Spoilers ahead of “Eyes of Wakanda.”
“Black Panther” still stands as one of the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s creative high points, and “Eyes of Wakanda” only adds to its already-impressive legacy. When the animated series was announced back in the winter of 2023, the premise of Wakandan warriors retrieving artifacts throughout history felt like the perfect expansion of the existing “Black Panther” lore. Moreover, some fans instantly noted the similarities between Erik “Killmonger” Stevens (Michael B. Jordan) and the stated mission of the show’s Wakandan “War Dogs,” leading them to wonder if we would get to see the beloved Marvel antagonist again. Well, the MCU fan-favorite does appear in “Eyes of Wakanda,” but not in the way you would think, and it’s the perfect sneaky nod to Killmonger’s first appearance in the franchise.
The first episode of “Eyes of Wakanda,” which is titled “Into the Lion’s Den,” focuses on Noni (Winnie Harlow), a former Dora Milaje warrior who’s tracking down The Lion (Cress Williams), another rogue Wakandan who made off with a bunch of vibranium artifacts and weapons. It’s vital that Noni stops The Lion before he grows powerful enough to begin a war with Wakanda, and it’s not hard to spot the parallels between their conflict and the one between T’Challa (Chadwick Boseman) and Killmonger in “Black Panther.” What’s more, it turns out special operatives have been undertaking similar missions for centuries, which deepens the weird ties that Killmonger has to his Wakandan lineage. Instead of returning those weapons home to be locked away in some vault, The Lion wants to take revenge for oppressed people by force.
All this gathering of Wakandan artifacts also got me wondering whether or not Killmonger was going to show up in “Eyes of Wakanda,” and the series’ final episode didn’t disappoint in that regard. Titled “The Last Panther,” this chapter follows two Wakandan operatives on an adventure that indirectly sets up the famous — and pivotal — scene where Killmonger pays a visit to the Museum of Great Britain in “Black Panther.” Indeed, as has become a motif in the MCU, it turns out Wakanda was responsible for creating one of its biggest problems years before it became an issue.
Eyes of Wakanda sets up Killmonger’s best scene in Black Panther
“The Last Panther” opens in the Ethiopian city of Adwa, circa 1896, and follows Prince Tafari’s adventure with his guard Kuda. They’re looking for a Wakandan artifact in a storage house, but that becomes harder due to an ongoing conflict between Italian military forces and Ethiopian resistance fighters. Tafari gets the gleaming hammer, and fans of “Black Panther” will immediately recognize it as having the same shape as the one that Killmonger sees in the British museum early in that film. If that was the only nod, that would be more than enough, but things go deeper for our odd couple, as evidenced by the fact that The Watcher is in the background of their mission after the title card rolls.
In Marvel Comics continuity, The Watcher only shows up for major league-level historical events, which is why it’s significant when he briefly appears in animated series like “X-Men ’97,” “Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man,” and now “Eyes of Wakanda.” We find out why when Kuda and Tafari eventually meet the titular “Last Panther” (Anika Noni Rose), who traveled back in time with the aid of a “Quantum Scanner.” As it turns out, their mission is to find the artifact that causes an apocalyptic alien invasion in the future and prevent it from falling into Wakandan hands before T’Challa’s run-in with Killmonger. In other words, “Eyes of Wakanda” literally uses Killmonger’s iconic moment to tell one of the coolest multiverse stories in the MCU’s entire Multiverse Saga to date.
Apparently, in the future timeline, humanity was set upon by some sort of insect horde and fell because Wakanda never adopted the integration philosophy that it developed after the events of “Black Panther.” In essence, T’Challa needed to meet Killmonger and fight over their differing views to ensure that Wakanda would be on-hand to help fend off these extraterrestrial invaders. However, he can’t do that if the axe isn’t in Adwa when it falls, because it has to cross through the black market over decades to make its way to the museum seen in “Black Panther.” It’s an inspired pull from the series’ creatives, showrunner Todd Harris included, and it’s made all the more poignant by the choice to make this adventure the one that occurs closest to the MCU’s present-day in “Eyes of Wakanda.”
Why Eyes of Wakanda is a successful addition to the MCU
Killmonger himself is a popular enough Marvel character that he continues to inspire spirited arguments years after both “Black Panther” and “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” released in theaters. That kind of emotional connection is rarer than we would like when it comes to comic book movies, and the choice to anchor the most ambitious story in “Eyes of Wakanda” to Killmonger pays off. A common complaint about this current cycle of “multiverse storytelling” is that its stories lack weight because it’s hard to attach stakes to conflicts when characters can be instantly replaced by their carbon copy variants from worlds we know very little about. And while I don’t share those complaints, “Eyes of Wakanda” nonetheless offers a workaround that a lot of people will respond well to thanks to its links to “Black Panther.”
No doubt, Marvel fans are going to theorize about what this means for the future timeline of Wakanda and if we’ll see “The Last Panther” again sometime soon. Rose, for her part, is no stranger to playing royalty, and many “Black Panther” fans probably love her performance as Princess Tiana in “The Princess and the Frog” too. Regardless, it’s a great way to craft another layer of connection with audiences, as Rose’s casting makes all the sense in the world. Meanwhile, the MCU’s TV shows have been on a hot streak for about a year now, and “Eyes of Wakanda” is arguably the first animated project that’s felt tailor-made to sit alongside the property’s live-action offerings. If there’s a lesson to be learned here, it’s that the MCU’s interconnectivity, when handled right, is more of a strength than something to be overcome.
“Eyes of Wakanda” is now streaming on Disney+.
