Black Panther: Wakanda Forever director Ryan Coogler had a massive hurdle to get over, just to get the sequel’s story started, and that was the death of Chadwick Boseman. Not only did Boseman’s death force massive changes to the story of Black Panther 2, it also forced Marvel Studios and Coogler to wrestle witht he massive decision of whether or not to recast the character or kill him off within the universe. The latter route was obviously the one that the Black Panther team chose to go in, which only led to the next big issue: how to kill off T’Challa.ย
In the end, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever chose to mirror real life and have T’Challa die from a sudden illness. Early on, a lot of fans wondered whether or not T’Challa would be given an epic hero’s death in battle; in a new interview, Ryan Coogler explains why that couldn’t have been the method of T’Challa’s end. Bottom line? It all boiled down to making sure T’Challa’s death had a very specific effect on his successor, his sister Shuri (Letitia Wright):
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“If somebody else would’ve taken T’Challa out, Shuri would’ve looked for that person. We wanted it to be a situation where the only place to go was internal,” Coogler explained to NYT.ย
He went on to explain how he knew the audience would be looking for the explanation of T’Challa’s death first and foremost, and wanted to use that as a springboard to getting to a deeper story about the stages of grief:ย
“Just practically, everyone was going to be waiting to see how we dealt with it, so doing it right up front made sense,” Coogler said. “In terms of the characters, we needed to introduce a different version of Shuri [T’Challa’s sister, played by Letitia Wright]. We’re showing the moment that she becomes a different person than the person we met. She’s the smartest person in the world, but she can’t save her brother. What does that do to you?”
Indeed, Wakanda Forever is largely about how T’Challa’s death and legacy reshape both the world and the people around him. For Shuri, much of the film is about her grieving process, starting from the denial of T’Challa’s grave situation (and her ability to solve it), and ending with the acceptance of her new responsibility and role as leader of Wakanda, and all that it means.
“We wanted to have an emotionally intelligent conversation. It’s about the transformative quality of grief and trauma,” Coogler concluded. “There’s this expectation with emotional trauma that you just need time. ‘Oh, give them a couple weeks off; they’ll come back to work and get back to it.’ But that person is completely different in some ways. You just don’t see it because the change isn’t visible.”
NEXT: How MCU Phase 4 Follows The 7 Stages of Grief
Black Panther: Wakanda Forever is headed to home video and Disney+.ย
