Catch-Up Reading: A Review of Black Panther issues #8, 9, and 10

written by Ta Nehisi Coates
drawn by Chris Sprouse and Karl Story (issues #8 and 10) and Brian Stelfreeze (issue #9)
colored by Laura Martin

It's been a while since I've read this title, but while I was happy to see Brian Stelfreeze on art duties again, if only for one issue, I confess I was a little disappointed to read three issues that were, for the most part, basically just a lot of talking heads. Still, the issues were a rewarding read just the same as Nehisi's dialogue, even when it isn't punctuated by fighting scenes is still grossly engaging.

Basically, after the action-packed issue #7 in which the Black Panther recruits a number of Marvel Universe friends to deal with Tetu's insurgents, things settle down a bit as Ayo and Aneka, the rogue Dora Milaje reevaluate their alliance with Tetu and Zenzi and their purported army of "the People" and T'Challa engages in a bit of a heart-to-heart with Changamire, the aged revolutionary whose ideas have inspired this uprising. More importantly, however, working together with Australian teleporter Eden Fesi a.k.a. Manifold, T'Challa succeeds in bringing his sister Shuri back from the dead. This could go a long way towards turning the tide of the uprising in T'Challa's favor.

I have wondered for some time as to why this book seems particularly intent on portraying Shuri as some kind of savior figure and playing up T'Challa's own personal inadequacies. There are a lot of strong women in this title, ranging from Ayo and Aneka to the empath Zenzi and even T'Challa's own mother, and I get the impression that part of Ta Nehisi's advocacy, at least for this title, is to really call people's attention to the gross disparity between the way men and women are treated in African societies. I often wondered why the title seemed so fixated on people's rage with T'Challa, not merely as a king but as a man, but when recalling the experiences of my aunt during her stay in Malawi some years, I finally came to understand where Coates' characters' rage is coming from. In many African countries, apparently, women do all the work while men do next to nothing. In families, women do the (literal) heavy lifting. It's not unlike the way lion prides operate; the lionesses do all the work. I'd like to believe there's more to this particular sociological phenomenon than just flat-out sexism, but whatever it is, Coates puts it right smack in the middle of the conversation, and it's definitely a conversation worth having.

This is really one of the more intelligent books I've read in a long time, and I find myself deeply interested in how it discusses topics like government, revolution and the relationship between men and women in a way that neither condescends nor reeks of intellectual pretense. It may get a little too esoteric at times for my taste, but even then I can still enjoy them. Still, even for a quality title like this, three issues of talking heads in a row is a bit much.

I also wished Brian Stelfreeze had drawn more of these issues.

7.5/10 (all three)