The New ‘Heart of Darkness’: Exploring Images of Africa in Wolf Warrior 2 (2017)

AbstractThis paper explores the parochialism overshadowing the representation of Africa in Wolf Warrior 2, a popular Chinese film released in 2017. Set in Africa, the film portrays the continent as chaotic, characterized by lawlessness, ravaged by war and disease, and destined for doom. Of particular interest to this paper is the role assigned to the Chinese characters, which reveals stereotypes of Africa in the face of a rising Sino-African economic, political and diplomatic engagement which highlights principles of egalitarianism. The article uncovers a “White Saviour Complex” in the film's Chinese characters in ways similar to Western colonial narratives. This is despite the fact that there is no colonial history linking Africa and China that would substantiate the new face given to this White Saviour Complex. This paper posits that Wolf Warrior 2 reasserts a superiority complex in views of Africa, often bundling the entire continent's countries into one hopeless entity desperate for a foreign saviour. It further suggests that the film announces China's displacement of the West on the continent. This paper argues that Wolf Warrior 2 reveals hegemonic anti-African racist stereotypes.