Marvel teases The World to Come after Black Panther’s death in a new summer comic book series

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The Black Panther is dead — and what happens next will shape the future of the Marvel Universe for years to come.

That’s the premise of a new six-issue comic book series launching this summer, titled Marvel Knights: The World to Come. Co-created by fan-favorite Black Panther writer Christopher Priest and former Marvel editor-in-chief and chief creative officer Joe Quesada, The World to Come is a glimpse at a Marvel Universe where T’Challa has died, unleashing conflict across the globe as countless factions seek to take control of Wakanda — and, specifically, the Vibranium the country possesses.

Marvel promises that the story “will reverberate across the globe, changing the Marvel mythos as you know it and boldly reinventing its most legendary heroes.”

It’s worth noting that, while the MCU has been dealing with a dead T’Challa since 2022’s Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, the roots of this comic go back years before that, and even a year before the first Black Panther movie reached theaters. The series has been in the works since 2017, according to Quesada, who said in a statement that Priest “pitched me an idea rooted in his original Marvel Knights take on T’Challa and Wakanda” — Priest reinvented the character for the Marvel Knights imprint in 1999, with his take forming the basis for Black Panther’s portrayal on comics and onscreen in subsequent years — that was “insane, beautiful, and edgy as hell. I told him I had to draw it — and that we should go even bigger.”

How much bigger? Well, Quesada and Priest are now credited as co-writing the basic storyline of the series, suggesting that something pretty substantial changed from that initial pitch — but beyond that, Marvel is staying purposefully vague.

The series launches June 4 2025.

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