"Wakanda Forever" is saved from being the worst MCU movie by one thing: the fact that "Thor: Love and Thunder" was even worse. But at least Thor 4 didn't take almost three hours to suck so badly.
Letitia Wright, as Princess Shuri, was just fine playing a sidekick role and providing some comic relief in "Black Panther," supporting Chadwick Boseman. But forced by his death to take over the lead, she just can't cut it, having neither the acting ability nor the screen presence to carry a movie, let alone the physicality to portray a believable super-hero. Angela Basset, normally an excellent actress of depth and gravitas, is relegated to petulant screaming and temper tantrums until she is mercifully allowed to be killed off. And while Dominique Thorne did well in her role as the black female Tony Stark, after being the driving character for the first act, she was simply forgotten for much of the rest of the movie, until debuting as Ironheart, in a suit that looked like a design rejected for the Power Rangers movie.
Granted, the death of the starring actor left the producers in a bad situation, but writing out the character was the wrong answer. I can't help but think that simply recasting T'Challa would have been a better solution. It would have been difficult to replace Boseman, but if nothing else, maybe they could have attracted better writers.
The cgi was adequate, but wasted on implausible scenes and badly-choreographed fight scenes, which came and went with no more lasting effect than a dance scene in a Baliwood musical. The dialog was bland, the plot was thin and unrealistic, and the villian was not only poorly-motivated and ultimately unthreatening, but frankly silly-looking (pigeon wings on his ankles, seriously?)
I'm glad I didn't see this dumpster fire in the theater, but waited until it was streaming on Disney, so that I didn't waste $15; the bad news is that I wasted almost three hours of my life. Unfortunately, "Wakanda Forever" is just another example of how the Disney movie-by-committee format is bringing down yet another once-great franchise.
Letitia Wright, as Princess Shuri, was just fine playing a sidekick role and providing some comic relief in "Black Panther," supporting Chadwick Boseman. But forced by his death to take over the lead, she just can't cut it, having neither the acting ability nor the screen presence to carry a movie, let alone the physicality to portray a believable super-hero. Angela Basset, normally an excellent actress of depth and gravitas, is relegated to petulant screaming and temper tantrums until she is mercifully allowed to be killed off. And while Dominique Thorne did well in her role as the black female Tony Stark, after being the driving character for the first act, she was simply forgotten for much of the rest of the movie, until debuting as Ironheart, in a suit that looked like a design rejected for the Power Rangers movie.
Granted, the death of the starring actor left the producers in a bad situation, but writing out the character was the wrong answer. I can't help but think that simply recasting T'Challa would have been a better solution. It would have been difficult to replace Boseman, but if nothing else, maybe they could have attracted better writers.
The cgi was adequate, but wasted on implausible scenes and badly-choreographed fight scenes, which came and went with no more lasting effect than a dance scene in a Baliwood musical. The dialog was bland, the plot was thin and unrealistic, and the villian was not only poorly-motivated and ultimately unthreatening, but frankly silly-looking (pigeon wings on his ankles, seriously?)
I'm glad I didn't see this dumpster fire in the theater, but waited until it was streaming on Disney, so that I didn't waste $15; the bad news is that I wasted almost three hours of my life. Unfortunately, "Wakanda Forever" is just another example of how the Disney movie-by-committee format is bringing down yet another once-great franchise.