Black Panther director reveals the crucial scene he had to leave out

Ryan Coogler said the team ran out of time and money.

The much-anticipated Michael B. Jordan fronted Black Panther hits Irish cinemas this week and director Ryan Coogler has given fans an insight into the writing process. He also revealed one fascinating scene idea that didn’t quite come to fruition.

"We were constantly writing. We lost characters, we lost whole set pieces, budget comes in, you've got to be light on your feet! But the gist of the story stayed roughly the same," he told Digital Spy. Coogler talked about a scene involving T'Challa (Chadwick Boseman) and Nakia (Lupita Nyong'o) that he would have loved to film but didn’t have the time or the budget.

"I was so in love with Wakanda, I wanted to explore it more," he said. "There was a scene in the script early days that we had to cut for the sake of affordability where T'Challa and Nakia run through Wakanda – they take a jog.”

"And it was kinda, think of it as a Rocky-style jog or a Muhammad Ali When We Were Kings-style jog where we saw all of Wakanda and you jog back to Nakia's home and you meet her parents.”

"But it was a scene that you couldn't afford to do and we had to lose it. Now looking at the film, we wouldn't have had time. We would have shot it and had to cut it out anyway."

This makes sense as, although Black Panther has received mainly positive reviews, one of the criticisms has been the longish running time of 134 minutes. (Read our review here).