Gay rights activists are outraged that Marvel Studios cut the only LGBT scene from the superhero film Black Panther. The movie, which opens everywhere on Friday, featured a lesbian scene between Okoye (Danai Gurira), left, and Ayo (Florence Kasumba).
We know the scene existed because a Vanity Fair magazine reporter described the scene in an early rough cut of Black Panther.
“In the rough cut of this Black Panther scene, we see Gurira’s Okoye and Kasumba’s Ayo swaying rhythmically back in formation with the rest of their team. Okoye eyes Ayo flirtatiously for a long time as the camera pans in on them. Eventually, she says, appreciatively and appraisingly, ‘You look good.’ Ayo responds in kind. Okoye grins and replies, ‘I know.’”
But when fans saw early screenings of the movie, the scene was suspiciously missing.
LGBT groups took to Twitter.com to vent their anger at Marvel Studios and Disney for deleting the scene. The hashtag #LetAyoHaveAGirlfriend was soon trending on Twitter.com, and users tweeted terms such as “lesbian erasure”.
One Twitter user tweeted: “It would have taken five seconds of screentime to have Nakia ask Ayo “how’s the girlfriend” and Ayo answer “Aneka is good.” Disney+Marvel consistently drop the ball on LGBT rep and this is the second time they’ve done it with a black woman”.
But a studio rep says the studio didn’t want to offend the movie’s targeted demographic, black people, who are historically intolerant of homosexuality — even though the lesbian scene was published in the comic book.
