DCEU’s possibilities to compete with Black Panther
LONDON, ENGLAND – NOVEMBER 04: Actor Ray Fisher attends the ‘Justice League’ photocall at The College on November 4, 2017 in London, England. (Photo by Tim P. Whitby/Getty Images)
Which black superheroes can the DCEU use to compete against Black Panther?
Marvel’s latest film Black Panther is quite the success! Thanks to its opening President’s Day weekend, the film is already out-grossing the DCEU’s Justice League. The box office continues to climb into the second weekend. Critics and fans are up in arms with excitement. African-Americans across the country are happy to finally have a hero of their own. No doubt, Warner Bros. is seeing the numbers and the social media reaction. Hence, they have to be asking themselves with the DCEU – “how do we get in on this?” Luckily, DC Comics already has plenty of black superheroes to choose from.
5. Cyborg
The first of our black superheroes is obvious and easy. The character already exists in the DCEU. Cyborg already has an actor and a role in 2017’s Justice League. Hence, Warner Bros. already has the basics to construct a film. Even before Justice League‘s release, there has been rumor and speculation about a Cyborg film. At one point DCEU had a release date of 2020 for the film. Nothing else has been said if this is still the case, but many are not holding out.
Sadly, not many fans are on-board with a Cyborg film. Part of the problem is people do not want to detach him from groups such as Teen Titans and now the Justice League. Strangely, they do not want to see him as an individual. A Cyborg film can impress two audiences though if comic-book fans – African-Americans and people with disabilities.
Cyborg hardly fits the traditional African-American stereotype you may see or hear a lot. He lives with a single parent, though it is his father. Plus, his father is a brilliant scientist. It seems most of the time the cliché’ is the single black mother with a runaway father. Yes, Cyborg’s father can be absentee sometimes, but this is due to him burying himself in his work and wanting to help the world. Not because of his socioeconomic status. The last time I can recall this particular African-American family arrangement was in John Singleton’s Boyz n the Hood.
Finally on the disabled front, Ray Fisher had this to say…
"“I’ve had lots of fans who come out and say ‘Listen, I can relate to Cyborg because I lost a limb,’ or ‘I have this cochlear implant.’ It’s one of those things when you actually start seeing it, when you actually start hearing about it, that made Cyborg more relevant to me than I think he ever had been up until that point.”"
This notion of Cyborg representing the disabled is something truly new. Part of it is his disability or life alteration is not something you can easily conceal like most characters who gain powers and mutant abilities. Cyborg has to live with them out in the open. He has to be looked upon differently since he has no way to conceal his alterations. Hence, it is not that different from someone in a wheelchair who cannot easily hide that they cannot walk.