Black and White, Chapter 2

The safehouse of the 66 Bridges Gang has just been shot up. The crime scene is looked over by two detectives in the back pocket of Sal Anthony, a Sergeant in the NYPD who is affiliated with the gang. The curious thing about the whole thing is that the shooter was using the same riot bullets used by the police. When Sal asks if this was done by a rogue cop, he is told the gang members said it was the work of the Black Panther.

This doesn’t make any sense to Sal, who then confers with Bernie Scruggs, the lieutenant in charge and another dirty cop. They question Dre, one of the gangsters who has encountered the Panther twice already. He confirms what happened and demands that the two cops do something about this situation. That’s when Scruggs handcuffs Dre. When the frightened drug dealer asks what they are doing, Sal Anthony draws his gun and says that they are “getting their act together.” He then begins shooting around Dre and then pushes him up to the wall. He then searches Dre’s pockets and discovers that he had been secretly recording their conversation. Dre pleads with them to show mercy, saying that the Black Panther forced him to try and gather evidence against them. However, all this has done is sealed Dre’s fate.

Before dealing with Dre, Sal talks to the 66 Bridge’s local, a man named Liddy, and asks him to pay off the two cops investigating the scene. Looking at the recorder he pulled off Dre, Sal notes that it is a cheap department store brand. Another paradoxical thing about the Black Panther they are dealing with. It leads Anthony to believe that they are dealing with a ringer. He decides that this situation warrants a call to Triage, the leader of the 66 Bridges.[1]

At that same moment, Kevin “Kasper” Cole, the young officer who has been posing as the Black Panther while on suspension, thinks about the advice he has been given about dealing with Sal Anthony and his dirty cops.[2] However, he replays these memories as though they were said by Grace, a woman he dated in high school. First she tells him what his father, “Black Jack” Cole told him, to he has to either decide if he wants to be in Sal Anthony’s pocket or Internal Affairs.[3] Then she says what Hunter — leader of the Hatute Zeraze and adopted brother to the real Black Panther — said about being chosen.[4] Kasper seizes on this last point and wonders who chose him.

The following morning, Cole and his girlfriend Gwen are rudely awoken at 6 am in the morning by Sargent Francis Tork, who bursts into their bedroom with his gun drawn. Seeing his own badge around Tork’s neck makes Kevin realize that this is the Sarge’s way of telling him his suspension is over. Gwen is annoyed that nobody seems to be paying attention to the fact that she is naked, as this was a sight people would have died for. Tork crassly reminds her that being pregnant takes away any interest that he would have had in seeing her like this. Gwen walks to the bathroom annoyed that Kevin isn’t even pretending to be upset that Francis is seeing his girlfriend naked, and not for the first time.

When Gwen leaves the room, Tork tells Kasper that all he needs to do now is to bend over for Sal Anthony a little. Cole refuses to do that because Sal is a dirty cop, but Tork says its a necessary thing. Sal needs something on “true believers” in law and order just to keep them in line. He then notices that Cole’s Black Panther get up is hanging off the side of the footboard of the bed and asks when he got so cavalier about keeping it out in the open. When Gwen comes back into the room to ask if she can go back to bed, Kevin audibly shouts and covers the costume up with a blanket. He then tries to cover up for this by claiming he saw a mouse. This causes Gwen to run out of the bedroom screaming. This allows Cole to hide the Panther duds Kasper tells Tork off for bringing it into his home.[5] Tork insists that it was there when he got in and Kevin realizes that it must have been put there by Hunter, remembering that he tried burning it the night before.

That’s when Kevin’s mother Ruth comes bursting into the room to kill the mouse. By this point, Kevin has rolled up the Panther habit in his bedsheets and tosses them to Francis who then tosses it out the open window into the alley below. After sorting things out with his mother, Kasper and Tork head into the living room. There, Tork confirms what he did with the Panther suit, saying it landed on someone’s luxury car parked outside. Cole quickly gets dressed (borrowing Tork’s pants) and rushes outside. Sure enough, it is the same make and model as the car he torched the night before. This one also has Wakandan diplomat plates and a dossier on Sal Anthony on the passenger seat.[6] Francis reminds Kevin that Hunter is the head of the Hatute Zeraze and replacing all the stuff Cole burned probably only took a phone call.[7] Cole is freaking out that this is parked outside his apartment as it connects him with his alter-ego and orders Tork to go and park it on the Hill, the original Black Panther’s former base of operations.[8]

Later, when Kasper goes for his face-to-face with Sal Anthony down at the station, he quickly realizes that his decision was made up for him. The Lieutenant refuses to talk to Kevin until he puts on a police unform as he has busted Kasper down to the role of a beat cop. He has also been assigned a police scooter to get around in, adding more salt to the wound. When he debates quitting the force and giving up he catches an Avengers Quinjet taking off. He curses the heroes, then gets on his scooter and putts off to his beat. An so it goes, with Kasper spending his time between beats sitting awake at night and dealing with his suffocating family. His mind is preoccupied with memories of his younger days. Until one morning, while washing down squad cars he spots Spider-Man swinging by. That night a confluence of conflicting memories occupy his mind. Bills being past due with Gwen nagging him to do more, the Black Panther busting a drug deal and handling wads of money he’ll never make. Francis Tork warning him to not involve himself with Hunter, and lastly Hunter saying that Kasper was chosen. Lastly, the image of Spider-Man swinging by the station.

It all becomes too much, so Kasper sneaks out as the Black Panther that evening. He heads to the Leslie N. Hill projects in Brooklyn, one the base of operations for the Black Panther whenever he was in the States. Entering one of the apartments, Cole is ambushed by Okoye of the Dora Milaje, who is the spitting image of his ex, Grace.[9] Cole tries to defend himself, but Okoye is by far the more skilled fighter. Someone else in the room orders her to stand down and apologizes for Okoye’s over zealous behavior. When Kasper Cole turns to face the other man, he is surprised to see that it is T’Challa, the real Black Panther!

Recurring Characters

Black Panther, Francis Tork, Ruth Cole, Gwen, Okoye, T’Challa, Bernie Scruggs, Sal Anthony, 66 Bridges Gang (Dre), Spider-Man

Continuity Notes

1. We’ll get to know Triage a bit more in Black Panther (vol. 3) #54-60. Also mentioned here is the fact that everyone believes the Black Panther is dead. That’s technically true as the Man-Ape recently slew the Black Panther of a future timeline, with the present-day T’Challa abandoning the Wakandan throne soon after. See Black Panther (vol. 3) #48-49.

2. As we learned over the last two issues, Kasper Cole stole a damaged Black Panther costume from his partner Francis Tork to bust the dirty cops who were responsible for his suspension.

3. Jack Cole gave his son this advice in Black Panther (vol. 3) #50. Kasper believes that his father, a cop,was framed for drug possession and is serving out a sentence in the State Pen. This will all be explained in Black Panther (vol. 3) #53. However, issue #56 counters this by saying he was the leader of the 66 Bridges.

4. Hunter alluded to the fact that somebody chose Kasper to become the next Black Panther last issue.

5. Francis had a damaged version of the Black Panther’s costume since T’Challa left it at his apartment circa Black Panther (vol. 3) #17. Cole burned that costume last issue.

6. Kasper stole this ride from Dre in Black Panther (vol. 3) #50. Hunter provided the dossier and diplomatic plates to Cole last issue before he torched everything.

7. Here it is mentioned that Hunter is the adopted brother of T’Challa. When he was still an infant, Hunter was the sole survivor of a plane that crashed in Wakanda. Orphaned by the tragedy, Hunter was adopted by T’Chaka and raised like his own son until T’Challa was born. Loyal to the country, Hunter eventually became the White Wolf of the Hatute Zeraze. See Black Panther (vol. 3) #10 for the dope on all of that.

8. Since Black Panther (vol. 3) #1, the Black Panther had been using the Leslie N. Hill Housing Project in Brooklyn as his base of operations.

9. We never learn much about Grace or what became of her. Also, any possible connection between her and Okoye have never been explored. At least time of this writing in January, 2024. I doubt there is anything other than the fact that the two look similar to Cole and doesn’t have any broader implications. Complete strangers can look alike after all.

Topical References

• One of the detectives at the scene of the Black Panther’s shootout says that 66 Bridges make the Gambinos look like the Flintstones.

  • The Gambino crime family is one of the most notorious and longest running gangs in New York history. They have existed as early as 1900 and are still in operation at the time of this writing (January, 2024). Since they have been at it for so long, that this could be made in a historical context and be a factual reference.

  • On the other hand, The Flintstones was an animated family sitcom produced by Hanna-Barbara. It originally ran for six seasons between 1960 and 1966. It has been revived in many different formats since then. Still, it should be considered a topical reference as a more contemporary example could be used in its place.

• Members of the 66 Bridges Gang are depicted using slang that was common place when this comic was published in 2003. Some of which is now considered dated, as such the usage here should be considered topical.

• Dre refers to Sal Anthony and his men as the “Keystone Cops”. The Keystone Cops are a troupe of silent film actors who appeared in short films released between 1912 and 1917. They shorts were comedies that focused on a group of bumbling police officers. Since then, the phrase Keystone Cops as since become a short hand synonym to refer to bungling police officers. Most people who use it today probably don’t even know its point of origin. This could be considered a topical reference.

• Dre is depicted using a pocket tape recorder made by Sony. This is a two fold topical reference as Sony is a real world brand and pocket tape recorders are no obsolete. Sal says it comes from Wal-Mart and sells for $20. Another double topical, Wal-Mart being a real world brand. Digital pocket recorders time of this writing (2024) sell for about $40 now, adjusting for inflation.

• Some details about Kevin and Grace’s high school years should be considered topical:

  • The first issue is that they attended Erasmus High School in Brooklyn, which is a real world school that was first built in 1785. It operated as a high school from 1905 until 1994 when low test scores found it shut down because the American educational system is a nightmare. Since 2010 the campus is now operated by five different other schools in the area. The building has also been assigned historical building status. One could argue that Kevin and Gwen’s attending this specific school could be considered topical. However, given the building's historical status one could also argue that perhaps — unique to the Marvel Universe — it has always operated as a high school.

  • Based on their yearbook, it appears as though Kevin and Gwen graduated in the year 1997. This date should be considered topical as it is relative to the date of publication. That said, modern readers should interpret this to mean that Cole graduated about 6 years prior to the main story. Assuming that Cole was 18 at the time, this means he about 24 at the time of this story and born 13 years prior to the start of the Modern Age, per the Sliding Timecsale.

• When Tork is channel surfing on the CRT teleivison in Kasper’s room (topical, as this is an obsolete technology) he complains about Regis being on TV (Christopher Priest really hated that guy) and stops on a channel playing the 1931 film adaptation of Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein. The reference to former talk show host Regis Philbin should be considered topical considering Philbin died in 2020. Watching Frankenstein on TV wouldn’t necessarily be topical as this is now considered a cinematic classic.

• Kasper jokingly refers to the mouse as “Mickey”, Mickey Mouse is a cartoon character owned by the Walt Disney Company. He first appeared 1928 short film, Steamboat Willie (which is finally in the public domain as of 2024!). This would have been considered a topical reference, but now that Disney owns Marvel Comics this would be viewed as a case of brand synergy now.

• The car that the Black Panther drives is identified as a Lexus. This should be considered topical as this is a real world brand of luxury vehicle.

• Francis mockingly called Cole “Sherlock”. This is a reference to the fictional detective Sherlock Holmes, created by author Robert Conan Doyle. Holmes was a great detective who appeared in 5 novels and numerous short stories written by Doyle. The character has since entered the public domain. Given that, and the fact that calling someone “Sherlock” in reference to one’s detective skills (even sarcastically like in this instance) has become part of common vernacular.

• Cole is later depicted wearing a shit with the Calvin Klein logo on it. Another real world brand.

• Ruth Cole gossips about shopping at Albee Square and King’s Plaza. This should be considered topical as Albee Square mall was torn down in 2004. King’s Square is still there, but its continued existence could change.