Only One MCU Film Makes NYT’s 21st Century Top 100 List

The Marvel Cinematic Universe is one of the most successful film franchises ever made, with movies like Avengers: Endgame making billions of dollars. But even though these movies are incredibly popular, they usually don’t show up on lists of the greatest films of all time.

That changed recently when Black Panther made it onto The New York Times’ list of the 100 Best Movies of the 21st Century.

This list, created by votes from actors and filmmakers, didn’t have many superhero movies on it. But Black Panther, directed by Ryan Coogler, made it to number 96. It was placed right between Gravity at number 97 and The Worst Person in the World at 95.

The only other superhero film on the list was Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight, which came in much higher at number 28.

Still, Black Panther getting a spot on the list is a big deal, especially since it became more than just another Marvel film. In its write-up, The New York Times said, “There’s so much to love. It’s a superhero spectacle that actually has something important to say, about how identity, history and responsibility intersect. Wakanda, the Afrofuturistic world where the story takes place, is a visual wonder… Chadwick Boseman shines in the title role, sadly one of his last before dying of cancer.”

When the movie came out in 2018, it had a huge cultural impact, it was called “a resistance to a regressive cultural and political moment fueled in part by the white-nativist movement.”

Black Panther was special because it leaned fully into its Black identity.

The audience that came to see Black Panther was also more diverse than any superhero movie before. In its opening weekend, 37% of the audience in the U.S. was African-American. That’s more than double the usual number for this genre.

The movie inspired real-world action, too. Frederick Joseph started a GoFundMe campaign so kids from Harlem could see the film. He called it a “rare opportunity” for kids of color to see a hero that looked like them. The campaign went viral, raising over $45,000, and started a trend called the “Black Panther Challenge.” Hundreds of other people started their own drives around the world, and the challenge raised over $400,000 in total.

The Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture even added Black Panther items to their collection. They said it helped tell a fuller story of Black identity in film. Disney also created a $250,000 scholarship called “The Black Panther Scholarship” for students at Loyola Marymount University.

At the end of the day, Black Panther meant a lot more than just a superhero movie. It told a story that reached people on a personal, cultural, and political level. Making it onto the New York Times’ list shows that even in a world filled with big-budget blockbusters, this film stood out for what it represented.

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