When Ryan Coogler’s Black Panther was officially announced in October 2014, I was, like many oblivious to the goings-on of the Marvel Cinematic Universe and its source material, mildly intrigued. Great, I thought at the time, a Black superhero movie is way overdue. But as more details about the franchise emerged — most notably for me as a Kenyan-American, its casting of its Black leads that represent the diversity of the Black Diaspora, which at the time was less than a rarity — my intrigue grew into something much deeper. Black Panther had the promise of not just revolutionizing the superhero industry as it pertains to Black-American representation, but it also could initiate a wave of African representation in Hollywood. Black Panther could be the beginning of a Hollywood that recognized people like me, that told the stories I, and the millions of people who populate the Diaspora, know and crave to see on a global stage.
So I raced to the movie theater on February 18, 2018, ready for the revolution. Instead, I saw a mess. Between mismatched and muddled accents; the full adoption of African warrior tropes (which was called on again in 2022’s The Woman King); the overall insult of choosing to highlight fictitious, African worlds, instead of opting to reflect of our actual world; and the lack of African talent behind the camera to realize the project, I was less than impressed.
Though I was disappointed, viewers were enthralled, and the box-office reflected that, prompting Hollywood to pay attention. And since then, there’s been a minuscule uptick of African stories in Western entertainment. But those portrayals are not without their significant faults, and even though conversations about diversity in entertainment have evolved since Black Panther, Hollywood still can’t seem to get it right when it comes to African representation. Why? The bar is low. Down in the gutter low.
That complacency radiates in every aspect of the creative process of developing our stories. First, a gross lack of African creatives at the core of the project and behind the camera. Unfortunately, the few times African stories are told by the West, there is often little effort to include African people in the process of creating that project. Movies like Black Panther may seem more evolved than its predecessors, like Coming to America or Blood Diamond, but it still neglected to lean on actual African people to guide the process of telling authentic African stories.
“Hollywood has had a nasty history of proudly producing African stories while either actively erasing or thoughtlessly excluding the tangible inclusion of African storytellers and their specific POV in critical decision-making pockets,” Kenyan filmmaker and African film scholar Silas Miami explains.
The result is what we see all too often— African characters that are confused and often fall into tropes. The former is particularly egregious when it comes to the way African characters speak in these projects. More often than not, and regardless of the characters actual ethnic background, their accents sound like a sonic caricature of a Nigerian accent. Black Panther saw its characters speak Xhosa, a South African language, in such an accent (which, in and of itself, was a battle with the franchise’s studio). As did Will Smith as Dr. Bennet Omalu in Concussion and Grace Saif as Ani Achola in the final seasons of Netflix’s controversial teen drama Thirteen Reasons Why. It’s a lazy and thoughtless approach that is the complete erasure of the nuances of African dialects, particularly colloquialism that recognize us as a modern people.
“The issue persists due to a lack of African voices in storytelling and decision making roles in Hollywood,” film editor and VFX artist Prince Tido agrees. “Many projects are shaped by external perceptions rather than authentic experiences. To change this, there needs to be more collaboration with African filmmakers, writers, and consultants, and a commitment to authentic, multidimensional storytelling.”
But for Miami, who wrote Netflix’s Disconnect, a Kenyan film, it’s not just about collaborating. He argues, “Hollywood truly overestimates the usefulness of its role within the fabric of African storytelling because it refuses to be honest about its capacity for equitable collaboration with African storytellers.”
“Let’s do quick math – If Jimmy has ten apples and Africa has violent, exploitative and persistent colonial legacies to contend with, then true collaboration cannot exist without partnerships grounded in sincere curiosity and a commitment to true equity,” he adds. “Not Equality – Equity.”
To play devil’s advocate, a part of me understands why Hollywood has approached African representation the way it has. Though film industries across the continent have existed since the 1960s, our film sectors are still small, and currently negotiating with their own identity crises. Hollywood’s catch-all strategy for its African characters could be a bid for Pan-Africanism, an effort to represent many African cultures to feel accessible to Africans and a global audience. It’s an understandable intention, but not without its deserving critiques.
“All approaches are valid, but I’d like us to be truthful about the practical limitations of Pan-Africanism (of which there are a few) so we can expand beyond them,” Miami explains. “While the ideology’s intentions were valiant, Pan-Africanism has long struggled to deliver lasting transformation across various political and economic scales. Still – if we are to challenge the rampant misrepresentation of African identities in media, then we are seeking liberation from a dishonest gaze.”
So where do we go from here? First, Hollywood needs to do its due diligence and find African creatives to collaborate with in efforts to tell authentic, African stories. We don’t need humble budgets offered as philanthropic tribute to realize our projects locally (and exclusively locally). We need to be in the driver seat of our own stories, just as Hollywood has started to find a way to let other communities of color lead their own narratives, from start to finish. And as Africans, our role in this mistreatment of our truths is that we are not outspoken enough about it. We need to demand more, and raise our own bar for how African stories are told internally and externally.
I’m an optimist, so I’ll likely go see the third installment of Black Panther. Not with bated breath, or crossed fingers, but with the small hope that the franchise finally gets it, gets us, right.
