Formula: Black Panther - Chadwick Boseman
A lot of movies have production issues that they have to work around. All the Money in the World had to fully replace Kevin Spacey. Furious 7 had to restructure around the death of Paul Walker. I don't know what the exact plans for The Dark Knight Rises were, but I have to assume not even being able to mention the Joker had to affect it. However, I struggle to think of a movie with as big a challenge as Wakanda Forever. The film lost the centerpiece character. A machine like the MCU has contingencies to everything except that.
Wakanda Forever doesn't make a seamless transition into a post T'Challa (Boseman) world. The film begins by quickly establishing his absence/death and shifts to Letitia Wright as the new lead. There's no perfect way to do this, but the film does well enough getting over with it respectfully before moving into the proper plot. That plot is that a secret civilization living under the sea with access to their own vibranium deposits reveal themselves to Wakanda. An American scientist built a device that can detect Vibranium which threatens to expose Namor (Tenoch Huerta), their leader, and his people. They threaten Wakanda with war against the surface world unless the Wakandans bring the scientist to them so they can dispose of her. In all honestly, that story is a little rough. Namor is appropriately powerful, but the logic of why his people are so militant after years of hiding is weak. And I don't think that could be blamed on Boseman's death.
The dirty little secret of Boseman's death is that it does give Wakanda Forever something of a free pass. Any criticism lodged at the film has that as a caveat. Throughout the film, I couldn't stop my brain from guessing about changes necessitated by Boseman's death. For example, with Shuri moved to the lead role, they introduce this scientist character (Dominique Thorne) to fill Shuri's old role. Killmonger destroys the plant that gives Black Panthers their strength, so they have to make a synthetic version of the plant. That doesn't mean every issue I had would've been solved with Boseman still being alive, but it's hard to untangle it all.
The film does OK rebalancing things without Boseman. He wasn't the most compelling of the MCU heroes. His greatest value to Black Panther was as the stabilizing force for the stacked cast. He could do the boring hero stuff that let Michael B. Jordan, Letitia Wright, Lupita Nyong'o, Danai Gurira, and others let loose. That makes him more replaceable in his franchise than, say Tony Stark in Iron Man, but it does throw off the equilibrium. Wright steps up nicely as the new center, and Nyong'o, Gurira, Winston Duke, and Angela Bassett all step up their roles to help. I was disappointed that a lot of the fun of Shuri was sanded down and replaced with grief and vengeance. I get why. I just wish I could see a little more of the character that became a fan favorite in the first place. I imagine she'll shine in the next Avengers movie though. Tenoch Huerta is fine as the main antagonist. Namor has some silly looking visuals; namely his winged feet*.
*They repeat a few times how he's so different because of the wings on his feet and his pointed ears. I found it funny every time, because the ears are barely even noticeable. You can stop with the winged feet part. You don't need to keep mentioning the ears.
I was down on the first Black Panther movie versus the consensus. While acknowledging its greater overall significance, I was annoyed by the number of people talking about it like it still wasn't fundamentally still a MCU movie. Wakanda Forever feels less like a MCU movie to me in that it is much more somber and less quippy. There's still the silly mythology, people in super suits, and the somewhat forced conflict though. The costuming remains amazing. The film struggles to make the underwater world as compelling, but Ryan Coogler still has unrivaled world-building above water. There are some very cool effects using water bombs throughout, although the action sequences did feel surprisingly small at times; especially in the climax.
In what is becoming a trend this season, the movie is absolutely longer than it needs to be even though it flew by. Kind of like Tar, weirdly enough. Coogler is a great filmmaker. I like seeing his work. Wakanda Forever passes the Blade Runner 2049 test of being a world that I'm happy to hang out in for as long as I can. The movie does drag at points though. It's an understandable challenge. When a character dies, you need to pause to pay respect, but how can you do that where it doesn't feel like the entire movie is being put on hold? Wakanda Forever, while entertaining, doesn't know how to fill that hole.
Side Thought: Am I alone in thinking that had Killmonger not been killed in the last movie, they would've found a way to rehabilitate the character and make him the new Black Panther and lead of this movie after Boseman's death? Michael B. Jordan is a superhero in waiting at all times. The character has a claim to the throne. He was a great villain because he was right about a lot of things. There must've been a meeting at some point to see if they could 'Captain Barbosa' the character for this movie before Coogler or Jordan or someone shut it down.
Verdict: Strongly Recommend
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