Black Panther: Wakanda Forever Director’s Cut Exists, Producer Teases Differences

Fan movements supporting the release of director’s cuts of movies have been all the rage in recent years. Arguably the most popular among the movements, the fandom aiming to pressure Warner Brothers executives into releasing a director’s cut of the widely-panned Justice League, proved successful once Zack Snyder’s Justice League hit HBO Max last year. There’s a growing movement for similar treatment with David Ayer and his take on Suicide Squad, though no word has been made official regarding a potential release.

As it turns out, there also happens to be a director’s cut of Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, though one Marvel Studios executive says it will likely never be released.

“There’s some [scenes] from the Director’s Cut that didn’t make it forward. There’s some that we played with for a long time, and screened, and screened multiple times,” longtime Marvel executive Nate Moore said in a recent chat with Collider. “We’re notorious for tinkering a lot in editorial and trying things. Ryan, by the way, is as well. So, things are in, things are out. ‘What about this over here?’ So, some are closer to completion, some are pretty raw.”

Will the Black Panther: Wakanda Forever Director’s Cut ever be released?

According to Moore, while he’s “never saying never,” Marvel Studios has traditionally prevented release as such cuts of the film, insisting the theatrical release is the only one available in MCU canon.

“We’ve typically resisted that, and I think we’ll continue to because we like to think we and the filmmakers landed on what the movie should be,” the producer added. “So, I don’t know that we’ll ever assemble it – I’ll never say never. I don’t think we’ll assemble it into a longer Director’s Cut. But certainly, I think there’s ways to get those scenes out there in the world without building an extended edition.”

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Now in theaters, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever follows Queen Ramonda (Angela Bassett), Shuri (Letitia Wright), M’Baku (Winston Duke), Okoye (Danai Gurira) and the Dora Milaje (including Florence Kasumba) as they fight to protect their nation from intervening world powers in the wake of King T’Challa’s death. As the Wakandans strive to embrace their next chapter, the heroes must band together with the help of War Dog Nakia (Lupita Nyong’o) and Everett Ross (Martin Freeman) and forge a new path for the kingdom of Wakanda. It has yet to be seen where the Midnight Angels tie into the story.

Introducing Tenoch Huerta as Namor, king of a hidden undersea nation, the film also stars Dominique Thorne, Michaela Coel, Mabel Cadena and Alex Livanalli.