I was surprised at first for Okoye to get a new dial here but in hindsight it makes sense and not just for the Midnight Angel armor - she's also got a bit of a different role in this film, and Ramonda's rebuke of her is crushing. Also good call on why both of these Black Panther films are stand-outs of their "phases" - in both the villain is so compelling because the villain isn't wrong. Killmonger isn't wrong that systematic oppression and injustice terrorizes people of color around the world and Wakanda could fix it all - he's wrong in that his idea of "fixing it" is "using that tech to beat colonizers at their own game". And Namor isn't wrong to believe that outsiders cannot be trusted or that they will never see the riches of Wakanda or Atlantis as anything more than treasure to be plundered - it's his "you're with me against them, or we're against each other" mindset that makes him villainous. They both make for amazing, incredible villains that just barely don't steal the show.

You nailed it; if not for the Midnight Angel armor, you wouldn't be seeing an Okoye dial this round. Much as I love Michaela Coel, Aneka didn't stand out enough to me to warrant dialing. I think it came down to the movie just having too many characters.

The interesting thing about WAKANDA FOREVER and BLACK PANTHER is how long both movies feel. Coogler takes his time with each and scenes feel a bit more meditative than you'd expect from a mega-budgeted action movie. I hope that he'll be the showrunner of the rumored Wakanda-centric Disney+ series, as I feel like those narrative sensibilities would be more at home there and give all of the characters more time to shine.

As to your (correct) point about the villains, it's interesting hearing some of the criticism Marvel Studios has taken for villains like Killmonger, Namor, Flag Smasher. When their villains clearly have the high moral ground, the narrative cop-out is to have them kill people to overwrite whatever point they have. I'd love to see an alternate version of these movies where the protagonists are forced to concede to the "villain's" point and work to improve society...

...and discover the real villains who wanted nothing to change...

Little late to the party here, but I agree with what's been said so far and love the dials to go with it!

I do definitely think this film mirrored my feelings on the first one and left me feeling like the antagonist was just about the best part of it. I'll save my thoughts on Namor for when he pops up but I've definitely got some things to say about him (all mostly positive).

This movie's handling of grief and acceptance definitely hit me right in a time where I was going through a lot of similar emotions, so I feel like the movie ended up getting some extra bonus points from me by way of catharsis. Even putting that aside though, I feel this movie tackled those themes very well overall. I feel pretty confident saying this was the best film overall to come out of Phase 4 just from a quality and writing perspective (although admittedly I still haven't gotten around to watching Eternals...oops).

My thanks, friend! I'm glad this is all feeling good so far.

Thank you sharing that too; from your brilliant and touching Death dial, it's clear that you're all too familiar with these themes lately. What strikes me about WAKANDA FOREVER is how it doesn't present grieving as a straight line. We once discussed how BIG HERO 6's story structure follows the stages of grieving, but everyone's emotions in WAKANDA FOREVER seems to wax and wane, grief coming in waves, sometimes more than we can bear, sometimes mere background noise. There's a rawness to it here, a frankness to it that I truly respect; it allows humanity and exploration into the grieving process in a way that doesn't feel like something one "gets past" but something one learns to accept in one way or another.

Very easy to see WAKANDA FOREVER as the best of Phase 4, but hoooooooo I'm very curious to know what you'd make of THE ETERNALS!

Director Ryan Coogler indicated that his original plans for WAKANDA FOREVER were for T’Challa to meditate on his role as monarch and to compare/contrast with Namor’s rule. The two of them were meant to form a brotherly bond that would be shaken apart by philosophical differences. Unfortunately, this was not to be. Along with that lost plotline came the loss of T’Challa’s outreach program, hastily retconned into Ramonda circling the wagons around Wakanda after France’s incursion (boss move in that U.N. hearing, right?).

I take Ironheart’s inclusion as a residual subplot of T’Challa’s outreach program (and as an obvious next-project MCU tease). While not necessarily underprivileged (look at her lab! She’s rich!), she seems like an obvious beneficiary of the outreach program, given that she masters how to track vibranium and that her Ironheart suit is only completed after arriving in Wakanda. She’s also the consistently lighthearted element of the script, and I suspect she’d have felt less out of place in the original script. As it stands, she feels like one plot element too many, a sidequest that pads the movie without adding significantly to it.



#171 Ironheart
Real Name: Riri Williams
Team: No Affiliation
Range: 5
Points: 60
Keywords: Wakanda, Scientist, Armor

9 11 18 3

8 11 18 3

7 11 17 2

7 11 18 3

6 10 17 3

6 10 17 2

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

Vibranium Repulsors: Penetrating/Psychic Blast & Force Blast. // This turn, if Ironheart makes a ranged attack without moving, she deals +1 Damage.

I LOVE THIS DIAL!!!!!

Many thanks, friend! I'm glad you like it! I was hoping to make it feel like Ramonda's UN appearance, where behind the scenes she'd been directing the Dora Milaje and had gotten the drop on France C;

Love this Ironheart dial… if they give us a new Ironheart dial soon I hope it’s something like this.

Many thanks, friend! Glad this one feels cool!

Truth be told, I scratched my head with this one. Riri just seemed like another Iron Man. Wasn't until I consulted my ideas for the first movie that I came up with a variation on their "Wakanda Forever!" trait.

Ooh, I hadn't noticed that callback. Very nice!

Haha my thanks! I don't credit myself with too much elegance in set design, but it's nice when it works out C:

Everything with Everett Ross & Valentina de Fontaine also feels a bit out of place. Yes, Ross was a big part of the first movie which used him better, but Ross & de Fontaine’s subplot doesn’t feel like it meaningfully goes anywhere. Sure, I like that de Fontaine is less of a comedy character than in her previous two appearances, but she just seems here to remind us that she’s gonna be a thing in CAP 4: NEW WORLD ORDER and THE THUNDERBOLTS.

If I’m reading the tealeaves, there’s a ton of emphasis put on the United States wanting vibranium and an increasing willingness to get it at any cost. I’d be amazed if the Thunderbolts weren’t ordered on a black ops mission to cripple Wakanda and seize its resources. If not that, the board seem set for a US-Wakandan war. I’d be very interested to see a worldstate where Wakanda handily won that conflict…



#172 Talokan Warrior & Siren
Team: No Affiliation
Range: 0
Points: 50
Keywords: Talokan, Warrior

9 11 18 3

8 11 18 3

7 11 17 2

7 10 17 2

6 10 17 2

KO KO KO KO

9 11 18 1

8 11 18 1

7 11 17 1

7 10 17 1

6 10 17 1

KO KO KO KO

Warriors & Sirens: Talokan Warrior/Siren may begin the game on click #1 or #7.
Hypnotic Song: 6. Force Blast, and Talokan Siren may choose the direction the affected character is knocked back.

Great dials here.

Riri is a lot of fun. I wish we would see more trade off powers that make you think and choose whether to run and gun or stay still and shoot.

Queen Ramonda is great. I'm still mad we never got a combat dial a la her appearance in What If. But this dial perfectly captures her appearance in Wakanda Forever. The leadership power is wonderful. I wish we could see more bonuses when Leadership is successful to show different flavors and levels of leadership.

Love the split dial on the Warrior and Siren. I think most people would have gone for straight Mind Control on the Soren but the power here more accurately represents what happened in the film. I wish there were more ways to damage them after the movement, like the old open sky maps. You could walk them off a cliff

Hey, huge thanks for all this, friend! Glad this all feels great!

I still mourn the loss of pre-2021 RCE & CCE-- they were great for creating choices players had to make. They added a great level of strategy. The SP was definitely made with those kinds of choices in mind.

You never know, we might start seeing more Leadership abilities like this down the line... at some point, I'm sure Wizkids will tire of Leadership being a generic-generating device XD

You read my mind on the Sirens-- that's exactly why I made the SP that way. Thankfully Wizkids has brought back fall damage, so there are more options for the SP instead of just moving characters into killboxes. But hey, I'll never turn down a good killbox C;

You know what doesn’t change much in the MCU? The worldstate. Sure, the Sokovia Accords were signed, but were they ever meaningfully enforced? Were heroes ever truly on the run? We never saw what happened to Captain America between CIVIL WAR and INFINITY WAR. Maybe he and his team just cruised around. Maybe there were no threats. Nothing seems to have changed in space. We don’t know what Captain Marvel was doing up there, but I’d sure like to see more of her solo adventures.

I bring this up because CIVIL WAR sure seemed like it wanted to set up the post-Civil War-era superhero registration act, but paid it only lip service. If it wanted to set up Dark Reign, nothing came of it. The Blip seemed to have been a thing that happened, but outside of people mentioning it, it’s rarely explored in the MCU, if at all. It’s only textual to FALCON & THE WINTER SOLDIER, but it’s meaningless in nearly every other work. Did it impact Wakanda at all? Sure doesn’t seem like it.

That’s all to say that the MCU’s big continuity seems to be characters, locations, and broad ideas; not an evolving worldstate. Just something to consider.



#173 Namora & Attuma
Team: No Affiliation
Range: 0
Points: 50
Keywords: Talokan, Warrior

9 11 18 2

8 11 18 2

7 11 18 2

6 11 18 2

6 11 18 2

KO KO KO KO

9 11 17 3

8 11 17 3

7 11 17 3

6 11 17 3

6 11 17 3

KO KO KO KO

Namora or Attuma: Namora or Attuma may begin the game on Click #1 or Click #7.
Water Bomb: 5 & Energy Explosion, and after Namora uses it, she may use Force Blast on all characters in the area of effect.
Brutal Warrior: Toughness & Combat Reflexes. When an opponent misses Attuma with a Close attack, deal them 1 damage.

I initially hadn't planned to dial these two, thinking that their tactics were too similar to the generic Talokan warriors and that they weren't narratively significant. It wasn't until my rewatch that I remembered that Attuma's fighting style feels distinctive, calculated, and brutal. I also saw that I hadn't adapted the water bombs in any capacity. Namora offered a good opportunity for that.