Next year is going to be insane for Marvel heroes. Not only will the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe unite to face off against Thanos (Josh Brolin) in Avengers: Infinity War, but we will also see Marvel's first solo movie fronted by a black hero in the form of Ryan Coogler's Black Panther. The film will delve much deeper into the personal life of Chadwick Boseman's T'Challa than anything we saw in Captain America: Civil War, and part of that will involve taking a look into his past. To properly flesh out the character's history, it now seems that Black Panther may even include an awesome flashback sequence to Oakland, California circa 1990.
A recent report from The East Bay Times confirms that AC Transit in Oakland, California has officially confirmed the use of an old logo from the 1990s in Ryan Coogler's upcoming Black Panther film. The scene in question will apparently be a flashback to 1990, during T'Challa's time as a high school student at Saint Mary's College High School in Berkeley, and the sequence will show him waiting for the bus and riding with average commuters as he makes his way to school. From a storytelling perspective, this humble scene for a royal character makes plenty of sense, as Civil War established that T'Challa wasn't necessarily ready to embrace his high-profile status as a statesman before the death of his father.
The fact that Black Panther will take some time to visit Northern California opens up some other possibilities with regards to potential crossovers. Although Black Panther himself likely won't factor into the story of these 1990s sequences (T'Chaka will still be Black Panther at that point), we are not ruling out the possibility that other San Francisco-based Marvel characters could potentially pop up. These range from pre-prison Scott Lang (Paul Rudd) to Hank Pym (Michael Douglas) just after his retirement from S.H.I.E.L.D, to Darren Cross (Corey Stoll) at the beginning of his partnership with Pym. Marvel has continuously found ways to become more and more cohesive as a cinematic universe over the course of the last few years, so we certainly think it's possible for specific Ant-Man elements to appear during Black Panther.
Of course, if you're a resident of the Bay Area looking to check out some of the film's production, then I am afraid that I have some bad news. Although some of Oakland's visual elements will be adapted into the production of Black Panther (we expect nothing less from a NorCal native like Ryan Coogler), the production of the film will take place in the typical Marvel filming locale of Atlanta. That said, San Francisco and Oakland are two of America's unique cities, so it's still endlessly cool to think that they will receive more exposure in this particular universe.
We will keep you up to date regarding all of the latest and greatest information related to Ryan Coogler's Black Panther as more details are made available to us. T'Challa will take center stage for the very first time in the Marvel Cinematic Universe when Black Panther debuts on February 16, 2018.
