In the hours since the release of the newest trailer for Marvel Studios’ “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever,” one of the more talked about points is its depiction of Namor – complete with his winged ankles in flight.
In a trailer breakdown piece on EW, writer-director Ryan Coogler says he leaned into the stranger parts of Marvel lore to create the film version of Namor, saying you have to embrace some of the odder parts including the foot wings, pointy ears and speedos:
“I think with making these types of movies, you’ve got to lean into the weird stuff, or you risk missing what makes it fun. [Namor’s] got really unique features and things that don’t necessarily go together. He can breathe underwater, obviously, but he’s got these little wings on his ankles. He’s got pointy ears and walks around in his underwear. It’s all fun, man.”
Coogler began outlining the sequel soon after the first film arrived, but had to rework the script in the wake of Chadwick Boseman’s death. Coogler calls the filmmaking process as “cathartic” and helped many cast and crew who were grappling with grief:
“I had to find a way that I felt like I could keep going and a way that our ‘Black Panther’ family could keep going. I started to come up with a film that had elements of the film that we had just finished writing, but also applied the themes that the people who were hurting just as much as me could actually perform and execute and come out on the other side whole.”
One switch up is the film ditched the spherical camera lenses of the first for anamorphic ones. Coogler says the film has the “fog of loss” over it and anamorphic lenses warp the image a little bit.
“Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” hits cinemas on November 11th.
