Ryan Coogler came out of the gate strong with his film Fruitvale Station. His success with that caught the eye of Kevin Feige, the head of Marvel Studios. He got the Black Panther out of this, and the rest is history. He made a sequel, and now, his production company, Proximity Media, is executive producing an animated series created by Todd Harris and also directed by him as well. Eyes of Wakanda that expands on the beautiful hidden empire. Fans of the films and great animation will surely enjoy this expansive look at the world Coogler and his company brought to life. I was blown away by how gorgeous this series looked.

This show is an anthology series that deals with a special sect of Wakandans called Hatut Zaraze.They are warriors who carry out dangerous missions throughout history. You thought you knew history before this, but you didn’t know history through the gaze of Wakandans. That’s the most fascinating thing about the series. It takes historical events we’ve all read about or heard about from history teachers of films and puts a Wakandan spin on them. I was completely enamored by what I was watching in this show. I only got to see four episodes, but they have wet my appetite for the final episodes I haven’t gotten to see yet.

Besides the tie to Wakanda and the Black Panther, this show has a unique animation style to it. It is hand painted where it takes the proportions of the characters a la contemporary American artists Ernie & Dean Cornwell and expands on them. Studio AKA handled the hand drawn aspects while Axis Animation handled the overall animation. Combined, this is one of the best animated series I’ve ever seen. The colors were vividly brought to screen, and the depth and layering of the backdrops were very realistic. This animation style is incredibly realized. I was genuinely blown away by how gorgeous it looked on screen.

With any animated show, an important aspect is the voice cast. Because this is an anthology series, it has many characters. Most of which, fans of the MCU probably don’t know. Even though some of the sequences are pulled straight out of history, the voice-over work is used on both new Wakandan characters and existing historical figures. As an example, Achilles. The series features an ensemble cast including Winnie Harlow, Cress Williams, Patricia Belcher, Larry Herron, Adam Gold, Lynn Whitfield, Jacques Colimon, Jona Xiao, Isaac Robinson-Smith, Gary Anthony Williams, Zeke Alton, Steve Toussaint, and Anika NoniRose. They are all fantastic in the series. Even though most of them I’m not familiar with. This is a good thing because it doesn’t distract from the story the writers are telling. 

With the show tying into the sacred timeline of the MCU, you have to understand the stories fit into that box. All four of the episodes I saw had a particular tie to the Future of the MCU in fascinating new ways. Anyone with a keen eye for looking for eastern eggs and so forth will notice some interesting artifacts that tie into the MCU and specifically the Black Panther films. Coogler and Harris definitely wanted to raise some eyebrows with how they planned this show around the sacred timeliness and the existing films.

Eyes of Wakanda is a beautifully realized mini-series that focuses mainly on how Wakandans have dealt with the history of the world around them over the centuries. The animation style is phenomenal. I don’t think I’ve ever seen animation with such depth and very realistic looking places and settings. The many backdrops in the show are breathtaking to look at. The voice-over cast is very good, and they don’t distract from the series at all. I was focused on the stories the characters existed in and not who voiced them. This is a show that a lot of MCU fans will like, I hope. I did, that’s for sure.

4/4 Eyes of Wakanda Episodes Reviewed They Are Streaming On Disney+ August 1st

4 ½ stars

Dan Skip Allen