I'll start with the obvious point: Black Panther 2 is a movie that comes with a lot of baggage not normally associated with a Marvel movie. Obviously, as everyone knows, Chadwick Boseman died before it could be made, so they had a huge, complicated task on their hands in trying to figure out how to present the film in a way that seems respectful while still being what Marvel movies all want to be, which is a big dumb spectacle. To be honest, for the most part, they succeeded in that specific regard; I'm very proud of them for not using Deepfake Bullshit in exactly the spot that I feared they might as I was watching. They seemed genuinely grieving for the most part, and it probably helps that everyone loved the guy in real life. And he was important to a lot of people, as was his character. They do not lose any points with me for this portion of the film.

The rest, though, I cannot say the same. A lot of this is a bit of a rehash of my opinions of the first movie (which was a lot better overall) but I'll say some of those things anyway. It is really weird that they took one of the weirdest ideas to think about in the first film (that cultural success is bred from an ethno-state that allows no outsiders of any kind) and then doubled down on it with a second one doing the exact same thing. It is weird that the good guys are a traditional hereditary monarchy and that's portrayed as good, and then they double down on THAT with the same thing. It's weird that they had a villain who was, in fact, correct and good (one of the MCU's absolute best in Killmonger) and then basically doubled down on even that with another villain who is basically correct, but has to do some "hey, remember, I'm the bad guy" stuff to remind you that the status quo is what everyone exists to protect and serve. These things are weird, right? The Avengers are already fundamentally Cops, and insisting that also, ethnic nationalism is really cool and good is just not the direction I'd go.

The biggest problem though is that Shuri is not good. I don't mean the actress, with her unpopular real life opinions (although it doesn't help), but the character - she is just mean-spirited and boring. That is a way some people process grief, so maybe it's just presenting it as a way people do that sort of thing, and accepting that yes, it is flawed, and then using it as a catalyst for development. But I just didn't like rooting for her at all! The villain, like in Black Panther, was actually cooler and better, and I'd rather root for him. Except for, again, the wild irrational out-of-character decisions he has to make to be evil enough to be the alleged villain. Oh well! He still saves an otherwise bad movie from bring awful with his presence. Too bad the nature of his character creates another of the film's problems, which is that it doesn't really feel like it is happening in the world, but all in some totally alien place divorced from reality by one step too far.

I guess the final thing I want to say about this movie, which is really more about "Phase 4" of the MCU in general. In the earlier films, they weren't necessarily super inter-connected, but they all felt like they were adding onto the world, making it feel "bigger." Basically all the current crop of films feel to me like they are shrinking it. This is partially just a product of inevitability; when there's almost nothing established, you can keep adding new things in other places with new characters and then tie them together later, and it feels like growing. But now that it is so established, the connections to other people and places and things feels conspicuous in their absence. None of the other superheroes show up at T'Challa's funeral? OK, sure man. They always throw in a few little tie-ins but it seems like all it does is serve to make the world feel small now, when you meet the same one guy at the CIA because he's the one guy who works there. No one ever shows up and none of the events (even though they are world-bending) ever seem to impact anyone off-screen and no one has any comment on them even.

Score: 5/10

IMDb: Black Panther: Wakanda Forever

PS: It should possibly be noted that I do not love Black Panther 1 nearly as much as everyone else! But it's still pretty good, mostly because of Killmonger. If you really want my controversial MCU film opinion, ask me about Winter Soldier some day.