Letitia Wright as Shuri
(Picture: Marvel Studios)King T’Challa, leader of Wakanda, felt like family by the end of the first Black Panther film. For obvious reasons, the tragic death of Chadwick Boseman, the man who played him, changed all the plans for this sequel. It could have derailed the Marvel/Disney franchise, but out of deep tragedy, 36-year-old director/co-writer Ryan Coogler, returning for Wakanda Forever, has woven yet another Oscar-worthy game-changer. This riotously poetic, serenely political and spectacularly cathartic yarn is the best blockbuster of the year. 2022 isn’t about Maverick anymore. It’s about mavericks.
At the start of the film, T’Challa’s witty little sister, the tech-genius Shuri (played peerlessly by Letitia Wright) is undone by the loss of her brother. Even a year after his funeral, she can barely think straight, unable to register a crucial statement made by her mother, Queen Ramonda (Angela Bassett; lithe; radiant): there’s something Shuri doesn’t know about T’Challa.
