I wanted to make a couple points I think are getting lost in the Killmonger discourse–a topic which continues to blow up my notes to this very moment (when will tumblr let you mute notes for individual posts?). First off, no it’s not ‘bad’ to like Killmonger. He’s got great lines, he’s clearly framed in a way the audience is meant to interpret as “cool”, and I personally think he’s the best (and most nuanced) villain to come out of the MCU to date.
The difference between Killmonger and Nakia is not violence vs non-violence. I see people getting sucked into that old MLK vs Malcolm X comparison, likely because it’s a common one, but it doesn’t really fit here. Nakia isn’t a pacifist. She’s a spy, so she uses stealth primarily, but when we see her on that mission she is armed. She carries those circular vibranium blades, and is a skilled combatant. The only time we see her caution against violence is when she says that boy was a child solider and victim of kidnapping, and when she takes Agent Ross back to Wakanda to heal him. Likewise, Wakanda is not a pacifist nation. It’s an isolationist one, but that’s not the same thing. I mean they literally choose their head of state through ritual combat. They have spies stationed all over the world called ‘War Dogs’.
The difference between Nakia and Killmonger isn’t violence per se, the difference between them is who bears the brunt of that violence. And that’s why I argue that Killmonger is wrong (I mean, he is the villain), and it’s Nakia who is right. Because Killmonger isn’t interested in Black liberation, or justice, or using Wakanda’s power to help others–despite what he says. He’s motivated by revenge, however justified. I argue that the real world parallel to Killmonger isn’t Malcolm, it’s Eldridge Cleaver. I say that because not only is Killmonger willing to massacre his own people–people he claimed to care about–to serve his own revenge and quest for power, he basically has been “practicing” his violence on them for years. It’s no accident that he behaves threateningly to several female characters (the girlfriend he killed in cold blood, the Shaman woman, the woman on the council he strangled, the Dora Milaje he killed, Shuri) when all the other Wakandans–particularly T’Challa–treat them with near deferential respect. And how did Killmonger get his name? He got it killing hundreds of Black and brown people, oppressed people, on behalf of the American military. Aside from Klaue,we never see him kill a single oppressor. And according to his past a an MIT graduate and decorated veteran, he likely never has. All his violence falls on the very people he claims to want to save.
One of the many great lines in the film is when they’re reading information on Killmonger on that screen, and Agent Ross chimes in, “No, he’s one of ours”. Because, yeah. He is. His tactics are 100% informed by the imperialist American military, and his strategy–covertly arm insurgent groups to destabilize the government–is one that the US government has employed several times with disastrous results that we all still live with today. He of all people should know his strategy won’t work, unless his goal is global chaos and destruction. If Killmonger really wanted to use Wakandan technology to free everyone, why not just go in with the Wakandan military he now controls? Wouldn’t that be easier, and safer? Using trained soldiers who know how use those weapons, and who could go in with an actual strategy because they are an actual military force? But that’s not what he does. Because that would get his hands dirty. Much better to sit back, arm oppressed peoples with future-tech, and let those oppressed peoples bear the weight of the violence and struggle against their oppressor in a global conflict that would almost certainly end with millions dead.
I’ll end this with a link to a great Atlantic piece on the subject of Killmonger. It says everything I tried to say, but better. And my favorite line from the piece:
“The following distinction is crucial: Black Panther does not render a verdict that violence is an unacceptable tool of Black liberation–to the contrary, that is precisely how Wakanda is liberated. It renders a verdict on imperialism as a tool of Black liberation, to that the master’s tools cannon dismantle the master’s house.”
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