Beyond 2019, the future is still looking a little hazy for the MCU, but one Marvel project that we know to be in the pipeline is Black Panther 2, with director Ryan Coogler confirmed to return for this highly anticipated sequel. That being said, it doesn’t sound like the filmmaker is ready to move forward with the feature quite yet.
A few days ago, Coogler received IndieWire’s Visionary Award for his work on T’Challa’s first standalone outing, and when the subject of a sequel came up at the ceremony, he had nothing to say:
“I got nothing… I don’t know nothing… It is true, I’m telling you. I don’t know.”
Seeing how Coogler’s next feature film is said to be a drama called Wrong Answer, based on the Atlanta Public Schools cheating scandal, it’s understandable that the director may not be bursting with intel on the Black Panther follow-up right now.
As it stands, it doesn’t look like this movie will be making it to cinemas until at least early 2021, with a recently rumored Marvel release slate suggesting that 2020 will be the year of Black Widow and The Eternals. And with Captain Marvel, Avengers 4, and Spider-Man: Far From Home all headed for theaters in 2019, it seems that the MCU could be a very different world by the time Coogler’s next comic book movie arrives.
In the meantime, awards season is just kicking off for the first Black Panther, with some major Oscar nods potentially on the cards for the acclaimed blockbuster. As the year nears its end, Kevin Feige recently reflected on the movie’s cultural significance and the diversity it brought to superhero cinema:
“Black Panther’s not real. He’s not a real person, but he represents real hopes and real dreams and real representation. And so there’s a certain amount of pressure that came with that, delivering on what people have been dreaming about for years, whether they read the comic book or not, because a lot of people said, ‘Wait a minute, this is a hero that looks like me.’ And the importance of that really can’t be understated.”
The pressure is on for Black Panther 2 to live up to the reputation of its predecessor, but it could be a long time before we find out if Coogler can deliver on the hype.