Black Panther: A Nation under Our Feet by Ta-Nehisi Coates, Chris Sprouse, Karl Story, et al.

In my ongoing Black Panther readthrough (see link below), there have been a few gaps where there were no Black Panther comics being published: 1980-87 and 1992-97 are probably the two longest ones. There was another one from 2013 to 2015, the gap between The Most Dangerous Man Alive! and Black Panther volume 6. It's comparatively short, but on the other hand, it's the first time that a number of significant events have apparently transpired between Black Panther runs... they just happened to Black Panther in other comic books. Since we last saw T'Challa, he's become king of Wakanda again, his sister (queen of Wakanda on her last appearance) is dead, he and Storm have gotten divorced, and Wakanda has been invaded by both Namor and Thanos. It's quite a lot!

from Black Panther vol. 6 #5

The first twelve issues of volume 6 make up a single story arc, A Nation under Our Feet, which chronicles a populist uprising in Wakanda that causes T'Challa to grapple with the meaning of kingship as he also sets out on a quest to resurrect Shuri... who despite being dead is on her own quest. I'd actually read some of this before; the collection of the first four issues were a finalist for the Hugo Award for Best Graphic Story in 2017. I ranked it sixth, finding it incomplete and impenetrable. Having now read the whole arc with the context of earlier Black Panther comics, I'm pretty baffled that issues #1-4 were collected on their own; the story hasn't even come to a stopping point, it just stops. At the time, I assumed what confused me was from earlier Black Panther comics, but that wasn't the case—annoyingly, it mostly happened in Avengers, I think. Writer Ta-Nehisi Coates fills you in a little, but often not enough; in issue #12, for example, T'Challa apologizes to the way he deserted Shuri before she died, but because I didn't know he did that until the apology, the moment falls flat.

from Black Panther vol. 6 #1

Overall, I felt like this arc had some interesting ideas but Coates didn't know how to pace a comics story; at twelve issues, it feels like the whole thing goes in circles a bit too much. Again and again, T'Challa agonizes over what to do about this revolution; again and again, the two different rebel factions bicker; again and again, Shuri talks to someone in the afterlife. It rarely felt like anything was moving forward, like the state of play was changing. In a twelve-issue arc, I think you need to have clear moments of energy and upset, but this story didn't have that.

I did, however, very much enjoy issue #10, which is where I felt Coates finally nailed what he was going for—and the majority of the issue is a conversation between T'Challa and a political science professor! But in this conversation, I felt there was a lot more dynamism than in the story's endless series of action sequences that didn't actually move the story forward. The idea of T'Challa grappling with kingship finally pays off here, and though the idea of a T'Challa who'd rather be a hero than a king doesn't accord with how I see the character (I prefer Priest's take), it works well enough on its own terms.

from Black Panther vol. 6 #12

Unfortunately, the climax in #11 is a bit disappointing. After all the stuff about returning power to the people, moving away from a system of "one man" having a "nation under his feet"... the way T'Challa defeats the rebel army is by summoning spirits of all the previous Black Panthers? Why? I didn't see how it paid off anything from the previous issue or story as a whole. And I'm curious how the new government promised in #12 is different from the old one, but I guess that's an issue for stories going forward. I am also curious to see more of some of the supporting cast, such as the politics professor and the two rogue lesbian Dora Milajae.

Brian Stelfreeze is pretty good on art, but like a lot of superstar artists on high-profile runs, he draws fewer issues than the fill-in artists do!

A Nation under Our Feet originally appeared in issues #1-12 of Black Panther vol. 6 (June 2016–May 2017). The story was written by Ta-Nehisi Coates; illustrated by Brian Stelfreeze (#1-4, 9, 12) and Chris Sprouse & Karl Story (#5-8, 10-12), with finishes by Goran Sudžuka (#11), Walden Wong (#8, 11), Roberto Poggi (#11), and Scott Hanna (#12); colored by Laura Martin (#1-12), with Matt Milla (#4, 11-12), Larry Molinar (#11), Rachelle Rosenberg (#11), and Paul Mounts (#11); lettered by Joe Sabino (#1-7, 9-12) and Clayton Cowles (#8); and edited by Wil Moss.

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