From Racist Black Characters to 'Black Panther,' We've Come So Far

By Terry Crews, USA TODAY

20 February 18

n 1915, D.W. Griffith’s The Birth of A Nation (originally titled The Clansmen) was the first American motion picture screened at the White House. The film featured a romanticized, heroic view of the Ku Klux Klan, while blacks, in particular, were presented as evil, conniving, violent rapists.

Portrayed with righteous fervor by white actors, some in blackface, the film was enthusiastically praised by President Woodrow Wilson, who is reported to have gushed, “It is like writing history with lightning, and my only regret is that it is all so terribly true.”

I’ve often said that history doesn’t give a damn if it’s true or not, what matters is who’s telling it. The same goes for mythology. The first modern comic book, Action Comics, featuring Superman, was created in 1938, smack dab in the middle of American segregation, and popular myths created by these books were never kind to blacks. Read and consumed by children, these books infected the culture of the day with racist black characters like Ebony White, Whitewash Jones and Steamboat.

Which brings us to Marvel’s Black Panther, an unapologetically black superhero movie depicting an African warrior/king from the fictional country of Wakanda. There have been successful films characterizing black superheroes before, notably Blade with Wesley Snipes, but none with a mostly black cast, black director and, amazingly, a black writer. Even the soundtrack is executive produced by a black record label.

It doesn’t disappoint, tackling action, humor and intense drama that finally, to my relief, wasn’t race-related. It was extremely satisfying to witness African-themed costumes, technology and warfare, but most of all, to see black people onscreen as full-fledged human beings, not just a sidekick or comic relief until the real hero shows up. Also, the film’s empowerment of its fierce female heroes rivals last year’s ground-breaking Wonder Woman, handling two sides of the typically marginalized coin with polished grace.

Listen to USA TODAY's geek culture podcast, The Mothership, break down ‘Black Panther’ and what it means for representation — both in superhero films and Hollywood at large.

As a black man growing up in the comic-book era, I remember seeing Christopher Reeve as Superman in 1978 and how happy I was to see a hero from those pages on the silver screen for the first time. “You will believe a man can fly” was the movie’s marketing tagline, and I was hooked.

One by one, I showed up for them all — Batman, Captain America, X-Men, Spider-Man — but I wondered, "How can black people be included in any of these movies, especially since their presence in the comic books that created them was so minimal?" When I was a teen, the main ones — Captain America’s sidekick The Falcon, Luke Cage and Black Panther — weren’t getting their own movie anytime soon.

I made do for years with black sports and music stars fulfilling the roles that were left out of the comics. My favorite book was Superman vs. Muhammad Ali, in which Ali actually beats Superman in a fair fight because Superman loses his superpowers. I had posters of Michael Jordan flying through the air, along with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s skyhook. In a knowledgeable nod to my experience as a teen, the poster of the album cover to Public Enemy’s It Takes A Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back is prominently featured several times in Black Panther. I could not hold back a smile, as I had that poster in my room as a teen and it even hangs in my office today. These men became our superheroes.

Seeing Black Panther in all its glory fulfills so many hopes and dreams I had as child. Adding this experience to things I wondered if I would ever see, like America having a black president, I smile again. 

Change may be slow and hard-fought, but as long as we never give up, it is inevitable.