All signs point to Shuri, but is that intentional? Marvel released a new trailer for the incredibly anticipated movie Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, and the trailer makes some heavy intonations that Letitia Wright aka Shuri is the new Black Panther.
But is she? A number of news organizations are reporting that she is but only based on the trailer. The truth is Shuri hasn’t been confirmed and Marvel has a history of pulling the old bait and switch when it comes to big announcements.
This means that Marvel could definitely have other plans, and there are a few reasons for this. First, Marvel’s history of red herrings is vast and well-known. Second, Marvel loves to surprise its fans with something unexpected, and finally, the company has a complicated relationship with Wright.
Over the pandemic, there was a lot of news about Wright’s stances on the vaccine and her outspokenness about her beliefs. This angered a lot of people and brought a lot of attention to what was supposed to be a slam-dunk blockbuster sequel. It wouldn’t be that surprising if Marvel is trying to part ways.
Past Red Herrings
Marvel has a history of red herrings when it comes to movies. For example, the Iron Man 3 trailer featured The Mandarin, one of his most notorious enemies. Trailers all pointed to this and there was even a LEGO set that pointed to this.
It wasn’t the case though. The Mandarin turned out to be an actor named Trevor Slattery who was just there to hide the identity of the real big bad. Interestingly, Slattery next showed up in the 2021 movie Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings.
In the original trailer for The Guardian’s of the Galaxy, we see a shot of the whole team lined up in a sort of intergalactic police lineup. The implication is that they get arrested as a team, but the truth is they didn’t even form yet at that part of the movie. Another GOTG red herring was the death of Groot, which we all know was done to bring us the adorable baby Groot and subsequent teenage Groot.
A red herring in Avengers: Age of Ultron implied that Iron Man’s artificial intelligence system J.A.R.V.I.S (Just A Rather Very Intelligent System) was destroyed early in the movie. However, it ended up becoming Vision, the synthetic hero who ended up being the necessary key to killing Ultron.
In a behind-the-scenes feature on the home release of the movie, director Joss Whedon said that J.A.R.V.I.S. going from AI to Vision was always the plan. In the trailer for the Avengers: Infinity War, we see a fully transformed Hulk charging into battle. In reality, it would be Bruce Banner in an Iron Man Hulkbuster armor.
Spider-Man: Homecoming was presented as sort of a romance story for Peter Parker, with Parker kissing his crush Liz Allan in the trailer. The twist ended up being that Allen was the daughter of the notorious Vulture, and the kiss scene wasn’t even used even though it was shot to throw people off the scent.
Perhaps the most well-known secret Marvel pulled was bringing back Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield in Spider-Man: No Way Home. There are lots more. With this kind of track record, it would be naive to assume we can trust the trailer.
Fan Reaction to the Trailer
What are fans saying now that the full trailer is out? Do they think it’s Shuri or someone else?
Many of them assume that Shuri is a done deal, like this user who said they “love how they incorporated Shuri’s dot markings on the black panther mask.”
Others touched on the idea that Killmonger would come back and take up the mantle.
“Folks really went on here to claim that Killmonger would somehow be resurrected to become the next Black Panther instead of Shuri. I’m just here for the shambles today…” said user Spin Kazama.
People are really convinced:
“FINALLY Y’ALL CAN SHUT UP ABOUT KILLMONGER AND M’BAKU BEING THE BLACK PANTHER. IT’S OBVIOUSLY SHURI” one user said.
Others weren’t as excited.
“I can’t lie, this trailer doesn’t have me hyped at all. Namor looks cool, that’s about it. If they didn’t recast t’challa it should have been okoye or nakia as the panther, they’re both 10x better fighters than shuri is,” said another Twitter user.
In a move that’s all too common, some people are decrying the fact that the character is going to be female.
“T’Challa will always be black panther, not a mary sue,” said on the bigoted Twitter user.
A lot of people expressed their discontent with Shuri being in the lead, including this comment from truecoins.
“Next movie to get review bomb. T’challa is bigger than Suri. And she’s a meh actress and person. Makes even less sense to gender swap Taskmaster. I guess this phase is all woman,” they said.
So to summarize, a lot of men are threatened by the idea of a woman Black panther and most people don’t love Shuri. Marvel knows this. They have a lot of money and do a ton of research. They obviously know people aren’t necessarily fans of Letitia. So what are the other possible outcomes?
Marvel’s Past Issues with Wright
Marvel’s issues with Wright are well documented and for a second there threatened to overshadow the filming of the movie itself. The controversy started at the end of 2020 when Wright tweeted out a video about anti-vaccination along with a praying emoji. The video is strongly anti-vax but offers no medical evidence for its claims.
She eventually deleted the post but not before it was shared thousands of times. When facing backlash, she said “My intention was not to hurt anyone” but then complained about being canceled for her opinions, and said the video “raised my concerns with what the vaccine contains and what we are putting in our bodies.”
This only made the criticism hotter, and even Don Cheadle chimed in, calling the video “hot garbage.” Wright deleted her socials but never actually apologized. If that was the end of the story it would still be troublesome, but unfortunately, it’s not. Reports started to surface of Wright sharing her anti-vax views on the set of the movie and that she lost her U.S. management due to her views.
This didn’t help at all. Next, she got injured on set, and production was forced to pause until she recovered. The exact nature of her illness was never revealed. That added more flame to the fire that Wright was getting headlines for all the wrong reasons. Another headline that popped us was that Wright wasn’t a U.S. citizen (she recovered from her injury in England) and whether she would have to be vaccinated to reenter the country.
Regardless of beliefs, all of this attention on Wright on what was supposed to be a smooth filming process didn’t make Marvel happy. However, enough time has passed that the whole thing may be old news and fans are ready to embrace Wright. Time will tell.
Possible alternate theories for ‘Black Panther 2’
We recently did a deep dive on the idea that there are potentially going to be two Black Panthers. One of the theories is that there’s another person in a Black panther costume at the 1:29 mark of the trailer. Some people think it’s Ramonda, T’Challa, and Shuri’s mother. Honestly, pretty good theory.
Others think it could be a flashback or simply the suit without the white dots on it yet. There are a few other theories floating around as well. Two popular ones are that either Lupita Nyong’o’s character Nakia could be the new Panther. While not supported by either the trailer or the movie poster with Shuri in the center, that doesn’t mean it isn’t true.
Nakia has the experience to take up the mantle, so that wouldn’t come out of the left field. Another possibility is Danai Gurira’s character Okoye. It’s a little bit of a stretch but it’s not out of the realm of possibility. So that leaves us with three possibilities for the new Black Panther.
What if they take it in a completely new direction and introduce someone else? That seems pretty unlikely as Marvel is keen on worldbuilding but would also want to stay true to the first film.
One more thing to remember: Shuri actually subbed for T’Challa in the comic books. She’s taken on the mantle a few times and despite having no superpowers it’s assumed she built her own suit of armor. Marvel described her powers in its biography of the character:
“Naturally intelligent, strong, and brave, Shuri does not have any super human abilities, though she keeps herself at peak physical levels. As Black Panther, she ingests the heart-shaped herb that boosts her strength, senses, and abilities, while also wearing a Vibranium-laced costume. After returning from the Djalia, she has a deeper cultural memory, can seemingly control crows, and also turn her skin statue-like.”
So where does that leave us? With Marvel masterfully building hype for one of the most anticipated movies of the year, it’s by no means certain that it won’t contain a shocking surprise. We’ll just have to wait and see what that is.