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Black Panther: Character and Monomyth
The great success of the 2018 superhero film Black Panther was noteworthy from a cultural perspective because it was a blockbuster superhero film to gain wide acclaim with an African-American cast and proudly Afro-centric themes. The film is testimony to the success of the demand that historically marginalized groups see themselves represented in major cinematic productions. However, despite the fact that the hero T’Challa is noteworthy due to his ethnicity and race, his story in many ways embodies the traditional, critical aspects of the monomyth of the hero’s journey, in which a hero is called to embark upon a needed journey (usually reluctantly), is initiated into a new way of life, followed by a return.
In Black Panther, T’Challa must return to his native Wakanda to assume the throne after the death of his father T’Chaka. To do so, he must face a test in the form of defeating M’ Baku. Other elements of the quest narrative manifest in Black Panther are the wise figure who counsels the hero, in the form of tribal elders. T’Challa is able to realize his objectives through the form of supernatural aid, such as the magical, heart-shaped herb which...
Rather than the traditional temptress figure of the heroic journey, however, women feature in very positive roles throughout Black Panther, including Nakia, who, after T’Challa has apparently been thrown to his death, heals him through the use of herbal medicine. This is also a feature of the return narrative, in which the hero faces death and sometimes dies and is brought back to life with a new sense of purpose and perspective.
The strong, feminist heroines of Black Panther are yet another example of how the film is very much a product of its time. The heroic journey has often been criticized for placing an excessive emphasis on masculine forms of psychological development, effectively writing women out of the core, mythic structure that is supposed to define all mythologies. Black Panther depicts women as involved participants in the future of Wakanda and they possess heroic attributes that are strong and physical in nature, not simply spiritual. Still, it cannot be denied that the battles of Wakanda are still fundamentally male in nature, and physical strength aided by supernatural prowess is an important component…
Works Cited
Black Panther. Directed by Ryan Coogler. Walt Disney Studios, 2018.
Campbell, Joseph. The Hero with a Thousand Faces (1st ed.). Princeton, NJ: Princeton
University Press, 2008.
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