Wakanda Forever, Now What?
As the dust settles over the excitement and release of "Black Panther", I can't help but wonder what's next. Draped in African attire, with an African accent, and a sense of black consciousness, "Black Panther" seemed like more than a movie upon its release. It seemed like a movement, like a great change is happening in Hollywood and the black community. But, is it really? When I talk to people about "Black Panther" and they start talking about it as if Hollywood all of a sudden gets it, in terms of diversity and the depiction of black people and their stories, I get slightly annoyed. The reason is because it's a superhero movie and it's Marvel (a white owned company). I have nothing against superhero movies or Marvel; I just feel like a superhero movie can't be a catalyst for change in the black community or in film. While images do matter, so does the story, the money, and actual work in the community.
The story is the best part about "Black Panther", so I'll give it that. The positive images of an all black cast accompanied by a black protagonist and antagonist on the world's largest stage and backed by Marvel is fantastic and, in large part, why the film has gotten so much publicity. My issue, however, when people try to relate the film to black consciousness and a movement of sorts is that it's not a true or even considerably true story. It's African, but it's not really Africa; it's Wakanda, a made-up African country that's super wealthy and the opposite reality of many African countries today. In my opinion, this aspect of it is somewhat propaganda used successfully to get black people's money. Furthermore, the story doesn't touch on any black issues. And I'm not even saying it has to! But, if it's going to be a catalyst for "change" in the black community and in Hollywood for black people, the film should touch on those issues and stories that affect black people the most. I will say kudos to the ending of the film, they touched on the need for technology education in under served communities; but it wasn't part of the story and only touched on it at the end.
Then there's the issue of money. Yes, "the root of all evil" money and the economic impact it has. As we've seen, the film has broken all types of box office records and seems to be approaching the billion dollar mark in gross sales. I will give Marvel and Disney credit, they have given back to the community in several ways including volunteering and recently $1 million from "Black Panther" proceeds to the Boys and Girls Clubs of America. But considering the amount of money they've made off the film, I'd suggest that they could do a lot more! $1 million is only 1% of a billion, so in essence, they've really only contributed 1% of the profits back to the community. Ironically, the large majority of the film's gross sales is coming from black people and the black community. To be clear, I'm not suggesting that it's a film's responsibility to give back anything to the community; but if we want to classify a film like "Black Panther" as a game changer or a movement in Hollywood or other wise for black people, we have to call them to task. I don't think this is an unfair assessment given the fact that we ask black athletes to do the same thing, give back to the community and set a good example, with much less money than Marvel has at its disposal.
It's funny, black people actually took the community to "Black Panther", people took church groups, non-profits raised money to take middle school kids, and the list goes on. But, how often does Marvel come to the community? The answer is not that often and certainly not with the same vigor we showed with our support of "Black Panther" and many other Marvel movies. I feel like workshops or scholarships or something like that would suffice. It just seems like the community is an after thought to Hollywood, and Marvel is no different. They'll gladly take our money, but until we call them to task as far as giving back to the community, they never will.
We've seen our share of black movies that should have been the start of a "movement" for years. Spike Lee's "Malcolm X" or "Bamboozled" or a list of classic black movies throughout the 1990s that really spoke to the community. Instead, it seems like we've put all our trust in Marvel and "Black Panther" to deliver us a story that "speaks" to our community. Unfortunately, I think "Black Panther" spoke more to our wallets. I watched the film and I'd watch it again and I'd take my kids to see it if I had kids; but, that doesn't mean that I can overlook the fact that it doesn't speak to the black experience in an honest manner. And certainly, based on the 1% of profits they've given back to the community, Marvel has no intentions of raising our levels of consciousness or improving our communities. And that's perfectly fine because I believe we must do that ourselves; so maybe, just maybe, what we can take most from "Black Panther" is that when we as black people work together for the same cause we're truly unstoppable.
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