Joe Robert Cole on Chadwick Boseman’s Passing, Not Recasting T’Challa & Black Panther Theories

Screenwriter Joe Robert Cole spoke with The Hollywood Reporter on the red carpet of ‘Black Panther: Wakanda Forever.’

Transcript

00:00How was it adjusting this script this time around, obviously with the loss of Chadwick,

00:03which has been such a heavy, heavy loss that's been felt, sort of working around that?

00:08And did you ever think about recasting the Black Panther in a certain type of way?

00:11Or how did you make that transition?

00:13Well, it was difficult.

00:15You know, obviously Chad meant a lot to all of us.

00:19And when we decided to not recast, you know, the way it affected the story was obviously

00:27our narrative had to incorporate his death, T'Challa's death.

00:31And so it kind of drove our narrative from that point forward and helped us to find our theme,

00:40which is overcoming loss and overcoming grief.

00:43And so as we were working on the script and the film subsequently,

00:49we're going through what our characters are going through.

00:51You know, we're working through.

00:53So it's a very personal process for us.

00:55Yes. Is there sort of like an, what's the experience like working on the second part in a franchise?

01:00Like, what does that feel like for you as a writer and sort of like stepping into that world

01:04and just sort of carrying the story forward in terms of just characters too more generally?

01:09And like, yeah.

01:10You know, it's a great question because you know a lot of the characters in a personal way.

01:16And so there's an ease sliding into their voice and emotionally where they are.

01:24But then we've expanded, you know, the universe of Black Panther.

01:29And so it was exciting to add new characters to Notion, Namor, Namora, Tuma.

01:35And so just an entirely, entire new world that really took the model that we used for Wakanda

01:43and applied it to telecom.

01:46So a different world.

01:47Yeah.

01:47And finally, too, there's been so many fan theories online.

01:50I don't know if you keep yourself posted on all that,

01:53but like people guessing who the next Black Panther is.

01:55And do you think anybody's been right that you've seen?

01:57There's a million theories out there.

02:01So somebody's probably right, but I'm not going to tell you which one.

02:05Okay, thank you so much.

02:06Nice meeting you.