The one thing we cannot do after losing "Black Panther"

Chadwick Boseman wanted the titular role as King T'Challa in "Black Panther" so badly that he prayed for it. A deeply religious Christian man, this wasn't an "all I want for Christmas" style wish or just another Hollywood competitive moment. He contemplated and comprehended deeply the weight and the heft of the momentous Panther mantle. He wore the responsibility authentically and meaningfully, as he did in biopics where he appeared as Jackie Robinson, James Brown, and Thurgood Marshall; but in his portrayal of T'Challa, he brought much of himself into that Vibranium suit. And now that Chadwick Boseman's soul has departed this world, we are all left with a sizable hole in our hearts... and a substantial responsibility to honor and continue the work he undertook. The one thing we CAN'T do with our grief... is nothing at all.

The impact of Chadwick's portrayal of King of Wakanda cannot be understated. As a white woman, I am decidedly ill-equipped and brutally unqualified to find the right words to express the magnitude of this loss. Suffice it to say, few of us will ever forget the first time we ever saw someone like ourselves projected onto the silver screen as powerful, iconic, and heroic... how we left the theater with a little more bounce in our steps, feeling renewed confidence, and ,maybe even a whisper of superhuman strength. For far too many Americans, that moment had only just arrived in February (Black History Month) of 2018 with Black Panther. All of us are indebted to Chadwick Boseman for his selflessness in continuing to portray T'Challa for years beyond his 2016 cancer diagnosis. So are we all responsible to the children whose hearts he made soar, and whose experiences he validated and uplifted, that they should not have to yearn long for more. The man who threw open the gates to Wakanda for the world while battling cancer did the heavy lifting. Support, love, and share media that celebrates Black heroes and voices.

One such voice belongs to Ryan Coogler, director of Black Panther. He has written one of the most moving obituaries I've read yet for the man who brought the legend to life. I humbly suggest reading the whole article as you honor and celebrate and grieve the loss of a hero, onscreen and off.

"I inherited Marvel and the Russo Brothers’ casting choice of T’Challa. It is something that I will forever be grateful for. The first time I saw Chad’s performance as T’Challa, it was in an unfinished cut of “Captain America: Civil War.” I was deciding whether or not directing “Black Panther” was the right choice for me. I’ll never forget, sitting in an editorial suite on the Disney Lot and watching his scenes. His first with Scarlett Johansson as Black Widow, then, with the South African cinema titan, John Kani as T’Challa’s father, King T’Chaka. It was at that moment I knew I wanted to make this movie. After Scarlett’s character leaves them, Chad and John began conversing in a language I had never heard before. It sounded familiar, full of the same clicks and smacks that young Black children would make in the States. The same clicks that we would often be chided for being disrespectful or improper. But, it had a musicality to it that felt ancient, powerful, and African.

In my meeting after watching the film, I asked Nate Moore, one of the producers of the film, about the language. “Did you guys make it up?” Nate replied, “That’s Xhosa, John Kani’s native language. He and Chad decided to do the scene like that on set, and we rolled with it.” I thought to myself. “He just learned lines in another language, that day?” I couldn’t conceive how difficult that must have been, and even though I hadn’t met Chad, I was already in awe of his capacity as actor.

I learned later that there was much conversation over how T’Challa would sound in the film. The decision to have Xhosa be the official language of Wakanda was solidified by Chad, a native of South Carolina, because he was able to learn his lines in Xhosa, there on the spot. He also advocated for his character to speak with an African accent, so that he could present T’Challa to audiences as an African king, whose dialect had not been conquered by the West."

 Rest in power, King. #WakandaForever