Excellent Film

Rating: 8/10 (16 February 2018)

Every time a MCU film comes out, critics hail it as "Marvel's best film yet" only for me to find it either good/average (Civil War) or complete trash (Thor: Ragnarok). So, when critics were calling Black Panther the best MCU film, thankfully, I didn't put much stock into it because I don't think it's Marvel's "best"; that title still belongs to Winter Soldier...BUT I freaking loved the movie; it's definitely in my top 5 MCU films (maybe top 3 but I have to see it again before I can make that decision). The good: it showcased an African nation with different tribes, that were technologically advanced, and had their own natural resources that the world has never seen before. That's significant to me because a lot of African nations were stripped of their natural resources centuries ago, so to see this on screen was a breath of fresh air as was seeing African royalty as opposed to the usual impoverished Africans, gangsters, slaves, thugs, drug dealers etc... The performances were amazing...Boseman was great as usual but the stand outs for me were Letitia Wright (Shuri) and Danai Gurira (Okoye); I'm glad my daughter gets to see 2 strong, intelligent black females on screen. Jordan was a cool villain (a lot better than most of those crappy Marvel villains); I can always appreciate when you can hate a villain's actions but empathize with their motives. The bad: the CGI was rough in a lot of places and some of the action pieces were very muddled. There were a few slow areas, but I often find that happening with origin stories, so I can overlook that. Overall, I really dug this film; for now, I'll give it an 8/10 but that could change upon 2nd viewing. Bravo to Ryan Coogler and his team!!!