Season Review: Marvel’s Avengers: Black Panther’s Quest

Progress can be found, but there’s still a long way to go before we can call this one “quality”.

You have to give credit where credit is due. In the grand scheme of things, Marvel’s Avengers: Black Panther’s Quest is better than 90 percent of the other Marvel animated series produced for Disney XD. Examples of hot garbage like Guardians of the Galaxy, Marvel’s Spider-Man, and Hulk and the Agents of S.M.A.S.H. have all helped in making sure we all know that the Disney XD network has been an overall failure in giving fans quality Marvel animation. With Hulu becoming a potential new home, maybe Marvel animation can be whole again because I’m not sure Marvel’s Avengers: Black Panther’s Quest is the series to help the cause.

At face value, Marvel’s Avengers: Black Panther’s Quest keeps most of the major ingredients of what I hate about all of the Marvel animated series. A plot premised around getting some sort of token for the fate of the world all the while straddling between that fine line of poor man’s MCU and deep comic book lineage to help fill in plots and introduce characters that may have not been seen before. Like the Black Panther feature-length film, Marvel’s Avengers: Black Panther’s Quest revolves around King T’challa teaming with the Avengers to fight bad guys. This season sees the boys fighting off threats from Atlantis, Hydra, and the Shadow Council lead by Killmonger who is decidedly nothing like his MCU counterpart, likewise for Man-Ape who has no intentions of teaming with any part of Wakanda in this one. During the course of the season, we learn that the Shadow Council is looking for a diamond-encrusted crown that is teaming with power and loaded with historical significance contrived from Wakanda’s past. This crown is both powerful and dangerous and even takes Captain America hostage which causes a rift in the Avengers who think T’Challa has gotten their leader killed. When we get Cap back, we get a new Wakandan Queen that is originally meant to lead the Shadow Council in its quest for world domination only to be convinced otherwise later on. Black Panther also takes the time to both piss off and then subsequently help lead to the destruction of Atlantis.

Due to the fact that this series borrows from both comics and the established MCU, the producers of the show have a bunch of fun in straddling the line between the deep mythos of Marvel comics and character assassination. Examples of that this season includes pretty much the entirety of Atlantis (Namor is nowhere to be found by the way despite the fact that Wakanda blows up his city of origin), Madame Masque, and even the world of Black Panther itself. For example, Shuri is a strong spiritual successor from the MCU universe…but signs of life from the likes of Okoye, W’Kabi, and Ramonda range from very light to non-existent. And while the MCU version of M’Baku makes strong implications that he is the Man-Ape all while not trying to name him, the series has NO problem in diving right into the character dressed up as an angry gorilla hell-bent on taking on Black Panther which is probably a tad closer to the comics.

The differing dichotomies between the comics and MCU is a plague that all of the Marvel animated series in Disney XD suffer from, however, there are some areas in which this series excels at. While still clunky and featuring uninspiring character designs, the overall aesthetic of Black Panther’s Quest is an improvement over most Marvel series and while we still have a slew of crummy MCU sound-a-likes for the characters of “Iron Man”, “Thor”, and “Captain America”, the principal actors for the series like Keston John (Killmonger), Daisy Lightfoot (Shuri), and most importantly James C. Mathis (Black Panther) are all quite strong and unique which helps us forget about the other actors during their watered-down imitations.

Marvel Avengers Assemble: Black Panther’s Quest is a way improved effort than most of the Marvel animated series on Disney XD, but that’s not saying much. The cliched premise and constant examples of character assassination annoy so much that it drowns out the strong contributions from the mainstay Black Panther’s Quest cast and therefore ultimately falls flat.