Editing Marvel Comics (section)

==== Black Panther ====
The most prominent and well-known of Marvel's African super-heroes (Storm arguably doesn't count as her being from Africa rarely mattered), as well as one of the earliest African superheroes from a mainstream comic publisher. T'challa is the heir to the throne of Wakanda, a reclusive and highly technologically advanced African nation. Originally, this was because Wakanda had A: avoided being caught up in the slave trade, B: developed a custom of sending its best and brightest abroad to study the most advanced technologies they could and then apply their knowledge to bettering their people, and C: the only significant deposit of vibranium, which is kind of like if America had been the only country in the world with uranium when trying to invent the atomic bomb. (In some versions of the story the wacky properties of Cap's shield actually come from vibranium, America's limited stockpile being a gift to FDR from T'challa's father T'chaka.) Less intelligent writers retconned this into Wakanda having always been centuries ahead of the world in terms of technology due to said Vibranium, because the original backstory didn't make them special enough. Cue black people IRL [[Derp|thinking Wakanda is a real place]].

As King of Wakanda, T'challa has been infused with a mutagenic/magical plant called "The Heart-Shaped Herb", which has given him superhuman strength, speed, senses, reflexes and agility. In later versions, his costume has also gone from just [[Batman]]-esque stylized bodyarmor to a hyper-advanced suit of [[Power Armor]]. Mostly concerned with keeping Wakanda safe from outside threats, or sometimes with opening up Wakanda to the outside world - it depends on the series/media. Wakanda being characterized as [[Elf|arrogant, elitist, aloof and xenophobic]], this is often a lot harder than it sounds. Usually he does this by joining international superhero teams like the Avengers, where he can upstage Iron Man with his own genius-level smarts and vibranium swag. Also there was that weird time where they hooked him up with Storm, seemingly solely to have an excuse to put Marvel's only big-name black superheroes in the same comics.<!-- July, 1966 -->