“Over the course of 40 issues [over three years], we … really defined the character in a way that hadn’t been done before. … Having done that, you go: ‘How do we up the stakes?’ Marvel is great about doing really shocking changes to their character — they don’t believe in just keeping everything as status quo.”
I love the shocking, breathless tone of this article – as if this were the first time Marvel (or DC, for that matter) had ever re-created a classic character in this fashion before. To me, this sort of thing – replacing the orignal hero with a successor in the same identity only with a twist (different gender, different race, younger character, etc.) are the desperate acts of corporate publishers trying to maintain their relevance to an ever-shrinking audience.
No, Reggie Hudlin, I assure you there is absolutely NOTHING shocking about a change like this. BP is not the first character to undergo an identity change and he won’t be the last, and no one seriously expects this to stick, either. But by all means, give it the old college try. I’m sure this’ll give BP a spike in sales before shrinking back to its usual mid-level slot, treading water as usual, buoyed by the occasional crossover event or two. But it’s all good if you and Joe Quesada get your names in the mainstream press, right?
Call me when you actually have something to say.
THANK YOU so much for saying this.
Call preferably when that ‘something to say’ is ‘I’m finally going to stop making Black Panther comics into unreadable dreck and hand the writing chores over to someone worth a damn.’
[...] Fresh from elevating BET from completely irrelevant to just mostly irrelevant, Reggie Hudlin has now turned his sights to reinventing Black Panther [...]
For reasons entirely unknown to me — a reader of their comics for more than 40 years — Marvel seems determined to ruin everything I have ever enjoyed about any of their characters.
The impending destruction of T’Challa by Hudlin and Co. is not only the latest indignity, but one of the coldest. It follows the insult of hiring Hudlin — who clearly has no clue what the character is about — to write Black Panther in the first place.
Why must you keep urinating on my hero, Reggie Hudlin? Don’t you have a pot to do that in?
PLEASE CHRISTOPHER PRIEST,
COME BACK AND SAVE “THE BLACK PANTHER”!
@Har125lem
Well, you’re going to have a long wait. In an interview with Comic Book Resources, Priest seemed VERY wary of writing comics again because he feels Marvel values flash and connections over talent and experience. (Huh, sounds like modern politics.)
So, we’ll have to be content re-reading Priest’s run to get some good Black Panther stories.
U SHOULD BE SHAMED THE BLACKPANTHER IS A KING NOT A QUEEN OR FELMALE !!! JUST WHO DO U THINK IS GOING TO READ THIS NOW? THE LAST TIME I CHECKED DIDNT SEE AND SISTERS IN THE COMIC BOOK STORE! I SEE WHY U CANT GET A MOIVE MADE OR U DID THE GREAT WHITE HYPE WHAT A MOVIE RANKS UP THEIR WITH SOUL PLANE .
Instead of writing quality stories that will draw new readers and engage long-standing fans, comic companies destroy their characters and then rebuild with a completely new mythos which shatters their fanbase. Comic companies, like record labels, continue to confuse profit with art. As long as the driving force is corporate profit, the practices of re-invention and retconning will continue.
WHY ARE THEY DOIN THIS??? I hope it has somthin to do with T’Challa gettin captured and storm has to wear his trademark panther suit or somthin!!! Hes my favorite hero!!!!!
WHY ARE THEY DOIN THIS??? I hope it has somthin to do with T’Challa gettin captured and storm has to wear his trademark panther suit or somthin!!! Hes my favorite hero!!!