Fictional character biography
T'Challa is born in Wakanda to T'Chaka, the Black Panther, and Queen N'Yami. N'Yami dies in childbirth, and T'Chaka's second wife, Ramonda, gives birth to Shuri. Ramonda vanishes shortly after. T'Challa defeats his uncle during a ritual event; this earns him the right to ingest a powerful ancestral heart-shaped herb. The herb gives him superhuman strength and speed, and he inherits the title of Black Panther. However, in T'Challa's boyhood Klaw invades Wakanda and murders T'Chaka during an attempt to seize Wakanda's valuable natural resource, vibranium. T'Challa and the Wakandans drive Klaw from the country and wound him. As an adolescent, T'Challa goes on a walkabout manhood ritual and meets a young orphan in Cairo, Ororo Munroe (who will later become known as Storm). He is sent abroad and graduates from Oxford University. He travels the world and returns to claim his throne in Wakanda.
Klaw returns to Wakanda to resume his attempt to steal the vibranium; this time, he is equipped with strange new weapons based on sound. T'Challa invites the Fantastic Four to Wakanda, then attacks and attempts to neutralize them individually. He does this to test himself as preparation to battle Klaw, and to test the Fantastic Four's abilities so they can help him. The Fantastic Four and T'Challa learn mutual respect for one another and team up to defeat Klaw together. T'Challa later leaves Wakanda and joins the Avengers, on Captain America's recommendation. T'Challa later reveals that he joined the team in order to spy on them and determine their possible effects on Wakanda's national interest. He lives in New York City and works as an inner-city school teacher under the secret identity "Luke Charles". He meets and establishes a relationship Monica Lynn, a soul singer, who accompanies him on his return to Wakanda. However, upon his return, T'Challa finds that Erik Killmonger, a Wakandan who was exiled to the U.S. because his father assisted Klaw, is prepared to usurp his title. T'Challa eventually defeats Killmonger in a battle atop a waterfall. Along with Lynne, T'Challa then leaves Wakanda again to investigate the murder of Lynne's sister. He determines that the Ku Klux Klan are to blame, and defeats them in combat as well. In later adventures, he reunites with his stepmother Ramonda and confronts apartheid in South Africa. He enters into conflict with a rival monarch, Namor of Atlantis. He also works together with a staffer of the United States Department of State, Everett K. Ross, and a team of female bodyguards called the Dora Milaje. He leaves Monica Lynn, re-connects with Storm, and deals with a renegade Dora Milaje named Nakia who feels jilted by him and seeks revenge. Erik Killmonger returns and destabilizes the economy of Wakanda in a renewed effort to conquer it. Killmonger defeats T'Challa and becomes a new Black Panther, but he is poisoned by the heart-shaped herb during his ascension ceremony. Killmonger is rendered comatose and T'Challa returns to his position.
Later, T'Challa finds he has a brain aneurysm and succumbs to instability and hallucinations. After his mental state almost causes tribal warfare, the Panther hands power to his council and hides in New York City. While recovering, he trains a police officer, Kasper Cole, to be the new Black Panther. T'Challa eventually recovers, Cole becomes White Tiger, and T'Challa returns to Wakanda.
Klaw again attempts to invade Wakanda and to cause a war with Wakanda's neighbor, Niganda. The U.S. government sends an army of Deathloks, cyborg warriors, to occupy Wakanda and fight Klaw. It becomes evident that Klaw's invasion is actually a ruse to advance U.S. Imperialism. Klaw holds T'Challa's mother hostage, but he refuses to negotiate. Black Panther and the Wakandans successfully defeat the Deathloks and Klaw.
T'Challa marries Storm. They tour the world. Black Panther and Storm side with Captain America against Iron Man in the civil war among superheroes sparked by the superhero registration initiative. They then temporarily join the Fantastic Four. Killmonger again tries to conquer Wakanda, but he is killed by Monica Rambeau. Storm and Black Panther then repel another invasion, from the alien Skrulls.
Storm returns to the X-Men and Black Panther returns to Wakanda. T'Challa suffers a brutal attack after meeting with Doctor Doom and Namor. His sister Shuri is trained as the next Black Panther. T'Challa is temporarily in a coma; the supervillain Morlun tries to devour his body. Shuri rescues her brother from Morlun, and is officially inaugurated as a new Black Panther while T'Challa recovers. T'Challa and Shuri team up to fight Doctor Doom, along with the Fantastic Four, the X-Men, and Deadpool. T'Challa remains wounded, so he is mystically charged by a Wakandan healer. Now returned to power, T'Challa leads a Dora Milaje army. However, because Doom is on the verge of taking control of Wakanda's vibranium, T'Challa takes the desperate measure of de-powering all of it. Now stripped of his power, T'Challa leaves Wakanda, while Shuri searches the world for new vibranium. Matt Murdock (the superhero Daredevil) asks T'Challa to replace him as guardian of Hell's Kitchen, while Murdock takes a leave of absence. T'Challa takes on a new secret identity in New York, presenting himself as "Mr. Okonkwo", an immigrant from the Democratic Republic of the Congo and a manager of a restaurant. Simultaneously, he takes on Daredevil's job as a crime-fighter.
Upon his return to Wakanda, T'Challa serves as a second to his sister, Shuri, who remains the kingdom's active ruler. T'Challa calls on the Fantastic Four to help him with conflict with Necropolis, a tomb below Wakanda. T'Challa meets Bast, the Panther god, who shows him prophecies of future disasters and restores all of his Black Panther powers so that he will be able to face these challenges. He also gains all the collective memories of previous Black Panthers. Shortly after, the Avengers come into conflict with the X-Men. Empowered by the Phoenix, Namor destroys Wakanda with a massive tidal wave. Returning to help, Storm is stunned when the Panther informs her that their marriage has been annulled because of her connection to her fellow mutant, Namor.
T'Challa calls on an elite and secret group of superheroes to face a new threat to the universe and all alternative universes. This group, the Illuminati, includes Mister Fantastic, Doctor Strange, Iron Man, Black Bolt, Beast, and Namor. T'Challa has discovered incursions from parallel Earths that could lead to the destruction of universes. T'Challa must temporarily put his animosity toward Namor aside, though Black Panther vows to kill Namor when the crisis passes. Wakanda launches a secret attack on Atlantis, Namor's kingdom, just as Thanos invades Earth. Namor deceives Thanos and leads him to attack Wakanda. The Avengers defeat Thanos, but Shuri learns about T'Challa's collaboration with Namor in the Illuminati. In response to T'Challa's refusal to disclose the extent of their activities, she expels him from Wakandan leadership. T'Challa is also called upon to destroy a parallel world in order to preserve his own. He is unwilling to do so, and the spirit of his father strips him of the Black Panther powers as a result. Namor then destroys the parallel planet himself and reveals his role in sending Thanos to Wakanda; T'Challa tries to kill him, and the Illuminati expel him from their group. Namor takes over the Necropolis, beneath Wakanda, and T'Challa and Shuri invade this subterranean city. T'Challa ultimately works together with the Illuminati to defeat Namor. T'Challa is able to transport Namor to another world and abandon him there. However, the various universes continue to collide and threaten all of existence. Doctor Doom, however, is able to create a new reality with himself in control. T'Challa and Namor are forced to join forces to eventually defeat Doom and restore the previously existing universe. T'Challa joins a new group called the Ultimates in order to fight Galactus.
Shuri appears to have been killed by invaders. T'Challa loses his connection with Bast, and his people begin calling him Haramu-Fal, meaning "the Orphan King". Wakanda is damaged and lacking in resources and connections as a result of the various invasions and wars. Wakanda experiences a national crisis as a result of its economic and political difficulties, loss of life, and the blow to their pride as a historically undefeated nation. A political conflict takes place when two of the Dora Milaje attempt to protect women from rape by foreign chieftains and are punished for doing so by Wakanda authorities. They respond by rejecting Wakandan authority and creating their own outpost. Partly as a result of this conflict, Wakandans generally become skeptical of the monarchy. This natural discontent is exploited by Zenzi, who works together with an American businessman to overthrow T'Challa. At the same time, a university professor named Changamire spreads democratic ideas among Wakandans. An insurgency develops against the Black Panther, and T'Challa consults with various dictators. Black Panther forms a new group called the Crew, including Storm and Luke Cage in order to counter this insurgency. T'Challa recruits Changamire to mediate the conflict.
Shuri is revealed to be comatose rather than dead. Her soul is transported to a new realm of Wakandan memory. She learns about their culture prior to the discovery of vibranium. T'Challa works together with Eden Fesi to recover Shuri. She becomes a new being, Aja-Adanna, who can maintain all Wakandan memory. Shuri can then consult T'Challa on the future of the nation. Shuri now has the ability to transform into a flock of black birds, a single large black bird, or a stone. Shuri helps to reconcile T'Challa with the dissident elements of the Dora Milaje. Wakanda embarks on a new path toward a democracy, with monarchy only performing a ceremonial role.
It is revealed that T'Challa had previously sent a team to space to investigate the meteorite that brought vibranium to Wakanda, but that these explorers were pulled back into the past thousands of years. As a result, they founded their own kingdom far off in the cosmos, called the Intergalactic Empire of Wakanda. This empire is eventually led by N'Jadaka. N'Jadaka erases T'Challa's memory and makes him a slave to the empire. T'Challa maintains some trace of his previous experiences, particularly his love for Storm, and this allows him to overcome the mind-wipe and to found a rebel group. His memories are then restored by the god Bast. T'Challa leads an army of Earth's superheroes to defeat N'Jadaka.
