- How are you doing, you wonderful nerds?
Scott here and with the Black Panther movie
just around the corner or, well, in the past,
depending on when you're watching this video,
I've been catching up on some great comic book stories
featuring the King of Wakanda.
As you might expect,
Black Panther stories can be a little bit political
I mean just the name Black Panther
has a history in and of itself
that we've talked about over in this video.
And I know that politics and comic books
can often put a lot of readers off,
but, T'Challa is a political leader in Wakandan
delegate politics and is baked into his character
ever since he debuted all the way in Fantastic Four
number 52, so I kind of feel like he gets a pass on this one
and politics is given a bit of a spotlight
in one of the characters more recent runs,
a nation under our feet.
Drawn by Brian Stalfreeze and written by Ta-Nehisi Coates.
It even starts with the comics name being a reference
to the 2003 Pulitzer Prize winning book by Steven Hahn
of the same title.
That book is about the history of African American
political power in the United States,
which is very fitting for this story,
since my friend La'Ron from the channel Readus101
thinks that he's uncovered the hidden meaning behind
this modern Black Panther comic book.
Relating it to a different real world.
Real world.
Listen to that voice.
Relating the character to a different real world leader.
Take it away, La'Ron.
- So Black Panther, a Nation Under Our Feet
is the fist arc for the character
after the events of Secret Wars.
But if you want a summary regarding what happened
in that book,
there are plenty of other comic book YouTubers
that have done videos on it,
so please watch and support those creators
because I just, I just, I just, I just, honestly,
I just honestly don't have the patience.
But in case you didn't read the events stories
leading up to A Nation Under Our Feet,
the story does a good job summarizing
everything that's happened Wakanda,
it's people, and how everything leading up to this point
has affected the relationship between the Wakandans
and T'Challa, their king.
So much that there's talk an acts of revolution
on multiple ends.
Some well meaning, and others power hungry.
Which, given the circumstances, makes complete sense.
Dr. Doom, Namor, and Thanos collectively did a lot
to Wakanda and some Wakandans just don't believe
in the monarchy anymore.
Despite who T'Challa is and what he represents
to the nation.
Writer Ta-Nehisi Coates does a great job deconstructing
both T'Challa's struggle regarding what Wakanda
needs him to be.
While also displaying how tired the people of Wakanda
have become.
He goes through his own journey trying to regain
the trust of the Wakandan people after losing so much
from the three aforementioned villains.
The topic of whether T'Challa wants to be a king
or a hero is brought up multiple times
over the course of the arc as a result.
Suggesting that while the two share similarities,
they are in no way the same.
And when presented with the group of villains
with the ability to amplify people's inner rage
and hatred,
to take advantage of a Wakanda in revolt
and on the edge of civil war.
T'Challa has to figure out what kind of leader
he has to be and what type of nation Wakanda needs to be.
Interestingly, the mindset of the Wakandans
in A Nation Under Our Feet
echos a sentiment in Coates' latest book
We Were Eight Years In Power: An American Tragedy.
A collection of his essays and editorials
that he wrote in regards to
the eight year Obama administration.
In it, Coates pens a notion regarding African Americans
that could easily be applied to Wakandans as well.
African Americans are war weary.
I mean, you are not wrong, sir.
Never the less, this had me wondering
just how similar his thought process was
in regards to writing his first Black Panther arc
versus writing his latest philosophical work.
And I found some very interesting parallels
between what T'Challa is going through in this story
versus what had to be endured by former president
Barack Obama.
Like Barack Obama, T'Challa was brought up
in a place of privilege.
It's the type of privilege that allows him
to see the world in a different light
than either the fictional Wakandans
or any of us in real life
and Coates helps make it clear.
T'Challa is one of the eight smartest people on Earth
in the Marvel universe.
And is considered a genius in advanced technology
and physics.
As backed up by his degree in Oxford University.
With that along with all of his knowledge
as a strategist and a politician,
his physical abilities, which includes raw strength
that's either enhanced either technologically,
magically, or both simultaneously.
And pretty much every Marvel event that he participated in
that either directly or indirectly affected Wakanda.
It's pretty much blurred his perspective
regarding the differences between being a hero
and being a king.
A common theme that's present over the entire course
of this arc.
For the parallel of Obama,
we have to be a bit more realistic.
Luckily for us, Ta-Nehisi Coates helps us out a bit
by taking into consideration President Obama's lineage
and how his upbringing both helped
and hindered race relations between black and white America.
He says, and I quote, by virtue of his background -
the son of a black man and a white woman,
someone who grew up in multiethnic communities
around the world, Obama has enjoyed
a distinctive vantage point on race relations in America.
Beyond that, he has displayed an enviable dexterity
at navigating between black and white America,
and at finding a language that speaks to a critical mass
in both communities.
End quote.
So even though he's established his own sense
of blackness over the course of his two terms,
crooning Al Green, putting up a basketball court
in the White House, and casually joking about being
on colored people time so he can prove
that he is black enough to some news outlets.
His upbringing caused him to.
In regards to major situations that happen
over the course of time in order to appeal
to both sides,
play the it's not about race card.
Because of this, he's talked less about race
than any other Democratic president since 1961.
And he had to be that way because even the slightest
mention of race from him,
like when we addressed the tragic death of Trayvon Martin
when he said the line,
If I had a son, he would look like Trayvon.
The wrong kind of people started to rear their ugly heads
both from the left and the right.
To quote Coates,
before President Obama spoke,
the death of Trayvon Martin was generally regarded
as a national tragedy.
After Obama spoke, Martin became material for an internet
vendor flogging paper gun-range targets
that mimicked his hoodies and his bag of Skittles.
End quote.
It's only when we acknowledge this fact
about president Obama that the next fact he has in common
with how Coates writes T'Challa in a Nation Under Our Feet
makes bit more sense.
And that's the fact that, in essence,
Barack Obama is pretty conservative.
Which is a political philosophy that technically
has two definitions in nature.
But the second definition is what everybody
regularly associates with Republicans.
A person who is adverse to change and holds
to traditional values and attitudes,
typically in relation to politics.
When in actuality, Obama falls in the range
of the first definition in regards to what it means
to be conservative.
Holding to traditional attitudes and values
and cautious about change and innovation,
typically in relation to politics and religion.
Coates summarizes this perfectly.
He peppers his speeches with nods to ideas
originally held by conservatives.
He routinely cites Ronald Reagan.
He effusively praises the enduring wisdom
of the American people,
and believes that the height of insight
lies in the town square.
Despite his sloganeering for change and progress,
Obama is a conservative revolutionary,
and nowhere is his conservative character revealed more
than in the very sphere
where he hold singular gravity-race.
End quote.
This also rings true for T'Challa
in Coates first arc for Black Panther.
Who is constantly reminded that,
while trying to tame the flames of a revolution
for a Wakandan for the people.
Both by his advisors, his step mother, and himself.
But that's where the similarities start to end.
Because with three words,
T'Challa completely separates himself
from the conservative mindset that Coates
notices in Obama.
Wakanda must change.
Coates run during this arc explores T'Challa's struggle
of wanting to be a hero and needing to be a king
to a country that is losing faith
in the monarchy and is demanding democracy.
And over the course of this story,
he realizes that this needs to happen.
Not just for Wakanda, but for himself.
He did a good amount of things to come
to that realization.
Less than stellar things he's not necessarily proud of.
And while some could say the same about certain aspects
of the Obama administration as yet another comparison
between he and Coates's T'Challa?
- We did some things that were wrong.
We did a whole lot of things that were right.
But we tortured some folks.
- [La'Ron] The fact that T'Challa can look his step mother
square in the face and say, I am a king, mother.
Nothing can change that.
But I will not be a tyrant.
Says so much.
And answering a fan letter at the end of issue six,
Coates's says that this arc was the story he wanted
to read when he was a kid,
and the story he wants to read now.
And after seeing that answer,
it makes me think that the reason why
there's only so much of a parallel between
Coates's take on T'Challa,
and how he views Barack Obama,
is because his vision of T'Challa is the Barack Obama
he's always wanted.
A convicted, yet flawed human being,
rooted in what makes him culturally black
and capable of expanding the imagination
that the dream of becoming a non-white president
is no longer a myth.
While at the same time, truly open and capable
of understanding that in many ways,
America, like Wakanda, must change.
- God I love that analysis so much.
Thank you La'Ron for making this video.
Everyone go check out his channel again,
it's Readus101, it will be linked in the description
and at the end of this video.
He makes some incredibly entertaining stuff.
I also suppose that if you made it this far
into the video,
you're probably wondering why the whole video
didn't really have much of me.
So if you haven't heard, YouTube's kind of cracking
down on smaller channels and I've always tried
to promote other talented nerdy people
on this channel and I wanna get to doing that
a little bit more over the next year.
So once or twice a month,
we're gonna be shining a spotlight on some
of these smaller YouTubers,
some of these awesome nerds.
We're making great stuff on the YouTubes
that maybe you haven't seen before.
Heck, we might even have some of my friends
who are bigger channels than us stop by occasionally
just for fun.
The point is, we're gonna be syncing with nerds.
That's the name.
That's the whole, you get it.
So yeah, go check out La'Ron's channel.
It's Readus101.
You can click in the description
or click it right here on screen right now
to see his video about how
the Ant-Man and Wasp franchise
is kind of like the filler of the MCU.
It's a really interesting video.
Definitely go check it out.
My name is Scott,
reminding you to read between the panels
and grow smarter through comics.
See ya.