‘It could bring healing’: Black Panther: Wakanda Forever opens worldwide

The much-anticipated release of the Marvel sequel is set to be one of the year's biggest hits, but it arrives with a swell of sadness

This time around, there were no filmgoers in brightly colored kente cloth outfits or other African garb waiting to greet the coming of the Black Panthers.

Where the first film was a celebration of Black excellence, the sequel, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever is an elegy for the late Chadwick Boseman. The mood was somber at theaters in Atlanta, the closest place America has to a Wakanda on Earth (like the original, it was partly filmed here).