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I've been reading the various incarnations of Black Panther since Christopher Priest's series many years ago. In fact, that title was the subject of my first piece for Collector Times. I've continued to stay with the titles that have come since then largely due to what Christopher Priest established in his run, that the Black Panther (specifically T'Challa) was an incredible thinker, planner, leader and warrior.
In the most recent title things changed a bit as things started out with T'Challa being hurt and his sister Shuri taking up the identity of the Black Panther. This wasn't a big deal to me as I liked the twist and it has been helping to expand the concept that the Black Panther is not a specific person, but rather it is a mantle that is worn by the person that leads Wakanda. Sure, this was established before by dealing with the fact that T'Challa's father was the Black Panther before him, but it was mostly just lip service. For the most part we have only known the Black Panther as T'Challa.
For quite some time things have been building in the pages of Black Panther. There has been a showdown brewing between T'Challa and Doctor Doom since the current run started. It's been a slow buildup but it's been one of those "chess games" that makes T'Challa such an interesting character. I'd like to say things have been interesting with Shuri in the mantle of the Black Panther, but she's pretty much just been the blunt striking instrument to T'Challa's methodical planning and training.
I must say that I've never been a fan of Doctor Doom. I find the character to be fairly annoying. I guess I'm just not impressed by a narcissistic ruler of a small country who happens to be well versed in science and magic. Sure, he's intelligent but his narcissism always seems to get the better of him and make the character . . . well . . . lame. Now, that's part of m problem with where the current Black Panther title has been going. You see, in order to better fight Doom T'Challa has gotten into using magic to a degree. He's always been about the science since I've been reading the character. Now, he's becoming the thing I can't stand, another version of Doctor Doom. Sure he may not have (or seem to) the narcissistic tendencies but the similarities are getting too close for me. Plus, there is the big annoyance, and that is that Black Panther has now become Doomwar.
I realize that some may say that Doomwar is merely something that the Black Panther is involved in, but all you have to do is look at the first two issues. They are written by Jonathan Maberry, who is the writer of Black Panther. Now, while writers may take on multiple titles at one time there is one other factor that cannot be avoided, and that is the "To be continued . . . " tag at the end of each issue is the tag used in Black Panther! It's Black Panther's head and collar for crying out loud!
I simply don't get why Marvel couldn't just let this story be what it is within the page of Black Panther. Is it because the X-Men are in it? Is it because others are going to show up and get into the fight? I simply don't get it. To me it just seems disrespectful of the character that Marvel appears to be making into something greater than a joke or a token minority character. This story is all about the Black Panther and Wakanda. At least it seems so. That is the root at least. With that being the case why couldn't this story have just continued on as issues of Black Panther?
I'm going to stick with the series and what I'm sure will be a return to or relaunch (again) of Black Panther, but frankly I wish Marvel would clean up their act. They got enough grief by having Storm marry T'Challa (I remember the comments of, "Oh, because they're both Black superheroes?" and now they seem to be saying that the character cannot have all these other "major" Marvel characters in his/her own title because they just aren't THAT important. Whatever, Marvel. If you want to play into the hands of those that already question how you utilize the Black Panther and characters in his/her title, then do so. I realize I may be reading too much into this but it just saddens me that everything in Doomwar is a Black Panther issue, but the name isn't on the cover. It's like the Black Panthers are guest stars in their own title.
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