Titus Levi on *Black Panther*
Titus emails to me:
I had an atypical reaction: I left the theatre feeling very, very sad.
First, for the reasons enumerated here.
Second, because everything good and noble turned out to be incredibly fragile. All it took was an alternate vision of how to use power and Paradise degenerated into civil conflict. Mind you, this is a civil war that lasted only a few hours, but still.
Third, it’s heartbreaking to look up to a place… that doesn’t exist. The whole “what if Africa (or some part of it) hadn’t been colonized?” question unsettled me. We lost so much.
Fourth, T’Challa never told Killmonger, “My father was wrong to abandon you.” Never. And he felt it strongly. Strongly enough to challenge his father in a vision. Why did he say nothing about this?
Fifth, after the civil conflict everything goes… right back to normal. No reconciliation process. No sense for how to address the resentments lingering in the shadows. Nada. That struck me as facile.
Anyway, leave it to me to be a killjoy in response to a feel-good movie.
Agh.