The footage, which, as mentioned earlier, was unfinished, showed off a variety of brief scenes from Black Panther, including a few action scenes and a few quieter moments of Wakandan life.
One of the first scenes we saw depicted Lupita Nyong’o doing what she told me she was most excited to do when I spoke with her at the Toronto International Film Festival: kicking some butt. Nyong’o plays Nakia, a fierce warrior and member of the Dora Milaje, Black Panther’s elite retinue of female bodyguards. Clad in a drab olive cloak, Nakia sneaks up on unsuspecting soldiers wielding assault rifles and beats them to a pulp quickly and quietly while their compatriots shoot at the darkness. The best part was actually an unscripted accident: when Nyong’o executed a combat roll to hide behind a jeep, part of her cloak got stuck on the car and she had to extricate it like nothing happened. She acquitted herself nicely and it made for a very useable take that may well wind up in the final film.
The film’s elaborate costumes were on display in a series of scenes depicting members of the Dora Milaje and other Wakandan officials trekking to Warrior Falls, the ceremonial site where the King of Wakanda is coronated. Performing traditional Wakandan dances on a boat–which is, in truth, the facade of a boat on a studio backlot surrounded by blue screens–the assembled actors were decked out in brightly colored robes, ceremonial armor, and vibrant tunics that look like they’re straight off the page.
While we saw T’Challa looking resplendent in a black-and-gold ensemble that looks like a classier version of the infamous Kanye West Tekken story mode tweet, his best look in the trailer was in his ceremonial garb as he approached Warrior Falls for his coronation as King of Wakanda. Bare-chested, T’Challa had panther-like markings on his pectoral muscles, shoulders, and back as he slowly approached a woman wearing pristine white robes. The woman was flanked by tiers of other Wakandan officials and VIPs imperiously staring down at T’Challa as he performed a brief ritual and bowed before the woman.
The footage presentation ended with a particularly tense scene set in a casino. T’Challa and members of the Dora Milaje are spying on the villainous Ulysses Klaw (Andy Serkis) and his goons, who are meeting with Everett Ross, the Deputy Task Force Commander for the Joint Counter Terrorist Center. (You may remember him, as played by Martin Freeman, from Captain America: Civil War.)
“You’ve brought quite the entourage,” Ross remarks to Klaw. “You got a mixtape coming out?” Clearly these remarks don’t wind up going over super well with the smuggler because the next scene is a full-on firefight in the casino with T’Challa taking cover behind an overturned table. Something tells me that this is going to wind up being a bonkers set piece that sets some of the film’s major conflicts into motion. After all, where there’s Klaw, there’s shady dealings pertaining to vibranium afoot!
I want to see this so badly... don't torture me Disney.
They went in for this movie.
