Somehow Overwhelmed

Rating: 8/10 (23 February 2018)

First would like to note that I rarely leave reviews, but seriously felt that I had to with this one.
First off I went into the cinema only a week late from my original planned date to watch what was undoubtedly (personally) my most anticipated flick of 2018; within which time I had heard a lot of different and also divided reviews from separate people. I had eventually settled on the suggestion that you'll enjoy the movie more, or less, depending on how much the character of 'Black Panther' and setting in the fascinating fictional city of 'Wakanda' appeal to you prior to your first viewing of the movie. I was comfortable with this as, being a massive fan of Marvel comics, I reassured the certainty that T'Challa is my favourite superhero of all time. Because of this it is easy to say that I may very well be biased to the character, however I entered my screening of Black Panther with fairly mediocre expectations of the movie after what I had heard, and it is safe to say that I was absolutely mind blown.
The score, to begin with, is very fitting to the setting which really immerses you into the story. It had an African theme to it, which suits the movie being set near to Kenya and Ethiopia, accompanied by a classic MCU soundtrack to satisfy the whole sci-fi and comic-book action side of it. Unfortunately Toto's "Africa" was not featured, however I did love the end credits tune 'All The Stars' by Kendrick Lamar and SZA which easily connected to the whole Oakland setting and perspective of Erik Killmonger (who is safely now my favourite MCU villain). Killmonger totally kicked ass and stole the show for me, and I adored the tie-in with him being the cousin of T'Challa (Black Panther) himself.
The CGI and special effects were fantastic and clearly had a lot of effort put into them, akin with the stunts performed throughout the movie; all of which packed a punch with certain scenes that seriously took my breath away. Shuri is such a sweetheart and is easily my favourite character, having some of the funniest scenes in the entire flick and the storyline really is fantastic and very true to the Black Panther comics.
Moreover, the ending of the movie genuinely brought a tear to my eye; something which not many TV Shows or movies have done before. I realized upon Black Panther's sacrifice of his own cousin, Erik Killmonger, he was reflecting upon his fathers advice that "it is hard for a good man to be king". This tied in beautifully with the way T'Chaka killed Erik's father in the prologue; but I also loved T'Challa's sense of forgiveness towards Erik upon taking him to witness the sunsets of Wakanda, in order to fulfill his dream created by his father, as the last image he saw before he died. In that scene where T'Challa and Erik sit together and watch the sunset, it was easy to identify the sense of family between them, which I like to think they felt themselves, as cousins, too.
I am easily going to give Black Panther a 9/10, making it my highest ranked Marvel movie ever. You should definitely spend some money on watching this movie, especially if you are a fan of the Marvel universe, and more in particular, Black Panther as a character.