Is Marvel Developing THE BLACK PANTHER!?
As most of you already know there are two movies currently in development at Marvel that have yet to be revealed. I think it pretty obvious that one of them is The Avengers sequel, but what about the other one? There's been a lot of speculation that is could be either Ant-Man, Dr. Strange, or The Black Panther. For those of you who were hoping for a The Black Panther movie, it looks like you're in luck!
Our friends at Latino Review are reporting that Black Panther is one of the two Marvel movies that are in development. It will be the movie to fill the release date spot of May 16th, 2014, right after Captain America 2 comes out on April 16th, 2014.
Screenwriter Mark Bailey was brought on to write the script for the movie back in January of 2011, so it looks like things have been progressing since then. Latino Review said they've had four different sources confirm this news, but just to be safe let's go ahead and file this under rumor until we have more confirmation because Disney and Marvel aren't confirming it.
There have been a few nods to Black Panther in the Marvel films, like the fact that his home country Wakanda can be seen on a map in Iron Man 2, which also happens to be where the metal vibranium comes from, which is what Captain America’s shield is made out of.
Here's what I previously wrote up about the Iron Man 2 Easter egg:
In the Marvel universe Wakanda is a fictional African nation which is lead by a king named T’Challa, who eventually becomes The Black Panther when he comes to America. Another reason that Wakanda is so important is In the distant past, a massive meteorite made up of the sound-absorbing mineral vibranium crashed in Wakanda, and is unearthed a generation before the events of the present-day. So it has the large deposit of Vibranium, the metal used to help create a unique alloy Captain America’s shield along with Adamantium.
How does this apply to Iron Man 2? At the end of the film, once again at the S.H.I.E.L.D. safehouse where Stark is being debriefed there is a map in the background. The map is focused on Africa and there was a red icon on the map that is pointing at the Wakanda.
If this does turn out to be true, I think it's great news! Black Panther is a badass. I was kind of hoping for Dr. Strange, but I'm happy with Black Panther as well. What do you think about Black Panther getting his own movie!? Who would you like to see play him?
Here's some information on the character:
The title “Black Panther” is a rank of office, chieftain of the Wakandan Panther Clan. As chieftain, the Panther is entitled to eat a special heart-shaped herb, as well as his mystical connection with the Wakandan Panther god, that grants him superhumanly acute senses and increases his strength, speed, stamina, and agility to the peak of human development. He has since lost this connection and forged a new one with another unknown Panther deity, granting him augmented physical attributes as well as a resistance to magic.
His senses are so powerful that he can pick up a prey’s scent and memorize tens of thousands of individual ones. T’Challa is a rigorously trained gymnast and acrobat, showing mastery in various African martial arts as well as contemporary ones and fighting styles that belong to no known disciplines.