Black Panther: Wakanda Forever was released this week to mostly positive reviews from audiences and critics alike. The film concludes Phase 4 of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. It follows the nation of Wakanda mourning the loss of T’Challa while dealing with a new threat in the form of Namor. The sequel features a number of characters from the first Black Panther film, including Letitia Wright’s Shuri, Angela Bassett’s Ramonda, and Danai Gurira’s Okoye, and is Phase 4’s longest film to date, clocking in at 2 hours and 41 minutes.
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Black Panther: Wakanda Forever producer teases director’s cut scenes
Marvel Studios is not known for providing extended or director’s cuts of MCU films. Meanwhile, it appears that Ryan Coogler has a director’s cut of Black Panther: Wakanda Forever. Producer Nate Moore revealed the teasing details of differences between the already lengthy new addition to the MCU and its alternate cut during an interview with Collider. He said:
“There’s some from the Director’s Cut that didn’t make it forward. There’s some that we played with for a long time, and screened, and screened multiple times. We’re notorious for tinkering a lot in editorial and trying things. Ryan, by the way, is as well. So, things are in, things are out. ‘What about this over here?’ So, some are closer to completion, some are pretty raw.
“There’s certainly a scene with Okoye and Ayo after Okoye has been fired that’s really interesting. That, again, I think is incredibly watchable. It just slowed the pace down of the movie a little bit. But you get to see, Okoye react to the new General, and you get to see what she was planning to do before the events of Namor, and the Talocan coming to Wakanda happen. It’s actually pretty cool.”
Will it release?
Although the prospect of a director’s cut of Black Panther: Wakanda Forever is likely to excite many fans, the MCU has never released any extended movie cuts in the past. Moore himself doubts that Coogler’s director’s cut will ever be released because producers and filmmakers typically agree on the theatrical cut being the definitive version of the film. Moore previously revealed the existence of a 4-hour director’s cut of the original Black Panther. He also doubted its release for similar reasons, such as unfinished visual effects and music. Having said that, Moore teases that the deleted scenes might release in some other form in the future.
Some scenes inevitably had to be trimmed from a film with such a lengthy runtime to make it more streamlined. Coogler ultimately decided that adding the Okoye deleted scene would slow down the flow of Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, despite the fact that Moore describes it as an intriguing addition that would help to further explain her state of mind after being demoted in Wakanda. The other cut scenes probably served similar functions and somehow didn’t fit into the final product.
With that said do you think MCU should release these extended movie cuts? Let us know in the comments down below.
