Black Panther: World of Wakanda by Roxane Gay, Alitha E. Martinez, Roberto Poggi, et al.

Not only did 2016 see the return of a Black Panther series after an absence of four years, 2017 saw an unprecedented development in the world of Black Panther: multiple simultaneous series. While there would be just one Black Panther ongoing, from 2017 to 2023 there would be a number of mini- and maxi-series that ran alongside the parent title: Long Live the King, Rise of the Black Panther, Wakanda and Wakanda Forever, Shuri, Killmonger, Agents of Wakanda, Black Panther Legends, even a revival of The Crew. The first of these would be World of Wakanda, a six-issue miniseries mostly focused on setting up characters and concepts from Ta-Nehisi Coates's ongoing. (And though Coates gets co-writing credit on just one short story that makes up one-third of one of the six issues, he always gets cover credit, and is credited as "consultant" on all of the other stories.)

from Black Panther: World of Wakanda #2

The first five issues contain a serializes story called Dawn of the Midnight Angels. Though this was released along side the second half of A Nation under Our Feet, it mostly takes place before it, with its last issue ending during issue #1. Its main characters are Ayo and Aneka, two members of the Dora Milaje who in Nation went rogue and participated in the democratic uprising in Wakanda. Dawn shows us how they met and fell in love, and what drove them to the point of rebelling against their king. 

I've been doing this Black Panther project in publication order, but for the first time I found myself wishing I had read something in chronological order instead. Not so much because I got Ayo and Aneka's backstory—indeed, I'm not quite sure you'd care about them if you hadn't read Nation—but because Dawn fills in a lot of the Wakandan backstory missing from Nation itself. Though it's all filtered from the perspective of the Dora Milaje, we see what T'Challa and Shuri and their country and Namor went through prior to Coates's series, bits of backstory he didn't totally spell out but evidently occurred during Jonathan Hickman's Avengers. It's stuff that would have been good to know!

Unfortunately, though, I didn't find Roxane Gay's story terribly interesting on its own terms. I liked the idea of learning about Ayo and Aneka's romance, but found the writing a bit thin; quite why Aneka doesn't want to be involved with Ayo isn't very clear at first, meaning it seems like she's holding back for no real reason except to prolong the story to five issues. I also found the villain, a rogue Dora Milaje named Folami, pretty ham-handedly written; it seems like she goes evil pretty much just because. The last couple issues, as we see the events of Black Panther volume 6 #1 from their perspective, are a bit stronger in some ways, but a bit too unsubtle in others.

There are two other short stories here. One, "The People for the People," is a brief prequel about Zenzi, one of the villains of A Nation under Our Feet. Maybe I missed this piece of information in Nation, but I didn't like the idea that she was Nigandan. It seems to me that the potential drama of a democratic revolution in Wakanda is undermined when one of the revolutionaries is an outsider (Zenzi) and the other obviously "evil" (Tetu).

from Black Panther: World of Wakanda #6

Lastly, there's "Death of the White Tiger"—I had not expected the return of Kasper Cole! Cole took over as Black Panther for the last dozen issues of Priest's run, and then was reinvented as the White Tiger for The Crew. If you've read any of those stories, you've read this one. Can you believe that over a dozen years later, Cole is still trying to get a promotion and pay raise so he can care for his girlfriend (who hates him) and baby? Yikes, dude, get your life together. The ending of the story promises a role for Cole elsewhere in the Ta-Nehisi Coates Black Panther universe... I can't say I am excited. (It is nice that they brought back Joe Bennett, original penciler of The Crew, though.)

Dawn of the Midnight Angels originally appeared in issues #1-5 of Black Panther: World of Wakanda (Jan.-May 2017). The story was written by Roxane Gay, with consultant Ta-Nehisi Coates, penciled by Alitha E. Martinez, inked by Roberto Poggi (#2-5) and Alitha E. Martinez (#1-2), colored by Rachelle Rosenberg, lettered by Joe Sabino, and edited by Wil Moss.

"The People for the People" originally appeared in issue #1 of Black Panther: World of Wakanda (Jan. 2017). The story was written by Yona Harvey & Ta-Nehisi Coates, illustrated by Afua Richardson, colored by Tamra Bonvillain, lettered by Joe Sabino, and edited by Wil Moss. 

"Death of the White Tiger" originally appeared in issue #6 of Black Panther: World of Wakanda (June 2017). The story was written by Rembert Browne, with consultant Ta-Nehisi Coates, penciled by Joe Bennett, inked by Roberto Poggi, colored by Rachelle Rosenberg, lettered by Joe Sabino, and edited by Chris Robinson.

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