‘Eyes of Wakanda’ Director Todd Harris Breaks Down the Show’s Signature Style

Go behind the scenes of the four-part Marvel Animation series, streaming now on Disney+.

Welcome back to Wakanda.

Marvel Animation’s Eyes of Wakanda is now streaming on Disney+, a stunning four-part series that explores the rich legacy of the Black Panther’s home. Created by longtime Marvel storyboard artist Todd Harris, the show spans thousands of years of Wakandan history, following the nation’s elite special forces (known as the Hatut Zeraze) as they travel the world to retrieve valuable Vibranium artifacts.

Each episode of Eyes of Wakanda centers on a different member of the Hatut Zeraze, stretching from the Bronze Age to ancient Greece and China and beyond. The series is part spy adventure, part historical epic — with plenty of impressive action along the way.

“My main pitch was a vehicle to depict history through the lens of Wakanda,” Harris tells Marvel.com. “What did those intersections look like? If technology is indiscernible from magic, what does the average person in the Bronze Age think of someone with those amazing abilities?”

Harris has a long history with the Marvel Cinematic Universe, working as a storyboard artist on films like Thor: Ragnarok and Avengers: Infinity War. He also helped bring Wakanda to the screen with Black Panther and Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, both directed by Ryan Coogler (who serves as an executive producer on Eyes of Wakanda). The two Black Panther films are both set in the present day, but Eyes of Wakanda spans centuries of history, and Harris and his team had to imagine how the country might grow and evolve through the decades.

“That was an interesting mission in and of itself because what you don’t want to do is just replicate something,” says Harris, who directed all four episodesd. “Ryan built such a concrete, palpable world of what Wakanda is today. Building backwards from that was basically the order of the day.”

Eyes of Wakanda also boasts a distinct visual style, with dynamic action scenes and lush landscapes that look like oil paintings come to life. “Marvel has a tradition of being founded on the drawn image, and there’s a love and reverence for that,” Harris explains. “I wanted to make sure that it felt like hands were on it.”

To depict the Hatut Zeraze’s graceful athleticism, Harris found himself drawn to the work of Ernie Barnes, the professional athlete turned painter known for his stylized depictions of figures in motion. Barnes’ signature aesthetic helped influence the characters’ long limbs and exaggerated proportions. Illustrator Dean Cornwell was another big inspiration, particularly for his painterly style and use of color.

The result is a gorgeous and stylized show that Harris describes as a labor of love — one that he can’t wait to share with Marvel fans everywhere.

“Everybody working on the show loves the show, and we loved working with each other,” he says. “Everybody there is a Marvel fan and a big comic book nerd, and all of us got together and made a show that we all wanted watch. And we hope that everybody else wants to watch it, too.”