Marvel’s What If …? Season 1 Episode 2 Review: T’Challa Star-Lord
On August 28, 2020, the world was shocked to learn that Chadwick Boseman died due to colon cancer. People’s thoughts went through many things, including the shock at learning that he had colon cancer or losing such talent so young. Everyone agreed that he left a legacy. While there are many roles you can look to, none is more important than his role as Black Panther. His final role was voice work for Marvel’s What If, a wonderful tribute to the character. This episode shows just how important Boseman’s T’Challa was to the Marvel Cinematic Universe. It’s a great tribute and will be greatly missed.
Marvel’s What If…? is available to stream on Disney+. If you missed it last week, you could read about the first episode.
Story: A lot of impacts
Last week’s episode was more cautious about how large the what-if scenario would become. It was a beat-for-beat scenario, similar to Captain America. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing. But there might be more. This episode shows just how huge one decision can have an impact on the entire universe. The universe was changed dramatically when T’Challa was accidentally abducted as a small boy. Instead of becoming space pirates, the Ravagers became space Robin Hood and his band merry men by stealing from and giving to the rich.
It has so many minor and vast impacts that we get to witness them all. We learned that Thanos is now a Ravager who ally with the heroes early in the episode. These moments are a great example of the potential this series has. This episode is filled with so much lore and world-building that I’m sure people would love to see expanded. It’ll be great to see the adaptation of Star-Lord’s achievements. It will be a bad episode if they show all of them.
It looks like the episode will be similar to Guardians of the Galaxy, with Star-Lord taking the Power Stone. It’s still possible to imagine the concept, but there are many twists, like Korath discovering Star-Lord and starting fangirling while being beaten up. This is a great meta moment because DjimonHounsou portrayed T’Challa on the Black Panther series. As the Collector is robbed, the episode becomes a heist as the Ravagers take it from him. This episode is a thrilling action heist with traditional double-crosses as well as fun planning.
