T’Challa, the new ruler of the advanced kingdom of Wakanda, must defend his land from being torn apart by enemies from outside and inside the country. – Source

Finally! The BLACK PANTHER teaser trailer has arrived and it crushed all the buildings! Honestly, I am not sure what I was expecting to see when we were finally given actual footage from this film but I definitely wasn’t expecting to get such an exuberant ode to blackness as what we got in the first teaser trailer. Heck, even the use of “Legend Has It” by Run The Jewels was perfect…Killer Mike may be a bit of a dumpster fire but he can make some hot music sometimes.

Ryan Coogler looks to have produced a film that is as unapologetically black as what Cheo Hodari Coker delivered with the LUKE CAGE series on Netflix. The shots of Wakanda that we see are done to show the gory of this secret, technologically advanced nation of proud black men and women and I am ecstatic. No comic book movie property (regardless of the studio) has had me nearly as concerned with how it would end up on film than this one. There are so many ways this film could have been ruined if it didn’t embrace the innate blackness and pride in that blackness that the character of the Black Panther is supposed to have.

But in just a little under 2 minutes it looks like Coogler has at the very least embraced the core of the character especially in terms of the most iconic runs of the modern Panther and Wakandan society in comics from writers like Christopher Priest, Ta-Nehisi Coates and Reginald Hudlin. There is a pride and majesty to the way the characters in this teaser are shown that you immediately get despite the brevity of the video.

And I would be remiss in not mentioning the vibrancy of the costuming and make-up. Every character has a distinctive and colorful look that just pops off the screen. This movie is going to definitely be one of the better looking films to come out in 2018 and I could see it getting lots of award love for costuming, hair and make-up.

The looks of the Dora Milaje (T’Challa’s badass lady bodyguards), Michael B. Jordan as Erik Killmonger (T’Challa’s archenemy) and just all the various good and bad characters are so distinct and interesting. You can get lost just perusing the background characters costuming with all of their intricacies.

And Wakanda looks amazing! A mixture of raw nature and advanced technology has this fabled land looking as good as I could ever imagine it looking in live-action. Getting the dichotomous look of Wakanda right was another major hurdle for anyone who was going to be making this movie and I am happy to see that Coogler and his team got it right.

Now that my appetite has been whet and a lot of my concerns have been soothed, I am now way too anxious to see a full trailer that will flesh out the meat of the storyline more and show some more action scenes. Honestly, I need more than a full trailer, I need to see this movie. 2018 can’t get here soon enough!