Tag Archives: Marvel
Black Panther Serves To Inspire In A World Built On Fantasy
I hold my clenched fists across my heaved chest and as I summon the power of a thousand Afrakan warriors my arms become heavy like the hammer of the mighty Thor times two. I am ready to pound the hell out of every white racist and race destroying Black person that crosses my path. I know it’s just a fantasy but I feel exhilarated, inspired, and powerful. Now I’m ready to take on the world.
Every dream begins as fantasy, an exaggeration of the actual outcome. There is no explanation for it. That’s just the way the human mind works. But if you think that it’s foolish to dwell on fantasy, who can tell me that god is not a fantasy? Yet he/she/it is the key drivers of the human psyche, providing hope, inspiration, and courage to billions to alleviate their fears of a hostile world. God has been insufficient however therefore; Black people still continue to search for any form of inspiration we can find.
That is why when a movie like Black Panther comes along to offer inspiration in the form of a fantasy, Black people have responded with overwhelming support. In fact, I have never seen Black people all across the globe get so excited about a movie before. Like Trekkies or Star Wars fanatics who get dressed up in fan gear to attend a showing, Black Panther supporters came out in all sorts of Afrakan themed attire. The result is that the movie has now broken sales records in numerous countries and is predicted to become one of the top grossing movies of all time.
In the months prior to its premiere, anticipation for Black Panther never wavered, it grew bigger by the day, which was a good sign for its creators, Marvel and Disney, that they had a hit on their hands. Personally, after witnessing the blind obsession on social media over what I saw as no more than a fantasy, I wrote it off. My consciousness does not allow me to get swept up in consumerism, which is a factor in all movie and product debuts.
So here we are, a week after the premiere and Black Panther has actually lived up to the hype but even it wasn’t a good movie in terms of its entertainment value, just the representation of Afrakans in positive positions of power was good enough for most Black folks. A new term has even been coined called “Afro Futurism” to classify movies in which Black people are set in leading positions of power.
On the other hand, Black Panther has got every major news organization scrambling to understand its success. They are wondering how Black Panther, a lesser known figure in the Marvel Universe is able to outsell all other movies with major characters such as Iron Man, X-Men, Thor, Spider Man, Captain America, and Avengers. Its success came because Black people were given a chance to Direct, Act, and create a story about us for us. The result is a product that inspires greatness within us.
Main-stream media is hearing from us how just seeing other Black people in positions of power is inspirational yet many of them are still confused. They say, “but it’s just a movie, a fantasy”. What they refuse to acknowledge is the power of inspirational figures even though they draw inspiration from statues and portraits of Jesus and movies about Super-man, James Bond, and Luke Sky-Walker.
Those inspirations make them feel that they can dictate the policies of the world, travel to the Stars, or become super sleuths that solve complected crimes. For us, Black Panther serves to inspire in a world built on fantasy. What world am I referring to? I’m not referring to the world of Wakanda; I’ am referring to the world we face every time we open our front doors.
