Black Panther History Month.
To celebrate Black History Month, Marvel is reminding everyone that here in the comics industry we have to identify our African American heroes by putting the word "Black" in front of their name. Thus, "Black Panther" is returning. Now these "Black" books are notoriously hard to seel, see DC's "Black Lighting" attempts.
Though we've gotten better about naming our black superheroes, these identifiers are usually still enough to convince the mostly white twenty/thirty-something basement leaving virginal male readership of comics that they want to avoid them. "Black Panther" was most recently seen in a smart and brilliant series written by (Christopher) Priest. Of course, it never could muster up too much in sales because it was smart and Marvel had a typo on the cover, leaving out the "X" in front of the title.
So now they're bringing him back so that African Americans can think of the black panthers for Black History Month. Why this extremist group of activists, most prominent decades ago warrants their own series is beyond me. And why the House Party guy can-- what?
Oh, not THOSE Black Panthers. Gotcha. But who follows up a smart insightful take on a storied and respected character and hand it to the director of 'House Party'? But wait.. he also produces and directs 'The Bernie Mac Show'. Okay, well this is a good show but is this the direction this property needs to go to. Will this tell the African American reading public that our "Black" superhero (See we labeled him just for you) is treated with dignity and respect. Does this guy even have writing credentials (I didn't see them)? Maybe it'll be great.
Maybe T'Challa will have a three foot 'box' on top of his head a la Kid... or was that Play?
Though we've gotten better about naming our black superheroes, these identifiers are usually still enough to convince the mostly white twenty/thirty-something basement leaving virginal male readership of comics that they want to avoid them. "Black Panther" was most recently seen in a smart and brilliant series written by (Christopher) Priest. Of course, it never could muster up too much in sales because it was smart and Marvel had a typo on the cover, leaving out the "X" in front of the title.
So now they're bringing him back so that African Americans can think of the black panthers for Black History Month. Why this extremist group of activists, most prominent decades ago warrants their own series is beyond me. And why the House Party guy can-- what?
Oh, not THOSE Black Panthers. Gotcha. But who follows up a smart insightful take on a storied and respected character and hand it to the director of 'House Party'? But wait.. he also produces and directs 'The Bernie Mac Show'. Okay, well this is a good show but is this the direction this property needs to go to. Will this tell the African American reading public that our "Black" superhero (See we labeled him just for you) is treated with dignity and respect. Does this guy even have writing credentials (I didn't see them)? Maybe it'll be great.
Maybe T'Challa will have a three foot 'box' on top of his head a la Kid... or was that Play?
posted by j.hues at 3:41 PM
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