Chadwick Boseman’s untimely death undoubtedly came as a shock to the world. As previously reported by REVOLT, the beloved actor passed away on Aug. 28, 2020 after a private battle with cancer. At the time, he’d already seen massive success as T’Challa, a warrior from the fictional African nation of Wakanda in Marvel’s 2018 box office hit Black Panther.
The star’s passing also took many close to him, including the film’s director, Ryan Coogler, by surprise. In an article published Monday (Dec. 26) by SyFy, the man behind the lens revealed he had big plans for Black Panther’s follow-up but had to make adjustments after the heartbreaking loss of his friend. “It was, ‘What are we going to do about the Blip?’” Coogler said during an interview. For those who may not be fully acquainted with the Marvel Cinematic Universe, “the Blip” refers to the resurrection of all the victims of Thanos’ Snap. SyFy noted that the film’s sequel planned to incorporate “T’Challa (whom Thanos snapped out of existence at the end of Avengers: Infinity War) and his son Toussaint.”
“That was the challenge. It was absolutely nothing like what we made. It was going to be a father-son story from the perspective of a father because the first movie had been a father-son story from the perspective of the sons,” Coogler explained. “In the script, T’Challa was a dad who’d had this forced five-year absence from his son’s life. The first scene was an animated sequence. You hear Nakia [Lupita Nyong’o] talking to Toussaint. She says, ‘Tell me what you know about your father.’ You realize that he doesn’t know his dad was the Black Panther. He’s never met him, and Nakia is remarried to a Haitian dude. Then, we cut to reality, and it’s the night that everybody comes back from the Blip. You see T’Challa meet the kid for the first time,” he added.
Coogler said Boseman would have appeared in the film alongside his fictional son, and the storyline would have focused on their bonding. “We had some crazy scenes in there for Chad, man,” the director shared. “Our code name for the movie was ‘Summer Break,’ and the movie was about a summer that the kid spends with his dad. For his eighth birthday, they do a ritual where they go out into the bush and have to live off the land. But something happens, and T’Challa has to go save the world with his son on his hip. That was the movie,” Coogler continued.
Black Panther: Wakanda Forever was released on Nov. 11 and is still showing in theaters across the country. Check out the film’s trailer below.