I use the darkness of my childhood as a launchpad to both entertain and maybe do some good. My father was in the KKK. Unfortunately,  Pensylvania has more KKK groups than any other states. Anything between Pittsburgh and Philadelphia is called Pennsyl-tucky. In Philadelphia that was a big factor growing up in the Kennsington section.

 

The thing that began my split away from my father was the introduction of the character, The Black Panther, in The Fantastic Four Marvel Comics that came out in the mid-sixties. The Fantastic Four were my favorite comics.

​​

​​​My Life Changed in Seventh Grade

​​

I attended Conwell, so one day I showed that comic to the librarian there and I said, my father hates this comic because of this character and I need to understand why he hates it so much. It was causing a problem between my father and I.  

​

She said, well...this particular issue is about Apartheid, and I said: What's that?

Librarian: Let me ask you some quewstions. Have you heard of the Jim Crow laws?

Jonathan: No.

Librarian: You ever heard of Dr. Martin Luther King.

Jonathan: Yeah. he was a bad guy. My father had a party for him when he was killed.

She sat me down and explained the facts of life to me.

​

Fast Forward to 2008

​​​

​​​I was doing a radio interview when I first started working for Marvel. I was writing some Wolverine and Punisher stuff for Marvel. So, in the radio interview...I talked about the impact comics had on my life. I mentioned my personal story about the Black Panther. 

​​

One of the radio listeners was Reginald Hudlin. He was writing a Black Panther comic at the time. We knew each other, so he reached out to the  editor-in-chief and said: "I know we've been using only Black writers on the Black Panther books, so why don't we invite him to work on the Panther Books. 

​​​

The main story about his sister, Shuri, becoming a Panther--I wrote that story. When his (Hudlin) run was done, I took over as the regular writer of Black Panther. I was the one who put her in the Panther armor. The stuff I did on my run was partly the basis for the new Black Panther: Wakanda Forever movie. 

​​​​

I put Shuri up against Namar for the first time. I created the Midnight Angels. I created the character Mica. About 40% of the movie was based on my comics. It's awesome!

​

My son and I went to the world premiere in Hollywood. I met the entire cast. It was wonderful seeing under Special Thanks, my name up there.

​

STAY TUNED FOR MORE JONATHAN MABERRY - COMING SOON!