Middle of the Pack Marvel

Rating: 5/10 (6 March 2018)

BP is one of the most disappointing movies I've seen in some time. After stealing the show in Civil War I was hyped for T'Challa's standalone feature. Unfortunately it didn't live up to the hype. The plotting was sloppy, the action scenes uninspired, the CGI frequently dodgy, the humor forced and unfunny (like the M'baka's vegetarian line - dead silence) It felt epic and small at the same time. I wanted to know more about Wakanda, but it was nothing more than window dressing. I wanted some details of their daily lives, but all we see are people milling about in some kind of market place and every African trope you can think of. If a white guy directed this, they'd be calling for his head. It seems as though the only things Cooglar knows about Africa are what he's seen in the Lion King and Coming to America. Even though they're supposed to be super advanced, they have spears and armoured Rhinos! Really? And they determine rule by combat. Seems like intelligence would be more important than physical strength in such a society. There's a guy with the disc in his lip, women with rings on their neck, stuff straight out of National Geographic. If they are a secret society, why even bother with typical African tropes, it could have been anything.
What I found the most off putting was just how lazy the script was. Many of the subplots were pointless, like the trip to Busan. During the car chase, the women are driving a car made of Vibranium. Bullets do nothing, but Klaw's hand weapon blows it to bits, even though he said vibranium makes his claw look like a pea shooter or something. T'challa drinks some kind of natural steroid during the combat to determine king, but both times he gets his ass kicked. What? The romantic subplot was tacked on and pointless. Vibranium can apparently enable one to do anything. It's supposed to be the strongest metal that can absorb impact but it can also cure wounds, be turned into thread, affect flora, turn tribespeople into experts in all technology, etc.
The plot was just so ridiculously stupid. The bad guy wants to send like five little spaceship things to give vibranium melee weapons to "war dogs" all over the world to enslave everyone. I'm not even going to touch on the insane racism of this since it was the villains plan, but how is that even a threat? It would only result in a few terrorist incidents and an eventual war for Wakanda. So dumb.
Another problem was that we just had Spiderman that featured Ironman, Thor that featured Hulk, and this got...Martin Freeman? Sure they introduced a lot of characters but they were all African Stereotypes and one Mary Sue (Shuri). None of them were very relatable.
The only thing the movie had going for it was the acting. They did the best with what they were given. Even T'challa was pretty dull. He was the boring boy scout people give Superman shit for. He had way more presence in Civil War, he was a slightly arrogant bad-ass in that. It gave him an edge. Here he's a vanilla boyscout that sometimes "freezes" and gets his ass kicked.
For the record I consider Ironman, Avengers, Winter Soldier, and Ragnorok as best Marvel and Ant-Man, Age of Ultron, Thor 2, Ironman 3 and sadly Black Panther as worst. People shouldn't be celebrating that it merely exists, they should be mad they were given such a lazy, mediocre product. I am.