Every Main Character In Black Panther: Wakanda Forever Ranked Worst To Best

Richard Schiff is an excellent actor. He made Aaron Sorkin's walk-and-talks look like waltzing throughout "The West Wing." He's made every movie he's in a little bit better, from "Se7en" to "The Lost World" to "Black Panther: Wakanda Forever." That's why it's painful to report that who Richard Schiff plays in "Wakanda Forever" is somewhat ambiguous in the film. IMDb lists his character as the U.S. Secretary of State, but I don't think he's addressed as such in the movie. He's an ambassador to the United Nations on behalf of America, who doesn't actually have to be the Secretary of State. (For example, Joe Biden appointed Linda Thomas-Greenfield, who is not Antony Blinken.)

The reason I'm waxing poetic about diplomatic positions and not Richard Schiff's role in "Wakanda Forever" is that there's no role there. Schiff makes it feel like there are whenever he's on-screen; this is no indictment of him. It's a lamentation that "Wakanda Forever" got Toby Ziegler in the Marvel Cinematic Universe as government brass and left him out to dry, one of the very few ways this movie disappoints. Pour one out for anyone who wanted Schiff to do anything remotely interesting in the "Black Panther" sequel, and raise a toast to Schiff for getting that well-deserved Marvel money.

In the Marvel comics, Namora is Talokan royalty with a decade's rich history. Here, she's Namor's muscle; that isn't objectively bad. Recent Marvel movies have made a poor habit of being overstuffed, and not diving into when Namora defended Atlantis from a mobster named Stomp Richards is wise. That said, there's little room for Namora (Mabel Cadena) to blossom in "Wakanda Forever." She gets grace notes in some solid action sequences and serves the absolutely iconic look pictured above. Notably, one of the film's final scenes also hints at bigger, more resentment-fueled character development for her down the road. 

Cadena's performance as Namora is also low-key astounding. The actress had to learn both Mayan and English for the role and convey the deadly ease of a supremely gifted warrior. She does and then some. Again, this isn't about Namora being a bad character. It's about the fact that there are richer characters in this story, or ones with more to do than Namora in an almost overstuffed movie. She'll get 'em next time.

Who is Valentina "Val" Allegra de Fontaine (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) in the MCU? Over three increasingly sizable appearances, Val's been a professional pot-stirrer. In "Black Widow," she was a high-level government operative who helped Yelena (Florence Pugh) track down Clint Barton (Jeremy Renner). In "The Falcon and the Winter Soldier," Val went into recruitment mode and gave U.S. Agent (Wyatt Russell) his codename and a new suit despite the fact he publically murdered someone. Now, she's the director of the CIA, played with gusto by Louis-Dreyfuss, who will be a major cog in "Thunderbolts." The thing is Val only sort of works as a cohesive character in "Wakanda Forever" and the MCU at large. That's disconcerting.

Why? For all intents and purposes, the Everett Ross and Val subplot is the weakest element of "Black Panther: Wakanda Forever." It makes sense that Ross reenters the fold and Val heads the CIA — not to mention being Ross' ex gives her a place in this story. But it almost all amounts to sound and fury signifying nothing. Post-credits scenes aside, expansions to this universe are most effective when they don't feel forced to do so. Val is a joy to watch and compellingly motivated, but the sum of her role here seems like an addition from corporate brass. 

There's an old adage that there are no small parts, only small actors. Accordingly, it doesn't matter how many lines you have because it's what you do with what you have that counts. Alex Livinalli, who plays Namor's trusted warrior Attuma, is not a small actor. Physically, he's massive. But Livinalli also seizes on Attuma's most important scene and makes it count for all its worth. In the span of one excellent fight with Okoye (Danai Gurira), Attuma reveals his value system and becomes one of the film's most formidable foes, all by saying very little.

Attuma values combat. It is the proving ground of one's worth as a person. When he battles Okoye it isn't just to apprehend Riri Williams (Dominique Thorne), it's to understand Okoye's mettle, make it unworthy, and end it. The fight is impeccably staged. It carries the real threat of danger, and that threat proves vital to making the film's heartbreaking second act feel properly foreshadowed. With very little screen time, Attuma shows us who he is and necessarily shifts the tone and course of "Wakanda Forever." No small parts or actors, indeed.

When I first made a list of all the characters in "Black Panther: Wakanda Forever," I accidentally left Ayo (Florence Kasumba) and Aneka (Michaela Coel) out. This speaks volumes about what the two characters actually do in "Wakanda Forever." It's fantastic that the two are in a relationship and offer queer representation within the world of Wakanda. It's a little heartbreaking that said relationship is ostensibly revealed through tossed-off dialogue and given little to no breathing room within the movie. It's also great that Aneka favors Shuri's new daggers over the Dora Milaje's spears, but that's almost all there is to her character apart from her relationship.

Again, this movie is filled with characters and some inevitably get the short shrift. It's disappointing that Ayo, who received three-dimensional treatment in "The Falcon and the Winter Soldier," is one of them. There's nothing wrong whatsoever about either of these characters or what they offer. Still, both Ayo and Aneka rank near the middle because prior MCU projects or the actors who play them suggest much more is possible. Here's hoping.

Nakia feels like a character with still untapped riches. It's not just because she's played by Lupita Nyong'o, who seems capable of doing anything as a performer; it's because, for two "Black Panther" movies in a row, the most interesting facets of her character have existed more on the films' margins than right within them. She is the love of T'Challa's life, but more of that love is spoken of than seen. She is capable of deep undercover work, but again, in "Black Panther," we hear about this more than witness it.

Both these elements receive some course correction in "Black Panther: Wakanda Forever." Even if it's impossible to see T'challa and Nakia together again, Nakia succinctly gets at the heart of their relationship through her grief: "He was King and Black Panther to everyone else, but to me ... he was everything. He was my T'Challa." T'Challa was Nakia's gravity, a love that shifted Earth. Crucially, then, we finally see Nakia on her own without T'Challa. Not only has she built an entire school on her own terms in Haiti, but Nakia also uses her resources alone to uncover the location of Tlālōcān, a city civilization hasn't found for centuries. She goes into battle and catalyzes Shuri to finish her synthesized sacred herb. "Wakanda Forever" shows us who Nakia is. No wonder T'Challa froze.

By my metric, M'Baku (Winston Duke) gets both the funniest and wisest lines of dialogue in "Black Panther: Wakanda Forever." The former is "you bald-headed demon," aimed at Okoye during a tribal council meeting, an insult no one but he could fling at her and hope to emerge unscathed. It's a moment that highlights the Jabari Tribe leader's unwavering confidence. As importantly, that confidence is integral to M'Baku's charisma. At this moment, we can see exactly why men and women follow him into battle and live under his rule.

We also saw examples of that in "Black Panther," though. "Wakanda Forever" gives us more. At the funeral of Queen Ramonda, M'Baku comes to Shuri for guidance. He wants to know if people should take refuge on Jabari lands in the wake of Namor's attack on the royal palace and surrounding city. Shuri, heartbroken, asks why he is coming to a child for advice. M'Baku says that she has experienced too much loss and sees too much horror in the world to be a child anymore.

Up until this moment, M'Baku has been the "Black Panther" franchise's favorite blunt instrument and all the more effective for being so. Here, we see his softness. Here, we learn there is wisdom and empathy, and patience behind his bravado. "Wakanda Forever" makes M'Baku a more layered character without sacrificing the qualities that made him appealing in the first place. It's a tremendous balancing act.

In the end, for Queen Ramonda, it was all about the furious statement and question from the first "Wakanda Forever" trailer: "I am queen of the most powerful nation in the world and my entire family is gone. Have I not given everything?"

The answer was "no." Queen Ramonda sacrifices herself for Riri at the midpoint of "Wakanda Forever," bringing the movie's meditation on loss and death front and center. Up until that moment, it has wrestled with a passing that occurred off-screen in every sense. But the real-life circumstances that informed T'Challa's absence give "Wakanda Forever" a different weight than most comic-book movies. When Ramonda passes, we are forced to see a character beloved by the audience and Wakandans alike pass away. That makes Ramonda one of the film's most vital characters.

That passing only matters if the way she lives throughout "Wakanda Forever" also soars. It does. For my money, the single most electric scene of Ryan Coogler's film is Queen Ramonda addressing the United Nations. That scene reveals Ramonda is a grieving mother who understands she will never get the chance to grieve in actual peace, no matter how many rituals she performs. She knows what the world whispers. For world powers, the death of T'Challa is a moment of Wakandan weakness. Her grief is their gain. Ramonda, with poise, cunning, and barely contained fury, proves them wrong. It's a model any person would be lucky to follow if they were capable of, and proof that Ramonda is one of the MCU's all-time great characters.

T'Challa is a character in "Black Panther: Wakanda Forever." He may die off-screen in the movie's prologue, but his presence haunts the film's every frame. Chadwick Boseman may be gone, but "Wakanda Forever" takes pains to process how he lived and bookend its epic superhero saga with grief and a period of mourning. The movie makes audiences participate in the meditative ritual Shuri becomes brave enough to undergo at the film's end. T'Challa is this film's most important character.

And here's the thing: All the "recast T'Challa" chatter that has popped up in the wake of the "Wakanda Forever" release is proof of how difficult it is for audiences to let this character go. Humans generally want heroes to get the death they deserve. The loss of Tony Stark was devastating but it's everything any fan of his could have hoped for him. That's not what T'Challa's death off-screen feels like. It's absolutely not, speaking as a cancer survivor, what colon cancer feels like either. Both are emotionally unsatisfying and horrifically mundane. T'Challa doesn't deserve that. Neither did Chadwick Boseman. But in refusing to let the Black Panther's fictitious passing be a balm, Ryan Coogler has actually forced audiences to reckon with how wonderful he was. Not every character can power an entire movie while barely appearing in it. T'Challa can and have it be a cathartic, unbelievable one at that. It's downright remarkable.

"Black Panther" posited that Shuri is a woman of science. "Black Panther: Wakanda Forever," for a split second, reveals that she is also a woman of faith. In the first moments of Ryan Coogler's movie, we hear Shuri praying that the ancestors spare her brother and give her the strength and ability to heal his disease. They do neither. Shuri goes on to reject rituals and throws herself into her lab work. When she later uses her scientifically created synthetic herb to perform the Black Panther ritual, she doesn't see her mother or brother on the ancestral plain — she sees Kilmonger. This isn't what she wanted from the Elders either. But it is, as Nakia points out, who and what she needed to see.

Shuri's story illuminates how having faith means absconding from what we want faith to yield to us. It suggests that, in truth, science and faith will always be connected in practice; it's institutions that keep them apart. To believe too strongly that something is meant to be (to try and right what's already happened) is the fastest path to vengeance and an unrighteous life. This is heady and morally complicated stuff for any hero's journey, much less one filling the shoes of an iconic character. Shuri and Letitia Wright are up to the task.

No one would've wanted this film for Shuri. Inexplicably, we're lucky we get it. Shuri becomes one of the most complicated, moving, and layered characters in the MCU by the end of "Wakanda Forever." There is no one more deserving of the top spot than her.