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Tuesday, April 17, 2018 

Black Panther comics are now imitating visual elements from the movie

And IMHO, not in a good way. The following revelation about where the comics are going with the lady named Okoye under Ta-Nehisi Coates is enough to question whether the way she's portrayed in the film was in good taste:
The latter seems to be the case with the newest issue of Black Panther, #171. When the Black Panther film went into production, writer Ta-Nehisi Coates’ run on the Black Panther comic title was only just beginning. Even so, the series was so unique and forward in its approach to the character’s world and mythology that a few issues managed to inspire Ryan Coogler’s film. Now, things are coming full circle, with Coates and Kirk paying homage to the successful movie in their latest issue of Black Panther.

While it would have been easy to simply emulate the large scope of the film, Coates doesn’t opt to mirror the Wakanda audiences has discovered. Instead, he continues to write the story he’s always been telling, that of a nation that is evolving, and of a King trying to allow his people, and his home, to flourish.

But on the opening page of the latest issue, fans of the movie recognize a familiar character: Okoye, who is played by Danai Gurira in the film. While Okoye originated in writer Christopher Priest’s Black Panther run in the 1990s, she hasn’t made an appearance in a very long time — that is, until Black Panther #171. What’s more, Okoye’s look has drastically changed; no longer is she a long-haired femme fatale. Now, she looks exactly as she did in the film, with a shaven, tattooed head.
Wow, and I thought it was bad enough Luke Cage had been victimized this badly since the turn of the century! Now they're taking one of Priest's creations and denigrating her visually, not unlike some of the white ladies who've been humiliated visually, with features like forcibly short hair and disturbingly masculine-looking character designs (as happened recently with Kitty Pryde in one of the X-books). This is just so unappealing, and simultaneously does a disfavor to the movie to boot, along with the audiences.

And the story Coates was always telling (and in at least one prior volume that got cancelled)? Basically leftism, and his politics, are discouraging. What's so unique about Coates' rendition that isn't so unique about the writers they've rejected like Priest, his own liberal politics notwithstanding?
However, the words “Wakanda Forever” are not used in the book — it seems that even Coates recognizes that this battle cry belongs to the film. Instead, the writer opted to use a “Hail Wakanda!” which could very well become a staple of the book. Still, the use of the cross-armed salute is a beautiful nod to a popular film that is sending shock waves on a worldwide stage.
What if the use of "hail" is an allusion to nazism? If that's what Coates is doing, that's really a show of disrespect for Lee/Kirby's creations. Marvel is simply not cashing in the right way on the movie's success.

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Oh, so being a monarch is now automatically equivalent to being a Nazi?

The Hail Wakanda chant can just as easily be taken as a reference to the Marx Brothers' movie Duck Soup, where the cast sings rousing choruses of "Hail, Hail, Fredonia!"

Should we take the fact that Harpo's real first name is Adolph to be merely a coincidence?

Well what did you expect? The comics have always made visual changes to reflect the current looks of whatever Superhero movie that has just appeared in theaters.

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