Ryan Coogler was born to be interesting, but fate has instead consigned him to importance. 

After erupting onto the scene in 2013 with Fruitvale Station, Coogler was parachuted into the Rocky franchise to direct Creed, saving the franchise and Sylvester Stallone from self-parody. However, achieving such excellence so soon was the worst possible development of his career. Marvel Studios picked up Coogler’s heat register like the Predator alien and, in keeping with its general policy for promising young talent, bought him out before he could become competition. Coogler’s talent burnished the Marvel brand and inextricably tied the march of social progress to cape-slop for an embarrassing couple of years. Artistically, the casualty lay in shifting Coogler’s focus from the singular black American experience to the macro. In other words, from people to a People.