So Black Panther opens nationwide today. I saw it last night, and let me tell you: it’s absolutely incredible. It’s as good as you’re hearing. It’s gorgeous. It’s compelling. Everyone acts their faces off. It’s also, inarguably, the most complex movie in the MCU.
You might leave the theater super jazzed and wanting to write meta and fic about how beautiful Wakanda is, how badass the Dora Milajae are, or who the real villains might be and why, or over that little cameo at the end (no spoilers). And you’re not wrong - but if you’re white, pump the brakes on that feeling for a few days.
There’s a lot to take in, about Black Panther. It’s an intricate, incredibly well thought-out movie that covers a lot of ground in terms of thorny and important themes. It stares right in the face of generational trauma, the legacy of slavery, conflicts between the diaspora and Africans and what responsibilities and connections each feel to each other, how colonization continues today under different names, and on and on.
And you’re gonna be missing the context for a lot of that. So hit pause on that content creation for a little bit, okay?
There’s a lot of meta, fic, thought posts, personal experiences, and resources already being shared by Black fans. There’s gonna be a lot more. Take the next few days to read them. Get lost reading up on the historical and cultural touchstones that the movie draws from. Follow Black fans and reblog their stuff. Listen before you hit post on that fic or meta.
And maybe you don’t end up posting it at all. Maybe you learn the context of the characters and issues and history you saw up on screen, and that great idea you came out of the theater with seems more and more like a hot take. That’s okay. It’s totally fine just to listen.
I’m not saying that white people aren’t allowed in the Black Panther fandom. I’m not saying that only Black people can write Black Panther fic. First, that would be incredibly hypocritical of me; and Second, I think that white people not putting in the effort to humanize non-white people literally makes us worse human beings.
What I’m saying is, if you wanna do it: it’s worth putting in the work. Not just to create content that isn’t full of microaggressions and outright racism, but participation means you have to put in the work to do it right. If you’re not willing to wait, and listen, and learn, and work - then just don’t.
