Black Panther: Post-Credits Scenes Explained

This article comes from Den of Geek UK.

Like all Marvel movies, if you wait until the end of Black Panther’s flashy credits you’ll be rewarded with an extra scene. And if you wait all the way to the very end of the credits, past the bit where they acknowledge the help of the City of Toronto (usually), you’ll get another.

The good news is that Black Panther breaks with recent tradition and rather than giving us one actual scene and one comedy scene, both of these have potential ramifications for what comes next in the MCU.

Post-credits scene 1

In a UN-style meeting room, T’Challa addresses a number of international government representatives, confirming that Wakanda will abandon their isolationist stance and share their resources with the world. T’Challa’s speech is a powerful one, and it will make many viewers wish we had a leader of that calibre in charge of their country.

Meanwhile, Everett Ross watches bemused from the back of the room as delegates scoff at the hubris of Wakanda which – let’s not forget – they believe to be an almost entirely rural agrarian nation. Piping up, one of them finally asks, in his hubris, “What does a nation of farmers have to offer the rest of the world?” – to which T’Challa only smiles knowingly. The scene ends.

What it means: The first thing to note is that this scene does confirm that Everett Ross survives the destruction of Shuri’s lab during the final battle scene – something we were free to assume but which we didn’t actually KNOW until this point.

Furthermore, we can assume from the way this scene is left dangling that T’Challa is about to come clean about Wakanda’s technological advancements to the world. Politically and technologically, the Marvel Universe is about to change.

Speculatively, this means you can expect to see a lot more Vibranium-powered tech in future movies, probably for both good guys and bad guys. In a way, that’s good news – the world is going to get tooled up just in time for a galactic warlord to invade in Avengers: Infinity War.

Post-credits scene 2

Beginning in first-person perspective, a person wakes up surrounded by Wakandan children. They’re in a small, simple hut in the Wakandan wilderness. The children run away shouting that “The White Wolf” is awake. We see the man exit the hut, and it’s Bucky Barnes, still missing an arm and last seen being put into cryogenic stasis in Wakanda at the end of Captain America: Civil War. Shuri greets him.

What it means: Calling back to Shuri’s line about Ross earlier in the film – “Another broken white boy for us to fix.” – we can guess that Barnes is indeed cured and ready for action (and also sporting a beard, as is the style). No surprises there for anyone who has seen the Avengers: Infinity War trailer, of course.

Interestingly, though, the nickname he’s given – White Wolf – is the name of a specific character from Black Panther’s mythology. It’s unlikely Barnes will fill that role specifically – in the comics the White Wolf was a white man named ‘Hunter’, adopted by King T’Chaka and raised in Wakanda to lead their covert-ops ‘War Dogs’ – but this does, at the very least, hint that this guy might be out there. After all, why else would the children know that name?

Of course, it’s also possible that Barnes might change his code-name to distance himself from his time as the Winter Soldier and take on this new nomenclature permanently. Or it could just be an easter egg for the fans. The important thing is that he’s free of conditioning and therefore back on the path to redemption, no matter what codebook you wave at him.

Either way, that’s all we get from the MCU until Infinity War. Hopes that the soul stone might turn up in Black Panther are effectively dashed.

Unless, that is, it turns out to be in the center of a Vibranium meteorite that landed on Earth…

We’ll find out when Avengers: Infinity War opens in May.