It’s primed for a huge IMAX launch and is currently surpassing all other superhero movies in advance ticket sales – yes, even Batman V Superman and Captain America: Civil War are no match for T’Challa – and on February 16th, Black Panther will reign supreme at the global box office.
Analysts predict a suitably epic four-day opening for the Wakandan king, though $100M-$120M seems a little low when you factor in Monday’s show-stopping premiere. It’s one that attracted praise from the four corners of the industry, and though we’ll reserve any judgment until the review embargo lifts on February 6th, Marvel Studios has clearly got another mega-hit on its hands with Black Panther.
But it turns out T’Challa’s standalone adventure could have been slightly different from the one that’s about to be projected onto theater screens near and far, as director Ryan Coogler once considered introducing Elijah Bradley (AKA the Patriot) into the MCU.
While in the midst of the film’s ongoing press tour, Coogler spoke to Cinema Blend (h/t Screen Rant), to discuss an alternate version of Black Panther in which Elijah Bradley was embedded into the story. Alas, Coogler and his writing partner Joe Robert Cole decided to scrap any plans in fear that Patriot would steal precious screen time away from Wakanda.
Crazy enough, for comic book fans, we toyed with the character Patriot for a little bit. Early on we were interested to get our hands on him, Joe [Robert Cole] and I, but that ended up going away so we could focus on Wakanda a little more.
The ones that you see were kind of always there. M’Baku, Killmonger, T’Challa, Nakia, Okoye, Shuri, Ramonda, Klaue, Everett Ross… they were always in every draft. So we had to make sure that they all had arcs, and it had something to do with that.
Slated to release on February 16th, Black Panther has been billed as a superhero movie like no other – fitting, too, as it’s the last MCU spinoff to arrive before the all-consuming Avengers: Infinity War.