{"id":1691,"date":"2018-05-14T07:21:48","date_gmt":"2018-05-14T14:21:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/?p=1691"},"modified":"2019-02-18T19:15:52","modified_gmt":"2019-02-19T03:15:52","slug":"black-panther-a-colonizers-appreciation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/post\/black-panther-a-colonizers-appreciation\/","title":{"rendered":"Black Panther: A Colonizer’s Appreciation"},"content":{"rendered":"

In February of this year, assuming you\u2019re reading this in 2018, a little indie movie called Black Panther<\/em> appeared in theaters and proceed to inhale all the money in the world. Expanding on the character introduced in 2016\u2019s Captain America: Civil War<\/em>, Ryan Coogler\u2019s movie broke new ground when it came to minority representation in a major tentpole studio film and proceeded to shatter box office records for February movies, surpassing Titanic<\/em> as the #3 highest-grossing film at the North American box office.<\/p>\n

And everything you\u2019ve heard about the movie is true. It\u2019s a damn fine pop entertainment with real heart, not to mention one of the best bad guys of any comic book movie, but also a refreshingly nuanced and fleshed-out portrayal of its several strong female characters.<\/p>\n

Even if everything you\u2019ve read about this movie is deservedly glowing, nothing I\u2019ve read or heard has touched on what I think are Black Panther\u2019s<\/em> two greatest accomplishments.<\/p>\n

First, I think that there is a false dichotomy between art and the commercial, that there is an assumption that something commercial automatically compromises its artistic integrity, and that something truly artistic is, by definition, uncommercial. Black Panther<\/em> exposes the lie of this prejudice. The film\u2019s nominal villain, Erik Killmonger (Michael B. Jordan), asks a legitimate question. Shouldn\u2019t Wakanda, an advanced African nation untouched by colonization and in possession of vast wealth and technology, do more to help those African peoples who did suffer under the yoke of colonization, slavery, and racism? The story doesn\u2019t let the heroes off the hook, because only Killmonger\u2019s extreme, all-or-nothing answer to that question is condemned. In the end, Black Panther\/King T\u2019Challa (Chadwick Boseman) concedes that his adversary had a point and changes his approach to ruling his country.<\/p>\n

This is serious stuff for a genre often (and unfairly) dismissed as juvenile fluff, and director Coogler and his co-writer, Joe Robert Cole, did not compromise on their movie\u2019s point of view while making a film that scored a 96% on Rotten Tomatoes and raked in almost $1.4 billion worldwide. To make a movie that succeeds so brilliantly as both art and commerce simultaneously is no small feat and hopefully Coogler and the whole team behind Black Panther<\/em> will be recognized for this specific accomplishment.<\/p>\n

Second, even with its massive breakthrough in showing that a mainly black cast could lead a blockbuster movie, that storytelling was far, far more important than the melanin content of its actors, I don\u2019t think the full impact of Black Panther<\/em>\u2019s success will be felt for a long time.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s not me being pessimistic, either. Back in the seventies, many of today\u2019s filmmakers were children or teenagers when they first saw movies like Jaws<\/em>, Halloween<\/em>, and Star Wars<\/em> (it wasn\u2019t called A New Hope<\/em> yet). Teenagers walked out of Jaws<\/em> wondering two things: where their dad kept the Super-8 movie camera and what could they use for blood. John Carpenter\u2019s slasher flick pretty much redefined horror movies for a generation. And Star Wars<\/em>? How many of today\u2019s filmmakers walked out of the theater in May of 1977, their brains melting out of their ears, and proclaimed, \u201cI know what I\u2019m going to do with my life!\u201d<\/p>\n

This year, a lot of young people, who knows how many but many of them persons of color, walked out of a screening of Black Panther<\/em> thinking, \u201cI need to get a camera!\u201d Then they dug into their pockets, pulled out their phone and said, \u201cOh, yeah. I have a camera.\u201d<\/p>\n

Someday in the future, ten, twenty, twenty-five years from now, a person of color will be nominated for their first Best Directing Academy Award or promoting their gazillion-dollar blockbuster movie, and a reporter will ask, \u201cHow did you get started making movies?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBlack Panther<\/em>,\u201d the director will reply. \u201cThat movie changed everything for me. It told me I could do this.\u201d<\/p>\n

There will be filmmakers who are household names a generation from now because of this movie. That\u2019s going to be the real legacy of Black Panther<\/em>, or so thinks this pasty-faced colonizer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Everything you’ve heard about this movie is true. It’s that good, but there’s more to it than that.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1692,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[357],"tags":[255,248,258,251,259,256,257,260,249,250,252,253,254],"class_list":["post-1691","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-culture","tag-africa","tag-black-panther","tag-captain-america-civil-war","tag-chadwick-boseman","tag-disney","tag-filmmakers","tag-legacy","tag-marvel","tag-marvel-cinematic-universe","tag-mcu","tag-michael-b-jordan","tag-ryan-coogler","tag-wakanda"],"yoast_head":"\nBlack Panther: A Colonizer's Appreciation - Paul McElligott Dot Com<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/post\/black-panther-a-colonizers-appreciation\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Black Panther: A Colonizer's Appreciation - Paul McElligott Dot Com\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Everything you've heard about this movie is true. It's that good, but there's more to it than that.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/post\/black-panther-a-colonizers-appreciation\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Paul McElligott Dot Com\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/paulmcelligott\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2018-05-14T14:21:48+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2019-02-19T03:15:52+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/the-black-panther-film-marvel.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1922\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1082\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Paul McElligott\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@PaulMcElligott\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@PaulMcElligott\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Paul McElligott\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/post\/black-panther-a-colonizers-appreciation\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/post\/black-panther-a-colonizers-appreciation\/\",\"name\":\"Black Panther: A Colonizer's Appreciation - Paul McElligott Dot Com\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2018-05-14T14:21:48+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2019-02-19T03:15:52+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/7046cd03017c72208828f8044a1bdbe8\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/post\/black-panther-a-colonizers-appreciation\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/post\/black-panther-a-colonizers-appreciation\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/post\/black-panther-a-colonizers-appreciation\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Black Panther: A Colonizer’s Appreciation\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/\",\"name\":\"Paul McElligott Dot Com\",\"description\":\"The pages are still blank, but there is a miraculous feeling of the words being there, written in invisible ink and clamoring to become visible (Vladimir Nabokov)\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/7046cd03017c72208828f8044a1bdbe8\",\"name\":\"Paul McElligott\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/075aacd7c1bd61f6addac96bcb712d1c3919ef4d2a1605cc98b3dc5344de75ec?s=96&d=blank&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/075aacd7c1bd61f6addac96bcb712d1c3919ef4d2a1605cc98b3dc5344de75ec?s=96&d=blank&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Paul McElligott\"},\"description\":\"Author, Writer, Scribe, Wordsmith, Thesaurus owner.\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/post\/author\/admin\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Black Panther: A Colonizer's Appreciation - Paul McElligott Dot Com","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/post\/black-panther-a-colonizers-appreciation\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Black Panther: A Colonizer's Appreciation - Paul McElligott Dot Com","og_description":"Everything you've heard about this movie is true. It's that good, but there's more to it than that.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/post\/black-panther-a-colonizers-appreciation\/","og_site_name":"Paul McElligott Dot Com","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/paulmcelligott\/","article_published_time":"2018-05-14T14:21:48+00:00","article_modified_time":"2019-02-19T03:15:52+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1922,"height":1082,"url":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/the-black-panther-film-marvel.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Paul McElligott","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@PaulMcElligott","twitter_site":"@PaulMcElligott","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Paul McElligott","Est. reading time":"3 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/post\/black-panther-a-colonizers-appreciation\/","url":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/post\/black-panther-a-colonizers-appreciation\/","name":"Black Panther: A Colonizer's Appreciation - Paul McElligott Dot Com","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/#website"},"datePublished":"2018-05-14T14:21:48+00:00","dateModified":"2019-02-19T03:15:52+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/7046cd03017c72208828f8044a1bdbe8"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/post\/black-panther-a-colonizers-appreciation\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/post\/black-panther-a-colonizers-appreciation\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/post\/black-panther-a-colonizers-appreciation\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Black Panther: A Colonizer’s Appreciation"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/","name":"Paul McElligott Dot Com","description":"The pages are still blank, but there is a miraculous feeling of the words being there, written in invisible ink and clamoring to become visible (Vladimir Nabokov)","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/7046cd03017c72208828f8044a1bdbe8","name":"Paul McElligott","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/075aacd7c1bd61f6addac96bcb712d1c3919ef4d2a1605cc98b3dc5344de75ec?s=96&d=blank&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/075aacd7c1bd61f6addac96bcb712d1c3919ef4d2a1605cc98b3dc5344de75ec?s=96&d=blank&r=g","caption":"Paul McElligott"},"description":"Author, Writer, Scribe, Wordsmith, Thesaurus owner.","url":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/post\/author\/admin\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1691","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1691"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1691\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1732,"href":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1691\/revisions\/1732"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1692"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1691"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1691"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.paulmcelligott.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1691"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}