Thaddeus Howze on Black Panther, Killmonger, T’Challa, and Young Men
Author(s): Scott Douglas Jacobsen
Publication (Outlet/Website): The Good Men Project
Publication Date (yyyy/mm/dd): 2018/08/15
Thaddeus Howze was a New York native and found his way to the West Coast as a consequence of his military service. He’s a California-based technology executive and author whose non-fiction and online journalism has appeared in publications such as The Enemy, Black Enterprise Online, Urban Times, the Good Men Project, and Astronaut.com. Thaddeus Howze has published two books, Hayward’s Reach (2011) and Broken Glass (2013). He maintains a nonfiction blog on science and technology at A Matter of Scale (bit.ly/matterofscale). He writes speculative fiction at hubcityblues.com. Here we talk about Wakanda, Killmonger, T’Challa, and young men.
The conversation started on the topic of the film, the Black Panther, and Wakanda and Erik Killmonger. I noted the brilliance of someone also consumed with anger and hate, and the way in which this took him – trapped him. This led to a question about the bad paths of some young men.
Howze stated, “Killmonger is a good example of a character who has all the right stuff. He is smart. He is capable. He has been to MIT. He is obviously a genius. He has been there. He has been in some type of program all his life. When he graduates from MIT, he goes out to work for the government and becomes a super spy, super soldier.”
He continued to comment on the scarification of Killmonger’s body as indicative of the people murdered by him. He killed to solve problems. However, Howze remarks the problem does not exist outside of Killmonger, but inside of him. He has trouble with channeling frustrations.
“His frustration with his family protocol. His family protocol is that he was the son of a diplomat in Wakanda. When his father, basically, went against the king’s rules, the king killed him and left the boy behind. Leaving him behind, he was left out of what he thought was his birthright, which was access to Wakanda and even the opportunity to be king if he could win the challenge,” Howze explained.
The issue for Killmonger, according to Howze, the less he had then the angrier he became at his predicament. Killmonger felt the missing potential. Then Howze related personal experience with personal challenges. An autism diagnosis did not exist before. He was accused of being incapable.
Howze, with a note on his son, continued, “As with my son now, he is autistic and dealing with the very same challenges. It is hard to get free of the frustration of people thinking that you are going to be less than you are or that you cannot achieve your goals.”
Relating back into personal experience, Howze spoke to the same frustration permeating all aspects of life for him. He became a “better worker, smarter worker, longer worker.” He did not want anyone to outwork or outfight him. However, Howze remarked, on a wise and touching note, hate was not – and is not – a good driver because hate consumes you.
“When you hate, it consumes you. You start to hate yourself. When I realized that was happening, I realized that I had to change where I was and start trying to like myself – giving me permission to make mistakes, giving me permission to learn, giving me permission to grow, and in a way that was positive,” Howze described.
Then I shifted the conversation into the Wakandan context, where I asked about the individual(s) who represented a healthier path in the narrative presented in the Black Panther. The character brought to the front and center of the conversation was T’Challa.
Howze said, “T’Challa is the exact opposite. T’Challa’s father does end up getting killed at a conference. The Black Panther, T’Challa, could not save him in time. He has his own griefs. His grief is that his father is passed. His father passed the mantle of the Black Panther on to him.”
With the rulership of Wakanda, T’Challa did not make a resolution with his father. T’Challa thought Wakanda should stop isolating itself. T’Challa’s father believed in the continued isolation of Wakanda from the rest of the world.
“After meeting Killmonger, he was even more of the belief that by separating themselves from the diaspora of Africa, such as it was with chattel slavery and the like, and isolating themselves from that,” Howze explained, “Ultimately, they feel that they have done a disservice to our brethren who have struggled all over the world. T’Challa came to grips with his frustration. “
In the spirit realm scene, T’Challa explicitly disagree with his father. T’Challa held anger and hate of the Western world. However, he channeled the emotional energy into something positive. Killmonger could not channel the anger into the positive.
“He channeled it, brilliantly. Except, it wasn’t a positive thing. When he finally achieved his goal, his goal was to destroy the world that he wanted to be a part of. That makes him a villain. That is what makes him a villain. He couldn’t channel his frustration effectively,” Howze opined.
Near the end of the conversation, we focused on the final portions of the film, where – spoiler alert (!) – Killmonger died. At the moment before death, Killmonger had a realization. I asked Howze about it.
Howze said, “For him, his realization was that if he opted to live then they were going to imprison him. They wouldn’t ever let him be free. As far as he was concerned, the only thing he had to live for was to be free. If the best you could offer him was being a slave or a prisoner, he would rather die.”
The slave and prisoner position for Killmonger was a lifelong struggle. Howze spoke to how Killmonger was, at a minimum, free, where he was king for a moment – even a bad one. He was okay with it.
Howze concluded, “He decided that was how he wanted to be remembered because so many of us die unremembered. He was going to die the king.”
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