Black Panther: All This and the World, Too by John Ridley and Germán Peralta

Black Panther: All This and the World, Too

Collection published: 2023
Contents originally published: 2022-23
Read: December 2025

Writer: John Ridley

Artist: Germán Peralta

Color Artists: Ceci De La Cruz, Sebastian Cheng & Jesus Aburtov

Letterer: Joe Sabino

While I enjoyed the set-up of volume 1 of John Ridley's Black Panther a lot, I found what was done with that set-up in volume 2 pretty awful, to be honest. The third and final volume is better than volume 2, thankfully... but as it's a direct continuation, it's hard to move past how heavy-handed some of the plot turns in volume 2 were, as the story of volume 3 directly depends on them.

This volume opens with Black Panther operating as chairman of the Avengers, still no longer welcome in Wakanda. The world's Internet infrastructure is taken over, and when T'Challa goes to investigate, it turns out that it's one of his own people who's done it, the very friend whose death kicked the whole thing off in volume 1. His enemy has the power to neutralize the Avengers, so T'Challa must take him down on his own with his own allies.

It's fine. Some of the twists are good, some are heavy-handed; some moments feel earned, some do not. I think overall, Ridley's run had the core of a good idea, an interrogation of the extend to which T'Challa was willing to go to protect Wakanda, but it wasn't done in a good way, because far too many characters judge T'Challa by a weird standard of ethics. One of the best parts of Priest's run (with which Ridley's is very obviously in dialogue) was how it treated Black Panther a king, not a superhero—what would a superpowered king do in a world of superpowers? how would he act to protect his nation and its interests? Ridley's run wonders if there might be ways in which T'Challa thus might go too far... but it doesn't do this interestingly, because everyone judges T'Challa for his choices right away without considering the rationale or consequences of them. To say what T'Challa does is bad because it's not what other superheroes do is a really boring way to criticize T'Challa. At his best, T'Challa was a square peg in a round hole, but instead of exploring how that lack of fit plays out, Ridley's run just asserts he ought to have been a round peg all along. Why do I need to read a fifteen-issue run devoted to telling me the character I'm reading is bad? It's cynical and uninteresting, and I'm worried this all leaves the character in a bad place for future stories as well.

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Black Panther: Range Wars by John Ridley, Stefano Landini, and Germán Peralta

Black Panther: Range Wars

Collection published: 2022
Contents originally published: 2022
Read: November 2025

Writer: John Ridley

Artists: Stefano Landini & Germán Peralta

Color Artists: Matt Milla & Jesus Aburtov

Letterer: Joe Sabino

I really enjoyed volume 1 of John Ridley's Black Panther run, finding it a return to form after Ta-Nehisi Coates's. It was interesting, from a character, action, and thematic perspective, surely the best work on the title since Christopher Priest.

So I was very much surprised by how much I thoroughly disliked this. The first few issues here wrap up the "Long Shadow" arc, and I found them dumb. I get that people might be mad at T'Challa having a secret plan of shadow agents... but I found the reactions here entirely disproportionate. The agents didn't even do anything. Can you get mad at the legitimate ruler of a country for having spies? Because that's literally all he did, yet everyone suddenly acts like T'Challa has committed the ultimate transgression. Yet he very much did "worse" things throughout Priest's run! And suddenly he's being deposed, being hunted by Wakandan police. Does it even make any sense? T'Challa is a popular ruler, you can't just politically turn on a guy like that. I didn't buy any of this at all, it made no sense. Clearly Ridley has a long game he's playing, and he's trying to get all the pieces into position for it, but the hand of the author is too obvious. To make all this work, you need to buy what Ridley is selling, and I did not.

A metaphor, you say? Surely not.
from Black Panther vol. 9 #10 (art by Germán Peralta)

The rest of the book contains another story that actually reads much more like an Avengers story in its features, even if I would say it's a Black Panther story in terms of its project. No longer king of Wakanda, a depressed T'Challa is focusing on his duties as chairman of the Avengers when Earth comes under attack by the "Colonialist," an entity from another dimension. This is science fiction in the classic tradition of H. G. Wells's The War of the Worlds: what if the aliens did to the Earth (i.e., specifically white people) what white people have been going around doing to other people? The idea is fun enough, there's a couple good jokes, but I didn't find the actual story did as much with it as you might hope for; there's not really any interrogation on the part of the white characters as to what this says about them. I did like the "Buffalo Soldier" character a lot, though.

I was also glad to see Germán Peralta graduate from one-shot/back-up artist to the series main artist. He's good at action and emotional expressiveness; clear composition and good storytelling.

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Black Panther: The Long Shadow by John Ridley, Juann Cabal, et al.

Black Panther: The Long Shadow

Collection published: 2022
Contents originally published: 2022
Read: November 2025

Writers: John Ridley & Juni Ba

Artists: Juann Cabal with Ibrahim Moustafa & Stefano Landini, Juni Ba & Germán Peralta

Color Artists: Federico Blee, Matt Milla, Chris O'Halloran & Jesus Aburtov

Letterer: Joe Sabino

After the long, meandering, dull narratives of Ta-Nehisi Coates's run, this volume felt like a return to form for Black Panther. Coates never figured out how to integrate story, character, themes, and action; in his work, you had long boring scenes of dialogue alternating with long boring scenes of action. I don't think I've ever previously read a comic written by John Ridley, but he clearly knows how to write a comic book, and how to do so in a highly effective way, to boot.

The basic premise here is that T'Challa had sleeper agents in other countries, living seemingly normal lives, but ready to be activated if the need came up—known only to him. Except, all of a sudden, they are being killed off... so he must spring into action to defend them, while making sure no one knows of yet another long-laid plan founded on a lack of trust. Ridley's characterization of T'Challa definitely owes a lot to Christopher Priest's; this is the master plate spinner, except this time the plates are crashing down.

The story isn't quite complete here; League of Comic Geeks tells me The Long Shadow ran eight issues, and this volume weirdly collects just five. So one doesn't know how it will all play out. But I liked almost everything here: the sense that for once T'Challa is on the back foot is well done, the action is strong (Juann Cabal is probably the best regular Black Panther artist in a long while), and the character interactions are sharp and interesting. If Ridley's subsequent volumes maintain this level of quality, this will be an all-time great Black Panther run.

We get some fun Shuri stuff, too.
from Black Panther vol. 8 #2 (script by John Ridley, art by Juann Cabal)

Issue #3 was a special double-length issue, celebrating Black Panther's 200th issue; it came with two bonus stories. (Weirdly, the collection sticks them in the middle by publication order, interrupting the ongoing story; it would surely have made much more sense to put them at the end!) One, "The Wakandan" by John Ridley and Germán Peralta gives a backstory for a new character, Tosin, an angsty resident of Wakanda's "mute zones" with vibranium superpowers. Meh. The other is a tale of T'Challa being eaten by the panther god to go on a mystical quest; I really enjoyed the unique writing and art of Juni Ba.

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King in Black: Black Panther / The Last Annihilation: Wakanda by Germán Peralta et al.

Between Ta-Nehisi Coates's run on Black Panther (which I just finished) and John Ridley's (which I will tackle next), there were two Black Panther–related one-shots tying into larger Marvel Comics events. In each case, I picked up the collection of the event from Hoopla, but I only read the Black Panther story in each book, plus the Hulkling and Wiccan one, since I do know those characters from Young Avengers (boy has their status quo changed a lot!), but none of the other stories in each book.

I guess this kind of scene is obligatory.
from King in Black: Black Panther #1

King in Black seems to about a bunch of Venoms attacking the universe or something. I guess they all work for a god of some kind? It didn't really matter to me; what you need to know is that Wakanda is under assault.

The story is written by Geoffrey Thorne (who got his start as a Star Trek writer, and surely his Trek fandom is the reason he knows the word "cathexis") and illustrated by Germán Peralta, but just as Jason Aaron was for Black Panther's Secret Invasion tie-in, Thorne is in full Christopher Priest mode here: T'Challa has a plan, and is ten steps ahead of everyone, including his own allies. It's not quite as good as Aaron's or Priest's take on this approach, but then, Thorne only has one issue for his canvas, so things just can't be as complicated. Peralta is a solid artist, capturing the characters and world of Wakanda well. This is a perfectly fine story on the whole—I doubt it will wow anyone, but I also think it works on its own and is enjoyable enough.

I've even less understanding of what The Last Annihilation is about, except that it seems to be about space and probably the Guardians of the Galaxy. Its Black Panther tie-in was also illustrated by Peralata; the scripting is by Evan Narcisse, who previously wrote one of the better Black Panther stories of the "Coates era," Rise of the Black Panther. One of the interesting storytelling consequences of the Intergalactic Empire of Wakanda arc is that there's now a way for Black Panther to be involved in space-based Marvel crossover events; indeed, more of Wakanda is in space than is not!

And the enormous space empire was never mentioned again...
from The Last Annihilation: Wakanda #1

I found Coates's Intergalactic Empire storyline raised lots of interesting ideas but did little of interest with them. It would be glib to say that Narcisse finds more to do with the concepts in this single issue than Coates did in twenty-five... but this is surely one of the better stories to be told using the premise. Narcisse focuses the story on M'Baku, one of T'Challa's former comrades in the resistance, who now finds himself working for the very empire he swore to destroy. How can you build trust in an institution previously used as a tool of oppression? How can you trust it yourself? It's a great concept, and Narcisse does great by it, with some effective character-based writing and, again, strong art by Peralta. My guess is that future Black Panther stories will move away from the "Intergalactic Empire" setting (indeed, the last page of this story sets up how that could come to pass), but if they did not, they could do a lot worse than to follow the template set by this issue.

"Cathexis" originally appeared in issue #1 of King in Black: Black Panther (Apr. 2021). The story was written by Geoffrey Thorne, illustrated by Germán Peralta, colored by Jesus Aburtov, lettered by Joe Sabino, and edited by Wil Moss. It was collected in King in Black: Avengers (2021), which was edited by Jennifer Grünwald.

The Last Annihilation: Wakanda originally appeared in one issue (Nov. 2021). The story was written by Evan Narcisse, illustrated by Germán Peralta, colored by Jesus Aburtov, lettered by Cory Petit, and edited by Wil Moss. It was collected in The Last Annihilation (2022), which was edited by Daniel Kirchhoffer.

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