Wisconsin, is refusing to hold a special election because the last one he allowed went for the Democrats. Right now, the generally motivated as well as the generally interested but hardly motivated voters are running off of the same energy, and that is a good thing. Whether it shall be an enduring thing is something to worry about when you realize that our president- who loves his freedom and Russia way more than your sense of normalcy- has decided that the best way to protect himself and Putin is to flood the waters with more press than the average person can endure and hope it makes them downright weary when it comes time to vote.

His plan seems worthwhile given the fact that the media is stuck in a paradigm of unprecedented ratings and interest in the latest news while simultaneously being disgusted by the person they are giving so much shine to each day. Trump's presidency may be saving a few dying newspapers across the country as we speak. Although his rhetoric continuously drives those he disgusts towards further hatred of him, it gets spin'd and retold by FOX news and by those Russian bots that keep generating half-truth memes to keep Trumpians motivated and fully on board.

If Russia is still as against America as it was when it was a union too, they have NOT only reignited the Cold-War that we declared victory over, they are winning the damn thing from the inside out with Donald Trump in office.

I write to you today because our president is also a Russian bot who refuses to denounce or fight back against Putin and quite possibly colluded with him to win the job. Our Congress is loathe in their responsibilities because they are unsure of how to do their job and keep their power at the same time. Meanwhile, WAY too many of you are looking for normal again while the war for our ability to still be called a union rages on.

What many of us see- including Facebook, finally- is that the necessity for nuclear war has been usurped by the simplicity of a digital one. WE are currently engaged in a war that WE don't understand so we can not be winning it. By the time we fully discover the extent of this war we will have endured internal damage that will never allow us to return to whatever normal used to be. In fact, when you think of it, old normal is probably to blame for this mess.

So please, stop looking for it.