Wakanda

**Wakanda**, known early on as **the Wakandas**, is a fictional African state in the world of Marvel Comics created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby in 1966. It serves as the base of operation for the Black Panther family of characters.

## Bibliography

* *Fantastic Four* 1961 (FF61)
* *The Avengers* 1963 (AVE63)
* *Jungle Action* (JA72)
* *Black Panther* 1977 (BP77)
* *Black Panther* 1988 (BP88)
* *Black Panther* 1998 (BP98)
* *Black Panther* 2005 (BP05)

## History of portrayal

### Prehistory

A form of alchemy or magic practiced by "a race of lizard-kings that died out before mankind descended from the trees" was at least known to some Wakandans such as T'Challa (DW10
#1, p.8).

### Past

Captain America pursued a team of Nazis into Wakanda during World War II. Here he met the Black Panther, to whom he gifted one of his shields; over time, however, the exact identity of this Black Panther has changed. During the '98 series, it was T'Challa's father T'Chaka;(citation needed) in the '05 run, thanks to Marvel's sliding timescale, this became T'Chaka's own father Azari the Wise.(citation needed)

### *Fantastic Four* and *The Avengers* (1966-1971)

First appearing as the Wakandas or the **Kingdom of Wakanda** in a 1966 issue of *Fantastic Four*

### *Jungle Action* (1973-1976)

New writer Don McGregor emphasised Wakanda as a nation with traditional African roots, and whose development of highly advanced technology was in large part due to increased exchange of ideas with the outside world under the rule of T'Challa.(citation needed) The introduction of new foreign elements to Wakandan society became a major point of conflict between the rapidly growing **Central Wakanda** and the inhabitants of smaller villages outside the capital; Monica Lynne was a key character during McGregor's tenure of the comic, and her foreign nationality formed part of this conflict with the more traditional inhabitants of Wakanda.(citation needed)

### *Black Panther* (1977)

Stub*This section is a stub. You can help Comics History and Continuity Wiki by expanding it.*
Jack Kirby

### *Black Panther* (1988)

Stub*This section is a stub. You can help Comics History and Continuity Wiki by expanding it.*
Peter B. Gillis

### *Panther's Quest* and *Panther's Prey* (1989-1991)

Don McGregor's return to his version of Wakanda ignored most of what had appeared in the intervening years. While Wakanda takes on a much smaller role in *Panther's Quest*, which takes place almost entirely in South Africa, it is mentioned that the country is cloaked from satellite imagery, keeping its exact location unknown to the outside world;(citation needed) contradicting Zanda and Azania's plans of attack from the '77 and '88 series.

*Panther's Prey* tells the story of an epidemic of imported crack cocaine in Wakanda.(citation needed)

### *Black Panther* (1998-2003)

New writer Christopher Priest further emphasised Wakanda's traditional African values, especially in their contrast with the morals and values of the Western world; the introduction of the teenage Dora Milaje came with references to the apparent normality of marriage for very young girls on the continent.(citation needed)

Priest's Wakanda was largely continuous with the country as defined by McGregor. As another example of chiefly African politics being the driving force of Priest's Wakanda, tribal tensions continued to be a major driver of conflict within Wakanda; in the case of the '98 series, however, and in contrast to McGregor's isolationist Wakanda, immigrant tribes from neighbouring nations stricken with war, such as Ghudaza, were one of the key players in Priest's version of Wakandan tribal conflict.(citation needed)

Under Priest, Wakanda's isolationism was revealed to in truth be a cover for Wakandan intelligence located across the planet, with large Wakandan airships located under American rivers and close to other powerful hidden nations like Atlantis.(citation needed)

### *Black Panther* and *Doomwar* (2005-2010)

Reginald Hudlin's *Black Panther* served as a true reboot of the series, and with this came many changes to Wakanda. Rather than becoming increasingly technological under T'Challa, Hudlin's Wakanda was already a major player on the world stage under his father T'Chaka.(citation needed) Niganda was introduced as yet another neighbouring nation with a tense Wakandan border.(citation needed)

### *Black Panther* (2016-2020)

Ta-Nehisi Coates focused less on Wakandan culture as uniquely continental African and emphasised the nation's connections to Black America, "consider[ing] T'Challa and Wakanda a product of the diaspora--or of the Atlantic world."(BP16
#7)

## Structure

Wakanda is ruled by a Tribal Council.(citation needed) There are said to be eighteen Wakandan tribes. (DW10
#2, p.7)

## Technology

In the King of Wakanda T'Challa's first appearance (FF61
#52) he is described as possibly the richest man on earth (p. 20), and is in possession of technology even Reed Richards finds incredible, including but not limited to: magnetic wave-propelled skycraft (p. 2), handheld intercontinental communications technology that makes use of "powerful sound beams" (p. 3), and space travel that might otherwise be considered "the idle dream of *visionaries*" (AVE63
#64). Wakandan soldiers employ "*polarity guns*" which fire "*magnetic anti-polarity beams*" capable of making objects repel each other (FF61
#52, p.13). The Black Panther's base is in a "*man-made* jungle" of technology beneath the Wakandan jungle (p. 9).

In McGregor's Wakanda, the sounds of "*mechanical weapons*" such as "lethal *gun blasts*" are alien to the country (JA72
#6). However, these same kind of weapons are used by the guards of the technological jungle. (JA72
#9, p.11)