With the first trailer for Marvel’s Captain America: Civil War finally online (check it out at the bottom of the page), we got a quick glimpse at Chadwick Boseman in costume as Black Panther. If you were wondering quite how the man also known as T’Challa fits into the sprawling superhero slug-fest, Boseman has opened up to Entertainment Weekly on the subject.
Set to be introduced in Civil War ahead of his own stand-alone film in 2018, Black Panther will show up as more of a neutral party in the conflict over the superhero-registering Sokovia Accords backed by Tony “Iron Man” Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) and resisted by Steve “Captain America” Rogers (Chris Evans), though he’ll lean towards Tony's side of the argument. Just don’t expect him to be wise-cracking as much as some of the others. “He’s definitely not the life of the party in this instance,” Boseman tells EW. “I think this is something true of the comic book character and the movie. You never quite know where he stands. There’s always a bit of concealing and mystery. So I think mysterious is more his boat. Not to say there’s not charm and he can’t be a ladies’ man and all that. It’s more like if there is humor, it’s more like James Bond.”
He is, however, not quite the settled and learned man found in the comics either. “In publishing, he is sort of this very wise and a sanguine figure who seems to know more than he lets on,” producer Nate Moore says. “I think this is Black Panther in his younger years, where he maybe is a little bit more fiery than I think how they write him in the comics because he’s very much in the nascent stages of being a hero. So that means he is probably more fallible than the Black Panther that you read in comics, but for reasons that are completely logical.”
He’ll also confront fitting into the world he and his people have suddenly been dragged into after years staying out of the various superhero scraps. “There definitely is a sort of tradition that he’s torn between, in terms of how things were done in the past and how things need to happen now in this new world,” says Boseman. “I think there’s perhaps a bit of a maverick there, and then there’s also a need to live up to traditions and his father’s legacy. And not even his father’s legacy, but the entire nation of Wakanda. I think those are the things you will see.” For more about T’Challa’s introduction to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, head to EW’s site. And if you want to read a full trailer breakdown for the Civil War footage featuring exclusive input from directors Joe and Anthony Russo, check out ours.
Captain America: Civil War kicks off the fight in UK cinemas on April 29.