It’s almost time to return to Wakanda. On Monday, Disney+ released the official first trailer for Eyes of Wakanda, a four-episode limited series from Marvel Studios Animation (X-Men ’97) and executive producer Ryan Coogler. Serving as a prequel to Coogler’s blockbuster Black Panther and Black Panther: Wakanda Forever films, Eyes of Wakanda will reveal the secret history of the Kingdom of Wakanda when it premieres August 1 — weeks ahead of a previously announced Aug. 27 release date.
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“Wakanda is a kingdom of many secrets,” the Lion (Black Lightning‘s Cress Williams) says in the footage, which offers glimpses of Noni (voiced by Winnie Harlow), a former member of the Dora Milaje in the year 1260 B.C., and the masked Iron Fist (Jona Xiao), protector of the mystical city K’un-Lun. Throughout history, the Lion says, spies have been “sent out across the world to do the missions that Wakanda does not want known.”
The logline states: “Eyes of Wakanda follows the adventures of brave Wakandan warriors throughout history. In this globe-trotting adventure, the heroes must carry out dangerous missions to retrieve Vibranium artifacts from the enemies of Wakanda. They are the Hatut Zaraze and this is their story.”
The Hatut Zeraze — essentially “Wakanda’s CIA” — “often have to venture out to regain stolen Vibranium, but they also have to keep secrets well-hidden so that Wakanda can ward off invaders and stay safe,” Brad Winderbaum, Head of Marvel Television and Marvel Animation, has said of the series set in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. “The Hatut Zaraze are challenged in different ways to stay loyal to Wakanda as they discover the rest of the world around them.”
Series creator and showrunner Todd Harris, a storyboard artist on both Black Panther films and Marvel Animation’s What If…?, animation is “the ultimate equalizer of locations.” For the globe-trotting adventure series, “Egypt costs just as much as New York City, and the moon costs just as much as Ohio. Filming around the globe has inherent limitations that we just don’t have in animation. That freedom allowed us to reimagine an idealized version of an era that’’s unaffected by human history.”
“This has been a long time coming,” Harris continued. “The story has been stewing for a long time in my head. I’m a big believer in what Wakanda represents to mankind as a place that’s untethered by expansion. It has drawn a line — a line it won’t cross and it won’t let anybody else cross.”
Eyes of Wakanda — featuring the voices of Winnie Harlow (Grown-ish), Patricia Belcher (The Villains of Valley View), Larry Herron (Marvel’s Spider-Man 2), Adam Gold (Hogwarts Legacy), Lynn Whitfield (The Chi), Jacques Colimon (Fright Krewe), Jona Xiao (The Flash), Isaac Robinson-Smith (X-Men ’97), Gary Anthony Williams (Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur), Zeke Alton (Batman: Arkham Shadow), Steve Toussaint (House of the Dragon), and Anika Noni Rose (Mufasa: The Lion King) — premieres with all four episodes Aug. 1 on Disney+.
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Image courtesy of Focus Features.
