Eastern action meets Western superhero formula in Marvel’s Shang-Chi And The Legend Of The Ten Rings
Simu Liu and Tony Leung headline an all-star cast in this first Asian-led blockbuster from Marvel Studios
Film Reviews Shang-Chi
Whether they come from a wuxia novel set in the distant past or a contemporary kung fu movie, Chinese martial-arts heroes—with their commitment to a moral code, not to mention their incredible abilities—offer a counterpart to Western superheroes. In 1973, Marvel Comics combined the two archetypes with the introduction of Shang-Chi, a character whose powers came from a lifetime of training in the fighting arts. Now the industry is poised for another convergence, as Marvel debuts its first Asian-led superhero movie, Shang-Chi And The Legend Of The Ten Rings, a project that blends Chinese and North American storytelling and star power.
The MCU is extraordinarily popular in China, which helps explain why so much of this new film takes place there. That said, at its core, Shang-Chi is an Asian American superhero story. Themes of homecoming, legacy, and balancing cultures and identities run throughout the movie. The soundtrack is multicultural, featuring both traditional Chinese music and southern hip-hop. The script, by director Destin Daniel Cretton and co-writers Andrew Lanham and Dave Callaham, retcons some of Marvel’s more insensitive depictions of Asian culture, while crafting an inspirational message about creating your own destiny and embracing the things that make you you.
For Shang-Chi (Canadian television actor and stuntman Simu Liu) and his sister, Xialing (Meng’er Zhang), that’s a loaded proposition, considering that their father, Wenwu (Tony Leung), is a thousand-year-old supervillain who has used the mystical ten rings of the title to build his reputation as a fearsome underworld kingpin. After the death of family matriarch Jiang Li (Fala Chen), an accomplished martial artist from a secluded, fantastical village, Wenwu dedicated himself and his son to revenge, while neglecting his daughter. (Leung’s heavy is an original character, a composite of two problematic Marvel Comics adversaries—including one whose earlier, divisive appearance in the MCU is addressed via a revisionist callback and subplot.)
Ten years after a teenage Shang-Chi was sent abroad to hunt down his mother’s killer, he’s going by the name Sean and working as a valet in San Francisco alongside best friend Katy (Awkwafina). But as usually happens in these movies, fate has bigger plans. Driven mad by grief, Wenwu has retreated into a delusional quest to save his wife by destroying her sacred ancestral home, which will unleash unstoppable forces of darkness in the process. So Shang-Chi, Xialing, and Katy depart on a journey between realms, on a mission to save their family—and the world—with the help of their long-lost aunt, Jiang Nan (Michelle Yeoh), and a menagerie of magical beasts.
In some ways, Shang-Chi is a mixtape of martial-arts movie genres: An early scene pays tribute to the balletic, graceful films of Zhang Yimou, while a dramatic bus chase later on apes the derring-do of an early Jackie Chan vehicle. Shang-Chi’s reunion with his sister takes place at an underground fighting ring with a ’90s raver, Mortal Kombat type of vibe, and later on, father and son will walk into a grimy, fluorescent-lit gangster hangout straight out of an ’80s John Woo movie. But where those films (Mortal Kombat excepted, of course) emphasized practical effects and the amazing skills of highly trained stunt people, Shang-Chi insists on either interrupting or burying the stunt work—spearheaded by Chan protege Brad Allan, who tragically died earlier this month—with mountains of blatant CGI.
This isn’t always the case. Although Shang-Chi cuts away from a punch as often as it lands one, an extended fight sequence set in a half-built skyscraper observes Liu and Zhang from above in longer takes that allow for at least a few seconds of unbroken fight choreography. And while the climax of this film is as chaotic and unintelligible as any other MCU movie, at least Shang-Chi has benevolent dragons and brave lions instead of the ugly metal detritus of Black Widow. The first half of the movie is funnier and more down-to-earth than its second, which transitions from modern action to mythical fantasy with an emphasis on Chinese folklore—some actual, some imagined.
But while Shang-Chi ekes some awe—and some “awwws,” in the case of a winged, faceless, oddly cuddly critter named Morris—out of its fantasy elements, in the end its greatest assets are human. That refers to the stunts, yes, but more often to Tony Leung, who exudes the type of movie-star charisma critics sometimes complain is on the decline. Leung isn’t exactly being challenged here, but he brings soul to the scant emotional depth of his character, a classic Marvel villain in the sense that he’s sympathetic until he’s not. Among the younger actors, Awkwafina stands out thanks to her natural gift for comedy. Yeoh’s talents, on the other hand, are mostly wasted. Cretton, making his first blockbuster after a run of human-scaled dramas like Short Term 12 and The Glass Castle, knows to let the comedian be funny. So why hire a legendary action star, then dedicate most of her screen time to exposition?
Living up to the expectations of Asian American Marvel fans hungry for an MCU movie of their own must have weighed on Shang-Chi’s writers and director. This anxiety is reflected in the story itself: After being given extraordinary power, Shang-Chi’s first instinct is to run away from it. That moment of human vulnerability suggests that there’s a point of view somewhere inside this gigantic, sprawling, tightly controlled slab of blockbuster product. For every earnest emotion, however, there’s a concession to the formulaic demands of the genre and the studio. Shang-Chi’s hero is on a journey to become himself, but the movie is lost inside of the machine.
300 Comments
In 1973, Marvel Comics combined the two archetypes with the introduction of Shang-Chi, a character whose powers came from a lifetime of training in the fighting arts.And, 16 years later, he’d team up with an alien cyborg to fight an a shapeshifting, alien sorceress that had taken the form an ancient Egyptian princess whom Shang-Chi straight up decapitated…And, in spite of the fact that Marvel no longer owns the rights to said alien cyborg, this is all still canon since Marvel created all of the character’s backstory in-house so they own all of his backstory.
Whoa, was she okay?
“I have never exploded. But I know what it would be like. Don’t ask me how. I just know. I’ve always just known.”
ROTFL!The only way to top that is with this….
I like Rom when I was a kid, I think whoever made the toy has had the rights since forever, but his backstory was really cool.
Yeah. I never had the toy but the comics were good. Super moody. Rare example of a marketing gimmick that went good.
I had a letter published in the Rom lettercol once or twice. Was awarded a No-Prize. 🙂 They actually SENT me the No-Prize! I got a little card in the mail that said it was the No-Prize, and congratulations. They sent the card weeks (or months??) before the book hit the stands, so it was quite a while before I made the connection between what I’d received in the mail, and what they said in the lettercol.
I am a hardcore comics nerd and I have NO IDEA how you pull the deep cuts you do. You have to have been following Marvel since the ‘60’s, but even then…. to be able to pull the specific pages means you either own a comic book store or have a collection that borders on the miraculous. Are you basically the Watcher?
Nah, I just read a lot of comics from my local library and watch YouTube series like Atop The Fourth Wall.
I mean a lot of Shang Chi’s stuff is a bit deep cut. I don’t think I’ve read a comic where he sticks around for more than 1 issue.
a lot of Shang Chi’s stuff is a bit deep cut. I don’t think I’ve read a comic where he sticks around for more than 1 issue.I loved Shang Chi’s series, Master Of Kung Fu. It was moody and beautiful (at its best; say from issue #s in the 80s and up).The stories were nothing special; sort of James Bond vs the Orient kinda stuff, and very repetitive. What made it unique was the style & atmosphere. Narrated in the first person by Shang Chi, who was meditatively preoccupied with peace and spiritual growth, and always irritated at getting pulled into the “games of deceit and death” required when his MI6 friends went into action against Fu Manchu’s villainous plots. The plots were silly, but the narration & atmosphere were immersive.This is one of those adaptations that I both am eager for and dread. From the trailers, there’s probably nothing in this movie that will echo the things I loved about the character ~40 years ago. But, it’s also likely that many of the things I loved about the character were problematic: stereotypical mystical Asian who mumbles about spirit, un-worldly kung fu monk who only wants to be left alone to meditate. This version will probably be “better” (less problematic) than the one I liked. But….
It’s all digital now.
Laserface, I love your posts. They take me back to my 80’s comic fandom and also give such great backstory to our current comic book-rich entertainment culture.
so is that where this storyline is headed? 😉
Jesus, I can’t get over just how yellow they made Shang-Chi’s skin. Was he like that in all his old-school comics?
Compared to the villains in his original series, he was pale. But, remember, the original story line was that he was the renegade son of the great Yellow Peril himself, Fu Manchu.
Between Fu, the Mandarin, and the Yellow Claw (Nick Fury’s nemesis), Marvel was REALLY bad about that. It makes you wonder why they try to reclaim it, instead of just letting go and using the formulas that served Chan, Yeoh, etc., so well.
I can’t get over just how yellow they made Shang-Chi’s skin. Was he like that in all his old-school comics?Sometimes they made him more almond-colored. His book ran from ~74 to 1983, and I think in the last few years of the run, he & his girlfriend Leiko were presented more with almond-y skin.
Aside from the tropes of that and previous decades, colors in comics and print at the time was extremely limited.As a kid, I thought Shang always had a great tan.
I’m incredibly excited to watch this and am rooting for this movie to succeed. I’m a big fan of Kim’s Convenience, a big fan of Simu Liu, a big fan of Awkwafina, and a big fan of the MCU telling more diverse stories. But no way in hell am I walking into a theater to see this, or any movie.
What if you had an aisle seat and breathed through a dryer vent snaked out through the emergency exit? Awkwafina would appreciate that.
Given the controversies of all the things you listed, this is definitely sarcastic right?
People can enjoy those things. Controversy doesn’t always equal bad quality.
I hope you find joy in life one day.
I feel the same. My solution—drive-in movie.
The Suicide Squad was the only movie I really wanted to see in theaters this year (and I wasn’t going to watch it on HBOMax because my internet is so shitty right now that I can’t make it more than 20 minutes into a show or movie without it dropping out). Thanks to (over)work, my wife and I weren’t able to see it til like 10 days after release at 3pm on a Tuesday afternoon. When I bought tix every other seat was empty, and when we got there that was still the case. Huzzah!
I had my heart set on seeing this and Dune in the theater. This was before it seemed like Delta was gonna fuck everything up. Now… if it was just me, I’d do it. Take a day off, go on a random Tuesday at 11 AM, take my chances the theater will be empty, wear a double mask throughout, and if I get sick, I’m vaccinated and chances are strong I won’t land in the hospital. But my little one is too young for the vaccine and my risk tolerance is zero for her getting sick. So no movies for me, not even middle-of-the-week matinees.
I imagine if we had kids or anyone else at risk in our home it might have been a tougher decision to make, so I feel ya. And oddly enough, The Suicide Squad was one of the only times I wish there HAD been an audience other than us, because I really wanted to hear how the general public reacted to it. As a lifelong comic nerd and fan of James Gunn since his Troma days I knew exactly what to expect, but I am genuinely curious how the average audience member reacted to the graphic violence played for laughs and the giant killer starfish and other weirdness.
I saw it in Toronto with a mildly sized audience and it was a fun experience to have others present.
Take the kid to the drive-in, it’s covid-free and she can wear her jammies. My kids think it’s a paradise, haha
My kids think it’s a paradise, haha
It is — I remember the first time I went to the drive-in, I was 12 years old and it was me, my younger brothers, my male cousin, and my uncle who came armed with mason jars full of beer to watch the first three PLANET OF THE APES movies.
Yeesh, you guys are true believers.
this is me except for the many saints of newark. God bless
Drive-in, yo. We’ve been hitting the drive in throughout the quarantine, and it rules.
I went to see SS with my son and there were only 7 teenage girls in the theater with us. So that was pretty safe. (Movie was a big letdown though).
As far as movies go, I’m limiting myself to 19+ screenings only. I saw Shang-Chi yesterday in a theatre that was at roughly 10% capacity. So the crowd was pretty subdued, but I suspect that would have been the case in any event (if we’re grading on a curve of Marvel movies, Shang-Chi is a solid B-).
Out of the 19, how many screenings do you have left to go?
You do you, but if you’re vaccinated I don’t see why not. Vaccines still very much work, although they’re not infallible, and if you take care to avoid peak hours I’m sure it’ll be fine.
I believe in the vaccine’s ability to save my life and keep me out of Intensive Care, and likely out of the hospital as well. But still too many questions about whether I can somehow pass it on to my kid. It’ll be on D+ in a couple months. I can wait and also hope the box office underperformance doesn’t count against the film when they’re considering sequels.
I have no intention of walking into a theater but I found a drive-in not far away. I figure sitting outside or watching from my car are safer options.
Awkwafina’s presence was a plus, but I got a lot more interested when I saw Tony Leung got roped into it.
Talked my sister into seeing it with me. Despite hearing me talk about him a fair bit, she doesn’t know Tony Leung by sight. A fair way into the film, when he and Simu Liu were on screen together, she leaned over and said, “His father is sexier than he is.” I leaned back and said, “He’s the reason we’re here.”
Regal Cinemas (and likely soon AMC as well) where I live is requiring vaccination cards along with ID at the door for all showings now. Yes, not foolproof, but good enough for me.
I’ve already reserved a seat in the back row of a huge IMAX theater with good ventilation and (most of) the people in there should be vaccinated, so I’m satisfied.
But no way in hell am I walking into a theater to see this, or any movie.
Trust the vaccine, trust science. That’s what everyobdy promised last year, that if we trust science, we can see Dune and shit this year. Trust the vaccine, trust science.
But as you know, the unwashed became the unvaccinated and Delta is now ruining life for everyone!
Trust the vaccine and trust science doesn’t mean “pretend the pandemic isn’t still happening”
Those are the exact thoughts I expressed on a similar thread here recently. Been a fan of both stars, and the MCU… bought Master of Kung Fu off the spinner rack… but Delta is not something I’m willing to risk.
what’s the problem to get Delta, if you’ve gotten two injections?
trust the science. You can get it, but you won’t need the hospital, and that’s the point. Trust the science.
That’s the problem!Delta! I don’t want it, need it or look for it in any way, shape or form!Likewise I don’t want the flu, HIV or cancer.Your “advice” is “ill” advised!
by that logic, you NEVER have sex, or go in the sun, or eat barbeque?
..or do you moderate resonable behaviour with reasonable precaution?
You voted for the OrangeIdiot didn’t you?
First, thanks for being polite.
You voted for the OrangeIdiot didn’t you?Alas, i’m a canadian socialist and a working scientist.
While you seem to be an American reductionist who assumes the whole world is a) American and b) “one of two things”. I might be wrong.
So this thread is obviously not for you.
Ah, in the non-American world, people discuss ideas with people who disagree, not echo loudly when we find people who agree. Let us discuss, friend.
Maybe you would think twice otherwise… or just “think” would be preffered since your handle indicates you’re new here.
Actually i’m from the AV Club PRE-registration days, like 2001-era, but the AV Club deleted my account for an argument between myself (a canadian Palestinian) and a pro-Israel pro-Settlement guy. He called me an asshole, i called him an asshole, he flagged me as antisemitic, i got booted.
In short, you suppose much… but. Trust science.
The grand majority of the people are from the USA but I don’t consider everyone to be American.Once again, this thread is not for you.Perhaps you should have stayed “booted”. Maybe you would be happier on Parler? Either way, discussion closed, “eh”?
it’s not for me, because we disagree about trusting science?
Okay. But Parler is more for people like you. Sure, they’re mostly on the right. But they like echo chambers as much as you do.Later
Imtrust science and the vaccine just fine.I don’t trust the covIdiots in this stateAnd it’s obvious that “discussion closed” does not mean the same thing in Canada, eh?It’s clear why you were kicked out of here in the first place, it also clear why you’re lonely. Now for the last time discussion closed… and you’re blocked.
If you trust the vaccine works as the numbers say it does, then you should also trust that it protects against ‘covidiots’, surely? Are you never going to go to the cinema again?
You know, Cranston’s Rules, I didn’t vote for Trump, but since I’ve got my shots? I’m willing to risk going to a theater, because…lots of folks like you won’t, so there’s a lot of space between me and the next person!Even before the vaccine, I had to do the shopping for my family, so I had to venture out, properly masked, to get food…usually among The Great Unmasked. (Yeah, I live in Upstate NY, where they still think Trump was cheated out of re-election!) I thankfully managed to be COVID-negative, and I get myself tested every time they’ll let me just to be sure I haven’t contracted it and will bring it to my family and friends.
You do you.I’m not going back to the theater and neither are most people on this thread … I get in and out of stores just fine but I’m slightly handicapped after an accident a few years back along with a touch of asthma so l will reconsider “theater” in December….Until then great picture and sound at home and too much coming up that I can’t fit it all between HBO, Hulu and Netflix
It is culling some of them, but not enough yet.
There is dark stuff going on here.
I’m confused – you’re suggesting that someone who is saying “trust the vaccine, trust science” is pro-Trump?
The very first post indicated “But no way in hell am I walking into a theater to see this, or any movie.”So this thread is obviously not for you.You don’t live in the South with the greatest number of idiots per capita do you? Maybe you would think twice otherwise… or just “think” would be preffered since your handle indicates you’re new here.
The thing about the “unvaccinated” is that they’re more likely to get COVID from us than we are from them…….and I can’t think of a better conclusion for those Trumpers.
It is culling some of them, but not enough yet.
Maybe I’m missing something, I live in the UK. But genuinely why do so many people feel this way still despite being double vaccinated, especially ones who are also young (ish) and generally healthy? The point of the vaccine is to stop hospitalisation, so that things can mostly return to normal, surely? Not to mention that chances of contracting covid on any level and especially passing it on are drastically lowered anyway if fully vaccinated. What are people achieving by continuing to emphasise that they still won’t do something like go to the cinema? I’m happy to be fully vaxxed and to get back out and enjoy some activities again. I don’t think that’s irresponsible.
How exactly does so-called “awkwafina” have fans, except among the extremely racist who also like to mock black American culture?
I really want to support this movie and see it in a theater, but of course, Delta makes me hesitate, in spite of being fully vaccinated and a dedicated public mask wearer.
Then I remind myself that my wife works in an elementary school surrounded five days a week by dozens of unvaccinated kids with poor mask discipline.Compared to her daily existence, a trip to the movies should be a cake walk.
This is why I saw it at 10:30 in the morning with about 3 people in the theatre. I have the vaccine and wore a mask. Its not like people are just falling over dead the second they leave their house. You can be smart about how you a movie in the theatre.
Went to a 1 PM show, barely half-full (even with capacity restrictions and I still had a whole row to myself and all 4 rows ahead of me were empty) and soon in Ontario Canada proof of vax will be required to enter theatres anyway (by the time No Time to Die and Dune are out). I am fully vaxxed and masked (only pull the mask down to the side to take a sip of water then back on).I don’t quite think if you’re at a responsible theatre and vaccinated it means that being in a movie theatre is instant death or even automatically getting COVID-19. But I will be much happier when the vax pass kicks in a few weeks.
I saw The Suicide Squad last month and they had socially distanced seating… I saw Shang-Chi at the same theatre last night and it was completely sold out. I was genuinely shocked at the hundreds of parents with young children I saw present. Everyone was eating popcorn with their facemask at their chin. It was a bit gross.
I went to the matinee to see this today and the theater was nearly empty. Plus regal theaters do reserved seating so I always book in advance and get tickets in the far corner away. Still, it was only me and two others in the theater – for what it is worth.
Well, I just saw the movie today, a month after release, at a matinee showing with a total of four other people in a massive theater.My point is, it’s possible to go to the movies if you plan it right.
Same here! Which is why I’ve only just now watched it thanks to its Disney+ release lol.Honestly I felt the movie dragged a little bit in places and didn’t have the usual constant-joke-telling that Marvel films often use to keep you having fun in the places they drag (which is arguably a good thing I guess as it makes it less formulaic to standard Marvel stuff)… but overall was a good time and the characters were cool (Katy especially) and the “villain” was really well acted and another of Marvel’s more stand-out ones.I do miss the cinema, but I ain’t going back to one for another 3 years at least lol.
Watched it last night too! Share your sentiment re: the pace feeling different, not as fast/punchy as other Marvel films, but I was ok with that. I really enjoyed it and hope they make more. Of the million things that was terrible about Boseman passing away, one of them is not getting to see a Black Panther/Ten Rings crossover, which I think would have worked nicely.
How to show people you’re inclusive and with the times? Make a movie about an Asian superhero with an almost exclusively Asian cast full of Asian tropes and stereotypes. Martial arts, check. Estranged father who’s demands the son can’t live up to, check. Have it take place in China or Japan, check. Dragons, check. Guy works low job but is sort of Asian mafia or warlord royalty, check. Etc, etc. Would have been impressed if it wasn’t exactly what you would expect from a bunch of white guys trying to look woke and appeal to an Chinese audience.
So. . . you’d prefer they not make a Shang-Chi film at all? Comment/name synergy checks out.
Kind of curious about how this ties up with Iron Man 3. But damn, I’m tired of all MCU movies landing in a predictable B range. Either making something really great or something bad and interesting Marvel.
Good luck to this movie, but as much as I like Marvel films, I’m not going to go watch this in theaters (especially since we have another Covid resurgence in our country)
I’ll do you one better, I’m not even going to watch it on streaming! Cause it’s yet one more B- MCU movie that’s exactly the fucking same as the rest.
Boooooo
I know, haha, no negative talk about the MCU allowed. Endgame was soooo epic, oh my god. The rat!
The AV Club appreciates your clicking through even if it is just to act the fool.
Right? Saying anything not-positive about the MCU means you’re acting the fool, I love this.
But you’re NOT just “saying anything non-positive about the MCU”, are you? You’re deliberately coming in to troll a Marvel thread — which makes you the fool, as well as the asshole.::Wonders when The Colonel will go off once I start crapping all over Zack Snyder…::
Wow, so me expressing my subjective opinion about a movie has led you to call me a “troll,” a “fool,” an “asshole,” and someone without “a chest.”Think maybe it’s time to stand up from the computer and go touch grass? You’re melting down over comic book movies, lady.
So you missed the point of my comment entirely?I guess it isn’t an act.
Was the the “point of your comment” to demonstrate that you have an personality problem that causes you to say hateful shit to strangers because you disagree with their opinion of comic book movies?If so, no, I got it.
You keep clicking on a thing you hate. AV Club, based on web traffic (and your contribution to it) determine that they need to keep it up with the Marvel content.You’re accomplishing the opposite of your goal. Unless your goal is to be a feckless screamclown soiling this environment for no obvious reason.Either way (and I repeat), The AV Club appreciates your clicking through even if it is just to act the fool.
What do you want, a medal?
What do you want, a medal?
Or a chest to pin it on?
If you’re not going to see this movie, and your only critique is “Marvel bad” with nothing more interesting to add, then why are you commenting on this thread? I’ve never understood people who spread negativity just for the sake of it.
Quite a hot take!~
But it does have Simu Liu and he’s just like Jung from Kim’s Convenience with more ass kicking.
You do realize it’s Marvel’s B-list that are the most interesting — probably because since Marvel never gave much of a shit about them, the writers could get creative.
In the mid-Aughts they did a short-run series AGENTS OF ATLAS, in which SHIELD Agent Jimmy Woo, discovering he’s the the descendant of Genghis Khan and heir to The Golden Claw, also finds out their history of “villainy” is a question of whether you were defending Asia or invading it. So he assembles a team of Antiheroes and D-Listers like The Sub-Mariner’s sister Namora, M-11 the Human Robot, Gorilla Man, Venus and Marvel Boy (aka The Uranian),
“Take Me To Ur-Anus!”
and they fight to protect the Earth from villains like Norman Osborn (who at that point is the Director of SHIELD!) and various other Above-the-Law types.I was so happy to discover that Disney+ is working on an AGENTS OF ATLAS series starring Randall Park as Woo….
Who are the two problematic characters Wenwu is a hybrid of? I thought Marvel/MCU replaced the terrible Fu Manchu nonsense when they were forced to for rights reasons. Was his comics replacement just as bad? (I haven’t read a Shang-Chi comic in aaaages, so I have no knowledge of the replacement, other than he exists.)
I’m sure someone will correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m pretty sure Katie’s referring to Fu Manchu and the Mandarin.
I think Wenwu is meant to be a mix of Fu Manchu and The Mandarin? I know the Mandarin got redone from the old mystic stereotype to ‘Asian Businessman’ like he went to the same tailor as Mr. Negative.
Marvel hasn’t really been that good with Asian characters in the past. I think there was one villain that was a literally building-sized egg with stereotypical Asian features.
The giant egg is a Wonder Woman villain. It wouldn’t surprise me if the same writer or editor was responsible for both, though, since there’s always been traffic back and forth between the Big Two.
And that makes sense about the Mandarin, thanks. I was just worried that Marvel crapped the bed when replacing Fu Manchu, which wouldn’t be hard to imagine happening.
Robert Kanigher did Egg Fu, he was 99% DC, did like two issues at Marvel, none of which featuring Asian villains. Not that anyone at Marvel created Fu Manchu — he’s a 100+ year old pulp novel character they licensed.
The Wonder Woman villain Egg-Fu (yes that was his name until around 2006. after that he was called Chang Tzu) was created by Robert Kanigher who never worked for Marvel.Ah, nothing like casual racism…
It wouldn’t surprise me if the same writer or editor was responsible for both, though, since there’s always been traffic back and forth between the Big Two.Or there was just hella anti-Asian racism in America in general, starting back when Chinese immigrants helped build the railroads, getting a big shot in the arm during WWII (one of the cartoonists who drew some astonishingly racist portrayals of Japanese was Dr. Seuss), and a somewhat smaller shot during the Vietnam War. Plenty of it to go around in pop culture.
Ah, looks like the same artist and writer duo that created the Egg Fu also worked on Spider-Man and Archie for a while.
This is incorrect. The writer Robert Kanigher, didn’t work for Marvel. The artist Ross Andru worked on Spider-Man.
IDK about the Archie stuff, but Kanigher worked for DC for most of his career. Most notably DC’s war comics. His most famous creations include Sgt. Rock, Black Canary, the Metal Men, the Unknown Soldier, Rose and Thorn, Poison Ivy, Barry Allen (Flash), and the original versions of the Losers and the Suicide Squad (very different than the movies)
Edit: Kanigher did write two Marvel issues in 1972; an Iron Man issue and an issue of Our Love Story. He never wrote Spider-Man. Gerry Conway and Len Wein wrote those Spider-Man comics with Ross Andru on the art.
Bob Kanigher and his drug stash were responsible for Egg Fu. He never worked for Marvel, and did the stray superhero work only because Marston liked him. He was much better with stuff like Sgt. Rock.
I’m hoping this matches up with that Marvel short, Hail to the King – where Trevor, the actor playing the Mandarin, is being interviewed in prison and… it turns out there IS a Mandarin, and he’s pissed off.
I loved how they handled the Mandarin in Iron Man 3, and also that that short gave them an out for him to be an actual big bad villain rather than a PR construct.
I’m really torn on Iron Man 3’s treatment of the Mandarin. On the one hand, Ben Kingsley is legitimately scary in his Mandarin scenes, so the rug pull cheapens that a little. On the other hand, what a rug pull! I think if Killian had been a stronger villain I’d be less on the fence.
Killian wasn’t even supposed to be the main villain in IM3, Maya Hansen was. But, Ike Perlmutter nixed that with his usual misogynist viewpoint.
Figures.
I am 100% on the side of the Iron Man 3 twist being awesome. Saying the rug pull cheapens the movie feels wrong headed to me, because Iron Man 3 is ultimately ‘90s style action comedy. The Mandarin turning out to be a joke was totally in-line with the tone of the movie.
Not seen it, but it would be amusing that instead of the expected stereotypical Imperial Chinese official, the “real” Mandarin is actually a sentient small orange.
I’m hoping this matches up with that Marvel short, Hail to the King –
where Trevor, the actor playing the Mandarin, is being interviewed in
prison and… it turns out there IS a Mandarin, and he’s pissed off. .Oh, it definitely does. Ben Kingsley was in the publicity cast photos taken before the premiere and splashed all over the entertainment mags.
That guy — Egg Fu — belonged to DC. Marvel had Mandarin, the Yellow Claw, and a license to Fu Manchu.
That’s Egg Fu. He’s DC.
No, that was DC — Egg Fu, one of Wonder Woman’s Rogue’s Gallery:And look at how progressive they are, writing them speaking Engrish!You know, even Sax Rohmer eventually had Fu Manchu do a face turn, and become more of an antihero….
Were there flashbacks to when Egg Fu was young?
Zircon the Blue….
They basically merged the Mandarin and Shangi Chi’s father (originally Fu Manchu, later with “real name” revealed as Zheng Zu) into a single character in the MCU.
The Mandarin has the whole backstory of finding ten alien rings that gave him various powers and later became a recurring Iron Man villain.
Shang-Chi’s father has the whole backstory of immortal international crime boss. (with some mystical stuff involved)
Shang Chi’s father is literally Fu Manchu. That’s a lot of his basic story arc as a character
You should read more than the first sentence of a post before hitting reply.
They basically just renamed Fu Manchu- they didn’t change any other details. So it’s more like a The Shadow/Grey Ghost situation where just enough was changed for it not to be a rights issue.
Fu Manchu and The Mandarin (who should be doable in a non-problematic way, the rings he got were from outer space so just let them take over his mind and the racist tropes go away).
SPOILER
The movie has him list some of the names he’s been known by, and one of them is Master Khan, who in the comics is a Power Man/Iron Fist villain, so he’s a hybrid of at least THREE problematic characters!
Didn’t he say he has been called Master Khan?
Is it just me or are we giving Marvel too much ‘diversity matters’ credit for basically using a Bruce Lee caricature created solely to cash in on kung fu films’ popularity in the 70s to now cash in on the Chinese box office?
I mean, except for the fact that the Moench/Gulacey run on MOKF is one of the top 5 Marvel runs of the 70s?
That’s a subjective opinion and a successful run 40+ years ago does not equate to the need to film a live action version in 2021. Do you honestly believe they would’ve chosen Shang-Chi for his own film if it weren’t for the Chinese box office? Hell, I’m not saying it’s a bad thing, but come on, this is a decision championed by it’s potential financial success, not the need to tell an obscure 40 year old story almost no MCU fans will even recognize?
“this is a decision championed by it’s potential financial success”Literally, Hollywood.
Oh, no, clearly. But this is the same well they got BP from. Same writing team, same time. Is Feige in his 50s? Because that puts those books right in his wheelhouse age wise.
In fact, the choice of Simu Liu as the star may have hurt the film’s prospects in China. The overall reaction to the film’s announcement in China was that the West has denigrated China’s prestige and hurt the Chinese people’s feelings by choosing someone who is not considered conventionally attractive by their standards.
yeah I don’t have super high expectations for how this will do in China, because, guess what, folks in the diaspora and folks who live in Asia have different experiences and expectations! Chinese ppl in China generally are not very concerned about “media representation” (so long as it is not offensive to their sensibilities) bc they have their own huge media industry with plenty of Chinese celebrities and movies. Going to see a movie with Asian faces in it is like…every day….it’s not in and of itself a draw the way it can be for Asian folks in Western diaspora. Would be nice if this did well, though, just because I think it’s a real bummer that netizens were so rude to Simu about being “ugly.”
“this is a decision championed by it’s potential financial success”So it’s like most movies then?
Also his dad was literally Fu Manchu for a while. They renamed him, but obviously didn’t change enough to avoid having to change him even more in this film
Sounds exciting! Mulan was beautiful but had some bizarre CGI moments in the fight scenes, so as long as Disney doesn’t do any of that to the martial arts scenes, then this sounds sweet (especially blending a lot of different martial art inspiration).
i hope that scaffolding scene they put out on twitter isn’t the skyscraper thing they praise in the review, because that fight looked like ass. shitty hyperactive camera like from a 90s nickelodeon juice commercial and floaty body physics.
lol plus if it is just another scaffolding scene that’s legit the “big end fight” in Mulan and that sucked. Just give us a blank arena with some sick ass fighting and not a ton of jump cuts.
Saw it last night – the camera was definitely too jumpy in the scaffolding fight, but the bus fight near the start of the movie was super fun, with good choreography and clean cinematography. The big final show-down was more of a big battle scene than a 1-1 fight. Overall, I quite enjoyed the movie – I liked / was invested in the main characters (protagonists and villain), it had a good mix of action and character development and fun, and it was quite pretty to watch. And not that it’s relevant for me, but I can definitely see it speaking to the 1st gen Asian-American experience. The ending was a little abrupt, but overall I recommend.
I enjoyed it too, such a fun Marvel movie and I find they often drop the ball the third act but this was great. it was nice not having the end be a giant “end of the world” moment.the characters were equally charming, and the humour didn’t feel as tired as the other marvel movies (aside from relying a little too much on the jail break out character).
I’m sure the image of Blue Lightning Dude vs Orange Lightning Dude was all done in camera.
I wonder if this movie does like Mulan, and seemingly like most every Hollywood movie aimed at Chinese audiences, where they stop every 10 minutes to explain the cultural significance of various shit.“Ah yes, that is a coi fish, to out people it represents wisdom and bravery,” etc etc. I can’t tell if that’s what Chinese audiences expect, or if it’s just how Hollywood panders to them.
I’m really excited for this movie, Douglas Wolk turned me on to the brilliance of Doug Moench and Paul Gulacy’s Master of Kung Fu run in the 70s starring Shang-Chi. It’s really really good 70s Marvel comics, and if you have Marvel Unlimited you should definitely check it out.Marvel, the publishing company, has a real optics problem though with Shang-Chi because, despite recent efforts, there are no good Shang-Chi comics with East Asian creators to turn new fans on to. Black Panther had Priest and Ta-Nehesi Coates, Captain Marvel had Kelly Thompson and Kelly Sue DeConnick…but Shang-Chi’s best stories have been done by white guys, and they still need a heavy dose of cultural context for a modern reading.Complete tangent: Is this Tony Leung’s first English-language movie?
Does this count? Because for a certain demo it’s the first movie that comes to mind with the name “Tony Leung”: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Lover_(1992_film)
There are 2 Tony Leung’s working in Hong Kong cinema. The one is Shang-Chi is the same one that was in John Woo movies and numerous Wong Kar Wai movies. The one in the Lover is the other one.
TIL to check if “Tony Leung” refers to “Big Tony” or “Little Tony” – thank you!
Damn, and the AVClub B- is a solid A anywhere else, so I’m stoked for Phase 4!
It’s funny cause it’s blatantly untrue
That’s the “B.B. Dowd” rule; not sure it applies to anyone else.
Eh, complaining that a B-range grade is unforgivably negative when the scale goes all the way down to F is silly. Think of the grades as what you need to advance to the next class at a community college, not as what you need to get into an Ivy League university.
Shang-Chi is one of my favorite Marvel characters, so yeah, I’m gonna watch this. Casting looks completely great, and the story? Well, in comics Shang-Chi was the son of Fu Manchu, worked with British Intelligence, fought Spider-man, got in a cab driven by Rufus T. Hackstabber… there’s a ton of leeway in what the guy can get involved with is what I’m saying.But unless Covid disappears one day soon, like magic (I was promised that at one point), I’m not going to see it in a theater. Which is too damn bad ‘cause this one looks like it would be great on the big screen.
But where those films (Mortal Kombat excepted, of course) emphasized practical effects and the amazing skills of highly trained stunt people, Shang-Chi insists on either interrupting or burying the stunt work—spearheaded by Chan protege Brad Allan, who tragically died earlier this month—with mountains of blatant CGI. This was the first MCU movie I was interested in since Endgame, but I was afraid of this. Besides maybe, MAYBE Winter Soldier I can’t think of an MCU movie that really wowed me with hand-to-hand choreography (though I think they do “8-year-old kid mashing their action figures together” really well, and that’s not a backhanded compliment).
Does Tony Leung get room to do his acting thing at least?
Having seen it over the weekend, I now think this criticism was way, way off. The fights were easily the best-choreographed since TWS, so only if the reviewer was referring to the final large-scale battle could that be even remotely accurate.
This review is about what I expected based on the trailer. I don’t think Marvel gets enough credit for how consistently high a floor they have for their movies and I think they get way too much credit given how consistently low their ceilings are. The majority of their movies are B-’s or B’s. If I think of ones that achieved a higher level, I go “Iron Man” (which of course was pre-Marvel Studios), “Iron Man 3″, “Captain America: The Winter Soldier”, and maybe “Black Panther” (though having recently rewatched, I didn’t think it held up great).There are very few movies that are outright bad (though there are some), and that’s a pretty amazing achievement considering how many there are. And there are a lot of movies that are absolutely solid and entertaining. But especially recently, you really can feel the formula running through all their movies and TV offerings, and the formula usually crushes anything original that’s trying to get out.Perhaps the biggest offender generally is Marvel’s sense of humor and jokiness, which is very forced and often unnecessary. It feels like they give their scripts to a comedy script doctor (like what Patton Oswalt used to do) and say “We need more funny, make funny line here.” Marvel is the king of undercutting dramatic moments with forced humor rather than letting those moments breathe.
I’ll give them slightly more credit in that the filmmakers they’re pursuing and attracting now are have talent and vision that when it meshes (James Gunn, Taika Waititi) it can elevate the pre-fab construction, and I appreciate it even when it doesn’t work (Captain Marvel for me). I’m not familiar enough to Cretton to know if I should be hopeful, but if we end up with an Ant-Man I’ll be satisfied.
What about an Ant Man Too?
Cretton’s ‘Short Term 12′ is an incredible film. It’s one of the few films I’ve watched that actually nails what it’s like to work with children and the cast is stellar across the board.
really? the majority of criticism for marvel movies i see and hear is the exact fact that they basically consistently deliver an assembly line, B’ish experience.personally, while in the last few years my enthusiasm has definitely waned, i agree with you that it’s the main selling point:it’s like a chain restaurant. it may not be the best meal i’ve ever had – though sometimes they might surprise and delight me with a new menu item – but i mostly know what i’m getting and it’s consistent. (also kudos for propping up iron man 3 i love that one, too)
I’ve said this before around these parts but after a year of watching HBO Max’s “straight to the dumpster” quality Blockbusters, it makes it harder and harder to say that these are assembly line. Like, we know they’re going to fight a bad guy at the end and 95% chance they’ll win, but if every other major franchise is any indication there is no formula for consistently making lovable characters that we want to return to other than hard work and taking creative risks by hiring the right people.
well they’re just different assembly lines. by virtue of having to use a lot of the same parts (actors, locations) both mcu and dceu films are (at least in my eyes) assembly line products. that one may be assembled in a better way doesn’t mean it wasn’t still part of a larger assembly line process. i don’t necessarily mean it as a pejorative, but these flicks aren’t made in a vacuum, is my point. even something like taika’s thor 3: obviously he put his own spin on it, but he didn’t even direct the action sequences.
Honestly, making a *good* assembly line product is its own art form because you consistently get the same results for your money. It’s pretty difficult to make this many pretty good action movies in a row
There are also good assembly lines and bad ones. Some make solid products, some don’t. Marvel’s make solid products, and this is due to a few things:1. Casting – Marvel’s casting is out of this world good, and it owes most of its success to its casting directors. 2. Control of tone – Marvel’s movies know exactly what tone they’re going for, even when they deal with weird subject matter. This is also why Marvel movies rarely reach major highs, but it’s a big part of why they never reach major lows.3. World-building – every movie is highly aware of the universe it inhabits, and Feige and co. are masters at piecing together puzzles to make each movie fit within established guidelines. Again, the negative here is no movie is allowed to stray too far outside what’s built, but the positive is it feels like a real, lived-in universe.Casting is definitely the most important one though. As you said, there is no formula for consistently making lovable characters (I might disagree a tad, but mostly you’re right), so the secret is cast the perfect person to bring that character to life, and Marvel’s hit rate on that is astounding.
I’m basically in complete agreement but with the one side note of along with absolutely inspired casting choices, you have to add hiring interesting directors which they’ve been doing for almost a decade. The Russo Brothers were not an obvious choice to direct the Winter Soldier as much as we might love the Community paintball episode. I’m just going to add that I’m not a huge fan boy. I love these movies but I doubt more than 1 or 2 of them would crack my Top 20. But for mainstream entertainment to be this consistently surprising and creative is unique in my opinion. The only other comparison from the last two decades would be the (obviously superior) Pixar filmography.
yeah i would almost say the directors (and writers [and feige himself]) have to be the secret sauce here.on paper, the DC movies are better cast than MCU movies. i deeply respected that snyder cast the almost-10-years-older-than-cavill amy adams as lois lane, who seemed perfect…and yet…the DC actors all look the part, but something is always off. the MCU actors can look off, but end up embodying the part.
yes , I totally agree. when I see a DC movie, and I see Amy Adams, I don’t say “hey there’s Lois Lane”, instead it’s :hey its amy adams, hey its Ben Affleck, oh look Jeremy Irons.with Marvel, when I see Mark Rufallo on screen, im like That’s Dr Banner!! when Scarlett shows up that’s Natasha! even Jeremy Renner is Clint to me. oh and Paul Rudd too, any other movie I see Paul Rudd and I will say hey! that’s Paul Rudd, but in Marvel he’s Scott Lang, not Paul Rudd. yes they totally embody their parts!
Hot take- I don’t think the Russo brothers are that amazing as directors, and feel why they worked for Marvel is they are good company men.
With their Marvel films I don’t see anything that distinct or interesting in their direction that really makes the films standout. The power of their Marvel films comes from the story and the world they’re playing in, not anything unique in the direction. They feel like studio blockbusters done incredibly well, rather than films with the voices of their directors.
(Whereas someone like Taika Watiti very much brought his personality and directing style to his Marvel film, and I am curious to see how Chloe Zhao works within the Marvel Studio system.)
The Russo Brothers may not have as much of a signature style as some directors but their super power is tying plot to character, and when it matters meaning subverting expectations and tropes. They made Captain America cool, and I don’t think it’s an accident that Black Panther is at his most badass in Civil War just like I don’t think it’s an accident they got picked to do Infinity War and Endgame. They gave us meaningful character moments for like 20 different characters in Endgame that pretty much all landed. Outside of getting good performances from actors that is the most important thing a director has to do (not that I really know, I don’t work in the industry), but it seems pretty evident when compared to just about any major blockbuster director that isn’t working inside the MCU.
“but their super power is tying plot to character, and when it matters meaning subverting expectations and tropes.”
They didn’t write the scripts for their films though.
I’m sure they were involved in the scripting process for their films to an extent- but given they weren’t given scripting credits on any of their Marvel films I’m hesitant to give them too much credit for this.
Because tying plot to character is something that comes from the script and in the writing of the films. It shouldn’t be something that only comes around during the shooting.
Black Panther being bad-ass I’d be inclined to give more credit to Spiro Razatos for that- he was the second unit director and stunt coordinator on Civil War. And on big franchise blockbusters the second unit are in charge of the action.
They certainly do deserve credit for the performances from the actors- but that’s not the only thing a director is meant to be doing. A director is also in charge of the visual style of the film. Think someone like Edgar Wright who has a distinct style based around fast cuts, crash zooms and match cuts. Or Chloe Zhao who makes extensive use of natural light, open landscapes and long cuts. Their films have personality not just from the actors performances but from how everything is shot, framed and edited.
To me the Russo directors feel like TV directors in the days before Peak TV. If a director was brought on to shoot an episode of Star Trek TNG- the show already has a set visual style and tone that they had to follow. Their job was to work within the already existing set-up and match the house style of the show. They still needed to get good performances from the actors, but their job wasn’t to stand-out. And that’s the Russo brothers Marvel films to me. They are matching the house style, and managing huge blockbuster sets while getting everything shot on time, and doing a great job of it.
From what I’ve read and seen in interviews they are pretty hands on in breaking the story beats at least, and this goes all the way down to when the whole thing is shot and they are still restructuring it in the editing bay. You’re right I didn’t give credit to the writers of these movies, or the second unit which as much as people say it’s bland, i love the detailed and idea heavy marvel style of action scenes. I feel like directors have some control over this in the sense, but they are working with teams of insanely talented artists so it’d probably be pretty difficult to mess up.I guess this goes to what you’re saying but they are really really good at making all these moving parts sing. They do have less individual style than Ragnarok, but Ragnarok is also my least favorite Taika film for what that’s worth. It’s a little too messy around the edges, where his movies tend to be pretty tight, absolutely hilarious, and usually pretty emotional (what we do in the shadows is the obvious exception.)Basically all of this was to say that back in 2012 or whenever they were hired it made more sense to hire someone like Zack Snyder, the “makes comic book movies look cool” guy, than it did to hire the Russo brothers. Everything we’ve said is probably also true of hiring Jon Faverau too.
Yeah they definitely are involved in those decisions- and to be clear I’m not saying they are bad directors, they’re clearly very very capable directors, I just don’t think they’re ‘amazing.’
To use your example of Taika- Ragnarok being messy around the edges is part of the appeal of it to me, and shows that it was made by a director who wasn’t trying to fit a studio mold. You can tell that he made calls Marvel wasn’t comfortable with (some of which they ended up retconning in IW.) And if the Thor franchise wasn’t in such a dire place, I don’t think they would’ve allowed Taika that freedom.
Where I come down to is if the Russo brothers and Kevin Feige got into a disagreement about the direction of one of their Marvel films who do you think would win the argument? We’ve seen this play out with Age of Ultron and Whedon, who was vocal about having to find compromises to defend the parts of the movie he believed in, and with Ant-Man- Edgar Wright left the film because in his view ‘they didn’t want to make an Edgar Wright film.’
Do you believe the Russo brothers would fight against changes to their film and possibly leave the film if it didn’t match their vision? Or do you think they would defer to Kevin Feige if the studio mandated changes.
I think the Russos get a lot of credit for the action sequences in their entries. In most of the films, those scenes are done by the second unit, making them stylistically pretty consistent; so that scenes like the knife fight in Winter Soldier and the fight over the gauntlet in Infinity War really stand out.
But that’s the thing. Should they be getting that much credit for the action in their Marvel films? From my understanding the action in their films is still mostly done by the second unit- and to me it still fits within the Marvel house style.
Their effects are pretty good too- their action scenes are mostly forgettable blam blam blam events unless you get a particularly talented director like with Winter Soldier (though I did actually like the teleportation fight scene from Thor the Dark World even though that movie was seriously flawed). But there’s rarely a time that a product looks shoddy and even the older stuff has aged pretty well since it was great for its time. I would love to hear more about the process for getting CGI at DC since there has been some really lackluster stuff from their cinematic universe- I wonder if part of it is planning or scripts are decided too close to production or not enough notes are given or not enough time is given to studios etc. The effects on King Shark in the new Suicide Squad look much better so I’m wondering what Gunn did that made the difference.
Not entirely, because the DCEU has good actors as well — unfortunately, they also have Zack Snyder to justifiably blame for why it all went off the rails so horribly. It’s not just that I really don’t like Synder that I say that, but that his sole audience seems to be basement-dwelling wannabe Edgelords….
See What I Mean?Feige might even be a bigger fanboy than Snyder, but he gets that his movies have to appeal to a broader audience than the kinds of DoucheBros who’d laugh gleefully at snapping someone’s neck…and raping barely legal girls.When you put these actors and even these character under someone else’s control, they tend to blossom — watching The Suicide Squad, with humor every bit as dark as anything Snyder’s done, shows you what happens when you have a creator like James Gunn who genuinely loves his broken characters, and doesn’t just use them to show off how “edgy” he is….
Yeah, I think there has been plenty of good casting for DC, it’s just been wasted. Like, honestly in some ways sad middle aged Ben Affleck wasn’t a bad fit for a “The Dark Knight Returns” style Batman, it was just a bad choice to start off their big franchise with a dark edgy Batman who brands people. I work with kids and it’s pretty remarkable how much the Marvel fandom has overtaken DC with kids- everyone talks about the Hulk, Iron Man, Spiderman, and Thor, but rarely about Superman. They sometimes like Wonder Woman and some girls have watched that super hero girls show. A lot of DC fandom for kids is Batman via Lego Batman or Robin, Beast Boy, Cyborg etc from Teen Titans Go
You know…. Not that Snyder *doesn’t* deserve shit for his grimdark nonsense but a lot of people ignore that Man of Steel was produced by Nolan, developed from his Batman tone. Dunk on Snyder by all means but the dour, self-serious shit has some of its roots in Nolan.
Yes, but that’s akin to saying “Well, Francis Ford Coppola’s partially responsible for directors shooting in underlit rooms thanks to The Godfather !” As with Coppola, the difference is that Christopher Nolan genuinely is the stylistic filmmaker Zack Snyder keeps pretending he is….There are good reasons to dislike Nolan as a director — for one big thing, his movies often depend on huge scale to obscure the fact that his “Big Idea” SF is closer to DOCTOR WHO than Clarke’s Evolution of Humankind. (I mean, seriously! The climax to Tenet is that Robert Pattinson’s Nigel is River Song, living his life backwards compared to John David Washington’s The Doctor The Protagonist, and Kenneth Branagh is The Master at the climax of “Last of the Time Lords”, getting shot by his abused wife who’s had enough. Nigel even martyrs himself to Reverse the Polarity of the Neutron Flow….) For another, there is a whiff of fascism to his Batman movies, between Bruce Wayne persuading Lucius Fox to use his 100% phone surveillance device to track The Joker, and Bane’s rhetorical resemblance to a more violent take on the Occupy Movement.But none of that matters until you’re thinking about the movie afterward, because while you’re watching Nolan’s films you’re enjoying how effectively he puts all his elements together to make a fascinating, breathtaking experience. Nolan knows how to make a movie, and he knows how to tell a story — something Snyder still struggles to do, so he slathers on the color grading and the digital effects and the slow-fast-show post-production trickery to cover it all up.
There are now almost as many MCU films as there are James Bond films, which are really the only two franchises that can be compared. And there are a lot of James Bond films that don’t hold up today, either subject wise (You Only Live Twice) or for the problematic content (a whole lot of them). But there are also plenty that are, honestly, pretty damned bland.
In contrast, there’s really only two Marvel movies I wouldn’t watch again (Iron Man 2 and Thor 2).
Having as high of a floor as the MCU does is hard and a real accomplishment.
The problem with that comparison is that the Bond films were made over a sixty year period and the MCU was done over a ten year period.
So to talk about Bond films not holding up in the same way as the MCU films feels like an awkward comparison at this stage.
What action films from sixties do hold-up other than Bond? (Bullit, but not much else.)
And its the same with talking about Bond films being bland- bland compared to what? The average action films of their era, or compared to contemporary films? Because the language of action cinema has changed so much that to compare something like The Spy Who Loved Me with a modern action film doesn’t quite work.
They’re two distinct achievements- Bond for having a long running series that lasted decades and retaining its popularity overall (with some dips over the years) wheras the MCU built itself up in a much shorter time frame to far bigger heights. The big question will be how long the MCU can run for and if it will still be running in another 20 years? (Let alone 50. Because the over-saturation may end up impacting it long term, while with Bond releasing one film every couple of years meant that never really became a risk.)
Thor 2 wasn’t great, but it was watchable enough.At the time there was some novelty in the damn thing not being set in the US 😛
it makes it harder and harder to say that these are assembly line. Like, we know they’re going to fight a bad guy at the end and 95% chance they’ll win, but if every other major franchise is any indication there is no formula for consistently making lovable characters that we want to return to other than hard work and taking creative risks by hiring the right people. .Hard agree.If it’s such a simple “formula” as it’s so trendy to say right now, then how come it doesn’t work for anyone else? How come it never worked before Feige and Co. ? The “formula” is great casting, bullpen-style-brainstorming at Marvel retreat sessions where they draw on decades of editorial experience to punch-up the big-picture-continuity/direction of the franchise, and top-notch directors with an original vision or style who are still willing to accept guidance from the top. And if I have a choice between occasional comedy in (some of) their films versus the grimdark-teenage-edgelord nonsense of their distinguished competition, I know which one I’m taking every time.
I agree that it’s the main “critique” when criticizing Marvel movies (ie my critique is not unique, certainly), but given that even stuff like Guardians 2 and Captain Marvel have an 85 % and 79 % tomatometer respectively, I actually think the majority of the criticism/writing about Marvel has been incredibly positive. When you take into account the thinkpieces that come out with every movie in addition to the reviews, the majority of writers treat Marvel movies as important and deep endeavors, even when they’re not (which is often!). To, perhaps clunkily, use your chain restaurant analogy – it’s like if Applebee’s released a new menu item and every food critic in the country engaged with it as if it were a new Michelin-star dish, even though the top food critics said it was just decent chain food. Does that make sense?
i think i get what you’re saying, and i think it’s kind of a damned if you do / damned if you don’t situation.if critics are too glib (this is fun kids stuff!) the adults who take this stuff way too seriously send death threats, if they take it too seriously (this is good, but it’s not good enough compared to other movies) the adults who take this stuff way too seriously send death threats. i agree that these movies are consistent (low floor, high ceilings analogy is on point) and i wish we lived in a world where even the biggest fans of these movies could go ‘hey, yeah, these are good for what they are!’ instead of ‘these are the most important movies of all time and die if you disagree!’…but at the same time perception is reality to a degree. if the majority of people reading these reviews and watching these movies really ARE invested to that degree, then i can’t begrudge a reviewer for viewing it through that prism. but that’s also the rub – you criticize these movies too heavily the cracks start to show almost immediately, you approach them as too light you’re kind of undermining why they’re so massively popular.basically what i’m saying is: yes i agree haha.
Yeah it’s funny, what we’re both kinda saying is the real critique isn’t of Marvel – which we both agree, makes pretty solid movies – but the ecosystem around it. Marvel just seems to suck up all the air in the room, and leaves little space for conversation about anything else. That’s not their fault but the fault of the clicks economy, where editors know that whatever Marvel news their team reports on, people will engage. That’s a modestly-sized cultural problem, in my opinion.
I think most of the people that vocally don’t like Marvel films are from people who used to watch them and got tired of them. A lot of Marvel fanboys act like it snobs vs the common man but it really isn’t. The snobs lost and everyone like trash now.
If you think that “the majority of their movies are B-’s or B’s” then you shouldn’t be surprised that they are getting high tomatometer scores.B- counts as a positive review on RottenTomatoes:
B- counts as a positive review to anyone reasonable, especially if the scale goes down to F.
I see that critique a lot, and something that it tends to overlook is that the series is more than the sum of the movies that comprise it.The character arcs and worldbuilding take place over multiple films, and so judging them individually misses their aggregate qualities.In other words, it’s like going into a chain restaurant every day, and realising at the end of the week that your series of unremarkable meals has taken you on some kinda culinary odyssey and the metaphor kinda falls apart here but you get the idea.
Iron Man wasn’t pre-Marvel Studios. It was the first self-financed Marvel Studios film.
I should’ve said pre-Disney Marvel Studios. It was distributed by Paramount as part of their deal – the Paramount-distributed movies generally have a much different feel than those distributed by Disney.
I think Civil War is top tier marvel. And it maintains the drama between Cap and Tony while being funny where appropriate.
Iron Man 3 is the worst Marvel movie together with Black Widow and Captain Marvel.
Personally I think the jokiness is absolutely vital, it leans into the absurdity of superhero characters with a self-effacing wink, which brings on board people who are embarrassed by comic book movies. The alternative is the endless po-faced and self-seriousness of the DC films where they shoot and miss for “dark and gritty” most of the time and can’t pull off on-screen jokes to save their lives.
Counterpoint, the best Marvel movies are the funny ones (Guardians, Ragnarok) and Iron Man 3 is a snoozefest.Or, different strokes for different folks.
for my money iron man 3 had some of the funniest stuff in the mcu.
What I’ve always said is that they might never reach Empire, but they consistently turn out Jedi.
As much as I enjoy reading AVClub reviews, I’m frequently skeptical of their grades when it comes to the MCU. Though through a different reviewer, this is the site that gave Infinity War a C+ and Endgame a B-. While I’m definitely a fan of more intellectual film criticism like that usually provided here this is so far outside the consensus view, both critically and culturally, that it invites skepticism of the review’s critical lens when it comes to the MCU specifically. This is especially true when the text of the review contains snide references to the MCU project as a whole on a site that has shown great ambivalence about the notion of a shared cinematic universe full stop. The MCU doesn’t have to be everyone’s cup of tea, of course, though I often find critical takedowns of it cloaked in intellectualism and “high culture” aesthetics to be a bit on the pretentious side. But I do think knowing going in that the critical lens looks with disfavor at the kind of movie being reviewed should color how we read the review.
Don’t hurt em, Thor!
Your notion of what grades mean is skewed; the scale goes all the way down to “F” therefore a grade can’t be considered “negative” until somewhere around the middle of “C.” You’re referring to movies that received positive grades, strictly speaking.
I can see that argument, but I don’t think it matches what AVClub does, particularly with more mainstream films. I DO think there is some posturing that happens to bolster ye olde filme nerd cred. Generally D and F grades are only handed out for unmitigated disasters. C range grades here usually read as the author didn’t care for it but it isn’t a complete catastrophe. B is solid film. A range is truly great. I think it’s difficult to make the case that Infinity War was a “meh” film, or that Endgame was JUST BARELY a good movie.
I dunno. I think a C+ for “Infinity War” is generous.
As I acknowledged, not everyone’s cup of tea. I’m not saying the reviewer, or you, aren’t entitled to their own analysis and views of the material. What I am saying is that AVClub reviewers are often more skeptical of MCU projects at the outset than either the general viewing public or the majority of critics. Doesn’t make either one wrong or right, but it is a piece of information to keep in mind when reading AVClub reviews of MCU projects. If I’m critiquing anything here it’s the notion of “objective” reviews, even on more thoughtful sites like this one.
I may be the only person here who is hyped that Tony Leung is in an MCU movie.
I’m a MCU fan and Asian American and those are things that have made me excited to see this, but I will watch Tony Leung coast in anything anytime. (Okay, I’m not watching Tokyo Raiders again.)
I’ve fully prepared myself to watch this movie and be okay with Tony Leung upstaging the lead, a rando who did stock photos shouldn’t be expected to compete with the one of the greatest living actors
Can someone give me an example of “Southern hip-hop”?Kid Rock springs to mind, but I’m guessing that’s wrong (wrong in a different way than Kid Rock is never right).
Outkast, Ludacris, TI, Big Krit, 3 6 Mafia, UGK etc
it’s rap music from the southern region of america, georgia and texas have the biggest output.it’s essentially the ‘third coast’ and has it’s own unique sound. the biggest examples are people like outkast or three six mafia, but basically every popular rapper right now is from atlanta.kid rock is from detroit and largely puts out country music now.
That would be very wrong. “Southern” hip-hop usually refers to the scene that’s been around since the ‘90s with rappers like OutKast and Ludacris (the so-called “dirty south”) and has since morphed further still with recent artists like Migos.Judging from the tracks released so far, the Shang-Chi soundtrack in fact appears to be a conscious attempt to team up southern-U.S. rappers like Rick Ross and 21Savage with international musicians like DJ Snake (Moroccan French) and Masawei (China).
OutKast, Jeezy, Ludacris, J. Cole, Lil Wayne. Basically all the NC, Georgia, New Orleans, and deep south rappers
I’m seeing an astounding lack of Geto Boys in these replies people. Or for Cash Money for that matter.
I think that’s mostly because Geto Boys haven’t really been relevant since the 90s (Scarface is a legend, and as important to Texas rap as DJ Screw was…but he was also never a commercial success the way most of the other artists that have been mentioned had/have, same way no one really brings up NWA these days when talking about West Coast rap, preferring to mention Snoop, Dre, Kendrick, The Game, etc.)
Tobe Nwigwe is from Houston.
Amusing since Kid Rock is from a tawny, upper middle class Detroit suburb.
Kid Rock is from the village of Armada, MI. It is a stretch to call it a suburb of Detroit just because it is in Southeast Michigan. It has a population of less then 2,000 and is located in the middle of an endless expanse of corn fields.
Kid Rock is from Detroit, grew up rich, and is awful. His trailer-trash affectation is not nominally southern.
I kind of hope that ALL the Shang-Chi films are subtitled “…the Legend of…”.In particular, I hope that the next one is “Shang-Chi and the Legend of The Iron Fist” (or “the Legend of K’un L’un”), thereby bringing that into full MCU canon and giving me the Master of Kung-Fu vs The Immortal Iron Fist fight I’ve been waiting for.
giving me the Master of Kung-Fu vs The Immortal Iron Fist fight I’ve been waiting for.
Gonna be a short fight — Shang-Chi will mop the floor with Danny Rand.Unless they recast him with an actor who actually knows kung-fu….
The current live-action version of Danny Rand, yes definitely. In the comics they were usually pretty evenly matched. The netflix show nerfed Danny to the point that he had trouble with random goons.
The mystical wonderland in the Shang-Chi movie seems like it would render any cinematic version of K’un Lun redundant, which is a shame. I’d like to see the Brubaker/Fraction/Aja Iron Fist run on the big screen, please.
Not necessarily (though I understand the sentiment). Having just got back from seeing it I could definitely see them retconning Ta Lo as one of the “Kingdoms of Heaven” and using that to connect to K’un Lun. But, then again, two “secret mystical cities” could well seem redundant, as you said.
This movie deserves better than being released during a pandemic.
The real question I have is: Is that Fin Fang Foom on the poster? Please tell me it is!
I wonder which ethnic accent Awkwafina appropriates in this.
But where those films…emphasized practical effects and the amazing skills of highly trained stunt people, Shang-Chi insists on either interrupting or burying the stunt work…with mountains of blatant CGI.
And now I’m MUCH less interested.
I don’t hate on the Marvel movies. I really don’t. But whereas the Disney+ shows found mostly creative takes on the characters, the movies are just… so same-y.
I’d recommend ignoring the hell of out that line, the action in this movie is maybe the best it’s ever been. The first two big action setpieces in particular are a blast. The only big CGI is at the end, and it’s straight-up necessary for narrative reasons that would otherwise be a spoiler.This movie borrows from classic Wuxia, magical epics like Hero, and a perfect dash of Jackie Chan slapstick and pragmatism. It’s baffling that Rife’s take on the last big sequence colors her opinion of the other fights this much.
This, I think people saying it’s like a jackie chan film is going to make people disappointedI think it’s better to refer it as a super high budget wuxia film
Yeah, having seen it now, I don’t agree with that line from the review at all. The fight choreography in this movie, if we are talking about non-huge-battle scenes, is easily the MCU’s best.
I’ll wait for it to stream, thanks. You won’t be finding me in a theater any time soon.
It’ll be interesting to see what derivative films are made if this does well. Mr. Moto is also owned by Disney (through Fox), which could make reviving the property be seen as redundant, but it could also be premised as a direct competitor to the Bond franchise. Charlie Chan seems to be owned by Allied Artists International and was supposed to get a film from Miramax and Lucy Liu in the 2000’s
Charlie Chan seems to be owned by Allied Artists International and was supposed to get a film from Miramax and Lucy Liu in the 2000’sThe base character is actually in the public domain at this point, although most of the movies are still under copyright.
I read a really interesting book about ten years ago about the real guy Charlie Chan was inspired by, a police detective in Hawaii named Chang Apana who carried a bull whip instead of a gun because he’d been a literal cowboy as his first job. And, frankly, that sounds fucking awesome to me. Take Gilded-Age Hawaii, and this little Chinese guy who’s basically Columbo until he turns into Indiana Jones and beats up a room full of drug smugglers or something.Read the man’s Wikipedia entry. The one paragraph summing up his police careers has like five fantastic movie premises in it.
Oh, absolutely! I’ve been saying for years that the character is unfairly tagged as “racist” because of the casting of white actors in the film roles. The underlying real life story is awesome and the novels are much less problematic than the films. There really should be a “respectable” video franchise for the character launched (whether as movies or a limited TV series).
Chan, specifically, is also seen as racist because the acting was very stereotyped, particularly the accent. Even the Mr. Moto series made fun of it.
This review makes zero mention of the performance of the film’s star, no? How is the new hero? How is the actor playing him? Unless the lack of a mention speaks for itself?
I wanna see it in the damn theater tho! Screw you, Covid!!
Bah. I will definitely watch this movie and most probably enjoy it, but I can’t stand (ugh) Awkwafina. Her ‘name’ alone makes me cringe.I do not get the appeal.
unbelievably real
The appeal is that she’s funny. Just a guess.Try her sitcom, or her rap videos. They’re not bad.
It’s her jarring, 50-year-old chain-smoker voice that gets me.
I don’t love some of her roles, but she’s really great in this, also The Farewell she was amazing in.
I apologize for replying to a random article, but as a fairly sporadic commenter: why can’t I view or reply to comments left on my replies? Is this a glitch or just Kinja becoming it’s 100% unusable, Denton-approved, shitty-ass platform?
It seems to be both.
My guess is?Both.
It broke months ago and nobody involved has any desire to fix it.
I won’t be a bit surprised if the comments feature doesn’t just disappear entirely before the end of the year.
…the irony being, you’ll have a hard time finding any of these replies to your comment about not being able to find replies.
Yeah, I can see which articles I’ve commented on from my profile, but those links just open the comments section from the top instead of taking me to my comment. So, good luck scanning through all of the threads, expanding everyone’s replies trying to find yours…Seems like “permalinks” do the same thing now too. And if you’re not logged in, you’re screwed: the login form triggered from the “publish” button just reloads the page without actually logging you in. This is all on mobile, btw – hopefully the desktop view works better, but who knows…
Ok, this review is good enough to convince me to give this film a chance.
My expectations aren’t very high. Shang-Chi is not a good comic or character (the fact that they needed to change his origin story and had to use the villain of another superhero to make the film are big clues), and I can’t say Liu gave me a good first impression. Also, kung fu movies are one of the rare genres Hollywood isn’t the best at making.Still, Awkwafina can be funny, and if the characters are likable, maybe the film will be enjoyable enough.
go see it, it’s one of the better Marvel movies in a long time.
For what it’s worth, this random internet stranger thought it was the best true origin story they’ve had probably since Iron Man. (With the possible exception of BP, but I’m not counting his movie as his true origin story because of Civil War.)
This looks good, although I’m far more interested in Eternals than this one. I wish Marvel were doing the Disney+ release with this one, though; I’d happily pay $30 to see it now, but with the current situation I’m not going into a theater for it, and will just wait until it comes to Disney+ the regular way.
I was really looking forward to seeing this movie in my backyard with my outdoor projector. I’ve watched so many new releases during this pandemic that way and I’m more than willing to pay the extra money. But I do not feel safe to enter a theater (even vaccinated) and will have to stream it later on when it’s too cold/rainy to watch outside.
A “B?” That’s an Asian “F.”
It doesn’t seem like they’re gonna be able to show this in China cuz of the Mandarin character…
https://www.jobcash9.com
I’m really curious about how this movie will be reviewed by critics at large.
Like Black Panther it seems like a film no one can give a bad review to without being seen as a racist. But I might also looking for a reason to put off seeing it as COVID cases are skyrocketing here in Alberta and I can’t buy it on D+…
Totally with ya there. One of the downfalls of the woke movement is a skewed critique of art. I definitely think Black Panther, especially, is an example. I mean the movie was imho, just pretty good. Entertaining as far as Marvel movies go, but 96% Critic Fresh, Best Picture nomination level? No way.
That being said, I will watch and probably enjoy Shang-Chi eventually.
this movie was amazing, and so was Black Panther lol. If your baseline assumption is that things are only getting good reviews because they have a minority lead, then you got some serious racist tendencies yourself.
Black Panther was adequate at best. The worldbuilding was decent. The set and art design was excellent. And the acting was good.But it had a firm paint-by-numbers story with no surprises. We’ve seen the story of the new king, overcoming challengers, facing a new challenger, losing, and retaking his crown a dozen times. Both in terms of literal crown to that same story being co-opted for spots movies.
It was basically Rocky III with superheroes.
30 minutes in and you could basically guess the rest of the plot.And yet everyone was tripping over themselves to argue it deserved Best Picture.
It’s kind of weird that this review says it follows a Marvel formula, and then lists a whole bunch of stuff that other reviewers also used as examples….that it didn’t.
Shang-Chi, please save us from the genocidal mass-murdering Chinese Communist Party!!!I guess not. Movie China isn’t REAL China.
Just got back from this, and honestly I think it’s probably going to end up in my top 5 for the MCU. It’s pretty great from top to bottom. The review is right about Yeoh being mostly wasted, but she does have a decent bit to do for only being in the third act, and there’s no reason she might not reappear later. Also, I’m not usually all that annoyed by actors being brought on sometimes just to play against expectations.
These reviews always have a standard blurb about how the CGI is so overwhelming and obvious (It is pretty apparent that they didn’t get real dragons for this movie, to be fair). At this point, it feels like complaining that your candy is too sweet. These movies are always going to have a ton of CGI in them. In some movies, you can see the unpolished edges, but why not try a little extra suspension of disbelief? As for this one, there’s a few frenzied action shots that are almost entirely CGI(I thought they looked fine), but there’s a lot more that’s just a joy to look at. Maybe it’ll look stale in ten years, but that’s ok, because we might all be dead by then anyway. Gotta keep looking at the bright side sometimes.
It is also a weird complaint, because literally only the final part of the final action scene is where the fantasy elements and CGI really kick in.Until then, it a standard martial arts movie, that maybe hints at Crouching Tiger stuff
I honestly didn’t mind the cgi fest at the end, if you consider the movie to be a high budget wuxia film, it’s pretty much par for the course
Holy shit this movie is fantastic.
Is this film getting a Chinese release? There was some hubbub a month or two ago about that not happening.
Now how exactly do you tell this movie from Snake Eyes?
Should I be worried that the paragraph that gives the rundown on the actors’ performances doesn’t even mention the eponymous main character played by Simu Liu (I haven’t seen Kim’s Convenience)?
Simu is probably the weakest actor of the main cast, but that’s because he’s surrounded by a lot of talent. He’s good in the role, and has great chemistry with Awkwafina. He really doesn’t have a lot of acting credit to his name yet, though I think he’s pretty good in Kim’s Convenience. I think he could really grow into the role in a big way over time, sort of like Chris Hemsworth’s Thor.
glad to see an american studio making a movie with a asian lead…but disappointed that its standard glowy laser MCU blandness
This movie currently sits at 93% CERTIFIED FRESH. Please get over yourselves.
This review would have been counted as fresh.
So what? Everyone should have the same opinion? “Ohhh, most tomato people like it so I guess I have to like it too now!”You, get over yourself.
So, it was three different films mashed together. Maybe four if you count “superhero” film. I also think the fight sequences could have used more room to breathe. Zoom out, man! Set the stage and let us see how it all works. Even so, I found myself charmed by how awkwardly everything fit together during the ride, and completely sold on it all by the end. It was a solid B for me. It helps that the film was buoyed by some winning performances by Liu and Awkwafina. Their chemistry is undeniable. I found myself falling for Katy’s charms and wishing I had someone like her in my corner. A true ride-or-die. And Leung is, of course, a fucking legend.Give me a tournament next.
So, this director and production team should definitely be hired to do the live action Avatar: The Last Airbender show. They literally had air and water
bending in the movie, and the way the rings were used is similar to
earth/metal bending. And it was all so smooth, exactly how bending should be portrayed.
The issue with bringing Avatar to live action is that it requires a significant amount of children who are good at acting and martial arts to be compelling. Doing a version of it featuring young adults (for instance, a sequel series about Aang and pals in the dawn of Republic City) is the only way I can fathom doing it well.The problem then is that even at its best, it won’t look as awesome as what a fraction of that budget could do in animation. The solution here is to respect animation more rather than try and find a way to do it live.
This film was fine, like many a Marvel film before it – it was nice to go to a cinema, though, as I haven’t been since Tenet this time last year.The final CGI smorgasbord is pretty rubbish, which is a shame – the fight BEFORE it, while still full of CGI, is much better – and it feels like the film is much more about WenWu than Shang-Chi, but it has some fun martial arts sequences and no grating characters. Tony Leung is superb.If I love the more balletic martial arts stuff from this film, what should I have watched? I saw Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon back in the early 00s but I’ve never really seen anything else like it.
Zhang Yimou’s Hero and House of Flying Daggers seemed like the biggest influences.
Spoilers:This movie is great! Go see it.
Actually he’s going by the name of Shaun. While I agree Yeoh is largely wasted, she’s there to give us a taste of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Avenger. And the movie keeps meandering away from the plot mechanics into interesting, beautiful or funny moments of whimsy and even lyricism, enough to allay boredom at the formula.
I saw it an enjoyed it. It was a good time, and lovely to look at, and the characters are enjoyable enough I’m excited to see them in future movies. The fight scenes in the first half were nice and fluid, while also being distinct and easy to follow, and full of character. Simu Liu was good, he portrays the character as an affable guy who has a little bit of edge, and Awkwafina was surprisingly great in her role (which is both far more integrated to Shang-Chi’s and far less grating or silly than one might expect from the trailers and their positioning of her as a sort of sidekick). I agree with the review that some of the talent was a little wasted, and the first two thirds are more engaging than the last one, even though that’s when things really start to get mystical. A solid outing, that probably won’t blow people’s socks off, but is a great showing of some welcome new blood in the Marvel landscape, and a fun adventure on its own. My only issues are story related, and they don’t ruin the film, so much as leave me scratching my head a bit.( MILD SPOILERS) The film struggles with the portrayal of its villain Wenwu. They end up telling us he’s a terrible villain, and having the characters say how bad he is, but he actually just comes off as a misguided character. Even his backstory just tells us he’s a real bad guy, but there’s no real evidence of it. On top of this we learn our hero has a dark secret of sorts that caused him to break from his father, but it’s not clear exactly why this occurs, and we don’t actually get to see that scene. The film kind of wants to have its cake and eat it. There’s every indication of a dark story under the surface of this one, and we are told that story, but we don’t experience it at all. It feels like they didn’t want any controversy for their first Asian super hero, but they had an idea that had some interesting darkness to it, and they just went with a dash of both. It leaves the central conflict of the film feeling somewhat listless, and like it doesn’t really need to happen. The scary bad guy of the film, the worst thing he does is get vengeance for a lost loved one, and be a shit dad. (I mean for a normal person the things he puts his kids through would be monstrous, but he’s a thousand year old magical warlord, in a super hero world, in that context he’s just kind of strict and harsh.) The true villain basically has no character and is just kind of a thing to beat. Like I said, there’s this suggestion that there’s more going on, but they kind of bury it under the conflict they’re trying to create so it fits the Marvel template. Curiously this also kind of buries the film’s protagonist at the end, who is kind of just along for the ride, until he gets to do a flashy move he has no reason to know how to do.There’s also a character that the film suggests is really important, but who kind of just dies out of nowhere, it’s a weird tendency in some of these modern big franchise films, and I don’t get it. It’s unclear exactly what destiny Shang-Chi was hiding from, or what he was supposed to accept, and the message of the movie gets very muddled by the ending. We’re also never really told why Shang-Chi is special, he just kind of is? The resolutions of the conflicts kind of just fail to address them, and things just move on once they’re “resolved”. It’s not a bad movie, but it’s story telling is saying one thing, and showing another, pretty much for the entirety of the last part of the film. Things happen as a consequence of what occurs before, but none of that really matches the reasons the film tells us is why these things are happening.
he’s a terrible conquerer who has killed thousands of people over his lifetime. I don’t think we need much more evidence he’s a bad guy, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t love his family. The film made us feel as conflicted as Shang-Chi. I thought this was some of marvels smartest storytelling, straightforward enough but with a lot of nuance that nothing is good or evil. Shang-Chi will always have the good traits of his mother but also some of the good traits of his father. Shang-Chi’s father tells him when he comes back they’ll return the Ten Rings to its former glory. So he’s literally running from becoming one of the biggest villains on Earth if he came back to his father.
(SPOILERS)Conqueror of what? What has he conquered, why is he in the shadows, what terrible things did he actually do, given no one knows who he is? Other than getting revenge on some mobsters, and having a small army of dudes, why is he a villain? What is it about him that makes him bad as a character, in contrast to Shang-Chi, or the people of the village. All of them kill to save those they care about. Even in his big conquering days, he attacks one city that has its own army. Why is he the bad guy there? I mean in Black Widow our bad guy is kidnapping and brainwashing children, the poser Mandarin was trying to destabilize world governments, Red Skull was a magitech Nazi, even old Obadiah was plotting murders. They just say, “He was kind of a bad guy, until he stopped being one because his wife was so cool she knocked the evil out of him.” (I also thought it was funny that this guy supposedly runs yet another secret power behind the scenes, infiltrated everything operation. In the MCU, these things are apparently a dime a dozen. Dude shoulda been a little more ambitious with his thousand year lifespan.)The most terrible thing he does in the film is threaten Trevor’s life, and Trevor aided and abetted a terrorist. We know his organization was potentially up to no good way back in Iron Man, but he seems completely disconnected from that. In this film his whole motivation is reuniting his family and saving his wife. He’s much more of a flawed hero as he’s depicted, than a villain.Even when he fights Shang-Chi, his son basically tells him he’s going to kill him, and he continually tries to talk him out of it. I don’t actually have a problem with all of that, it’s just it doesn’t really match what we’re told about him, and I feel like the film needs to provide more context to him given how big his character is. (In the trailer I remember he has a sinister line, something to the effect of “I told my men they would not be able to kill you. I’m glad I was correct.” more touches like this suggest a more monstrous aspect to the character that we don’t really see in the film.)Also, Shang-Chi runs away after apparently murdering someone, tells us he was really conflicted about it, even though before that he was pretty driven, he then proceeds to throw half a dozen people off a sky scraper, with no issue. We don’t get to see why he felt he needed to break away. He goes from someone who would “Burn the world if he asked me to.” to someone who just doesn’t want anything to do with that. Why? It’s unclear.Also, nothing is good or evil? The giant bat tentacle dragon that devours souls is a pretty unnuanced representation of evil (the other dragon is pretty clearly a force for good, though neither of them have much to say at all). I think the story has some of those ideas at its core, but it mostly tells us about them, it doesn’t really put the time in to show us any of it.
One thing you have to keep in mind is they wrote wenwu with a pretty common trait amongst immigrant father’sIts such an asian dad thing, show little emotion, be stubborn in their ideals no matter how much their children argue with modern social ideals, but ultimately everything they do is for their children, even if it’s not openly overt or obvious
I really liked that aspect to the character, and I could feel that, particularly in the response of the audience I saw it with (predominantly Asian crowd, who really enjoyed the film, lots of cheering, and big applause at the end). It’s kind of those traits I think make the character, like most evil dads would be all “It is a shame you cannot understand my vision my son, now you must die…” when Shang-Chi basically starts trying to order his army around. He’s like “Alright, nap time slugger. You chill in the caves, we’ll talk about this when I get home.” Like I wouldn’t say he’s a good dad, but for a supposedly villainous nearly immortal warrior guy with an army in the mountains, he’s better than expected, and the film really suggests he cares about his kids. (He doesn’t even hassle his two runaway children until an evil demon starts playing mind tricks on him.)Which makes me really want an explanation of what makes him also a monster. What is his bad guy deal? Like, it’s not immortality, he’s got that. It’s not a god complex where he wants to rule the world, because he’s not really making any moves on that, and he’s had a thousand years to make it happen. He doesn’t seem like a full psycho who wants to see the world burn. Does he just dig the aesthetic of trading in weapons? It wasn’t even that hard to get him to stop, he just had to meet a pretty lady who could hold her own. (Also a thousand years and only two kids, dude had restraint) So why isn’t this guy just martial arts super man? Why is Wenwu a villain?
I mean have we become desensitized to violence and terrorism that a warlord is not a bad guy? His wife changed him to be more family focused and leave behind the warlord life but it cam to bite him back in the assI mean the film made him more of a crappy father then like a super evil villain, and ultimately Im ok with that, made the emotional beats land harder. I guess fans of the Mandarin want him to be more villainous and devious as a long term powerhouse villain, but making him yet another villain that needed to be stopped lest he turn the world into his playhouse is not an interesting motivation anymore
I’d actually have been happier if they just embraced the anti-hero, or misunderstood hero thing, and had the whole “Manderin” aspect be something that evolved out of the vacuum he left behind.As for a warlord being inherently evil, or a bad guy, for me it depends on context. If he was still a warlord in the modern age, yeah, that’s a hard moral position to defend. If it’s in ancient China when that was the norm, he’s not any more bad than all the other warlords kicking around (unless they show us that). And considering he didn’t, y’know take over Asia or the world, in spite of being a super hero when everybody else is using spears, he’s pretty tame as far as warlords go. He ain’t no Ghengis Khan is what I’m saying (and even he did a ton of forward thinking things while he was killing thousands building empires).Basically in this movie, his position felt a little too morally defensible for the perspective the movie had on him. (Dude thinks extra planar villagers have imprisoned his wife in a hellish prison, he wants to free her. This is of course impossible because she was…shot(?) by gangsters like two decades earlier, so he’s obviously not in his right mind. Being mentally manipulated is a position of sympathy for a villain, and hard to feel like he’s the bad guy in the situation if he’s not really doing what he would if he didn’t have demons on his brain.) I’d actually have thought it was cool if the supposedly evil warlord was kind of a misunderstood or flawed hero, and it was the guardian villagers who made some kind of morally dubious compromise to seal away evil. Maybe instead of being murdered by gangsters (which kinda came out of nowhere) the mom always had to become the new dragon (which explains her powers a bit more), cause the old one formed the prison or something, and he wanted to fight her on it because he didn’t want to lose his wife. Or alternatively, he took her to be healed after the gangster thing, and all they could do was turn her into the dragon, but he took that as them killing her (I also kinda felt like the nameless and characterless dragon should have had something else going on, instead of just kind of being there for the heroes to run around on. It feels super important, but has no character at all) and he swore revenge. Or maybe due to his arrogance he tried to defeat the evil before so his wife wouldn’t have to stay, and of course in doing so risked releasing the evil, and everyone considers him dangerous because of that, so they were both exiled. That would have made the way they frame him make a little more sense, and made the conceit that the demon was pushing him to do what he already wanted to do also fit better. Basically I just feel like the story pieces they placed in the combination they placed them for him don’t match up with what surrounds them, and they needed to reshuffle the deck, or change the film’s view on this guy. Because he feels like he’s from a similar, but different, story than everyone around him. It’s like if in every scene in Star Wars Darth Vader was super charming and kind of fine, maybe just like a little smug and a shit dad, but everyone still acted like he was strangling people left and right, and then we found out all the stuff he was doing was because he was drugged.
he’s had lots of names throughout history, all of them he was a conquerer. he’s in the shadows because that’s how they operate until he dissolved the Ten Rings when he met Shang’s mother. I don’t know how you need more clarification that he’s a really dangerous person whose killed a lot of innocent people, but that doesn’t make him still have some qualities Shang looks up to.Shang seemed pretty conflicted about killing the gang leader, I don’t know why we’d need to see it spelled out for us that he didn’t want to return and continue the killing with his father.
Man the inability to direct reply from notifications is so bloody annoying, when are they gonna fix that?I know that’s what they said. But why is the question I’m asking. Why is he a conqueror, what does he conquer, why in the shadows now. Other than loving his family, there’s nothing there. He’s just a bad guy (in name). I need clarification because he has no prime motivation for his deeds, and they aren’t showing me his deeds they’re just telling me. Thanos had a kind of dumb reason for doing his thing, but he had one. We only hear about his past from Shang-Chi’s mum, and she doesn’t even have a take on why his dad is how he is. He just is. And the character suggests a more complex morality than that, but it’s elided. Shang wasn’t conflicted at all until after he did it. He describes himself in the terms we would put for a zealot. He wanted vengeance. We see the young man who again describes himself as “willing to burn the whole world if he asked me to.” but we don’t see how that changed, we just see the adult man who feels differently for reasons (except he kind of doesn’t because he’s pretty convinced his purpose is to kill his dad because he’s the only one who can, and his dad needs killing, because he’s so bad, and he’s gonna do bad things. Of course his dad is being manipulated by an evil soul sucking monster, so that kind of colours things doesn’t it?My point is the narrative doesn’t show us an evil man, it shows us a powerful man being manipulated into doing bad things, for what he thinks is a good reason, and it tells us he’s bad. That is a flaw in the film’s storytelling. I’m not saying the film is bad, I greatly enjoyed it, but I found that aspect to be lacking, and the ending felt rushed because there was no moment of coming to terms with the conflict between Shang and his father, because their conflict was hazy. The closest thing we got was that Shang felt his father was distant, which he of course was, that’s not quite enough to hang a climactic arc on.
It’s because they managed to get Tony Leung to star in it. And he brought such empathy and compassion and understanding to the character that there were times I had to sit back and go, “Wait. This dude’s a warmonger.” Which, to me, makes him a far more dangerous person than the mustache-twirlers.
Agreed, the actor was so charismatic and he brought a lot of feeling to the role, so it felt a little odd that things were so surface level when it came to how his conflict played out. I kind of kept waiting for the other shoe to drop because he seemed to have no reason to be a warmonger. When the people of the village said he was tainted, I was like “What did he do?”, because it was so vague. I really wanted more of his character to be explored, and more of the dynamic between him and his children to be front and center in the film. Like I would not have been shocked if it was revealed that he was a sort of an antihero the whole time, and that the mother’s people had a more grey morality when it came to sealing away the evil or whatever. The way he was played it totally would have made sense that he had been preparing an army for generations just to fight some big bad guy or something.
While I liked the first half, the movie fall apart in the
back half. The big problem with this movie is that it’s two disparate
ones smushed together. They could be good separately, but they don’t mix
together.
Shang-Chi is a low key character so throwing in all the
flashy magic elements in further buries him in his own movie. I like Simu Liu, but he’s upstaged by more dynamic supporting characters.
For a movie named The Legend Of The Ten Rings, there’s surprisingly little revealed about them.
https://mattthecatania.wordpress.com/2021/09/05/is-shang-chi-the-legend-of-the-ten-rings-as-epic-as-its-title/
An unknown cast as the lead in a movie with Tony Leung and Michelle Yeoh? Yeah you’re probably being upstaged
The reviews raised my expectations but the film did end up being more or less what I originally expected it to be, for better and for worse. This one definitely falls on the lower tier for me, as far as MCU films go.One big problem is that neither the comic nor the character are that great to begin with. Doing a great Spider-Man film is doable, but a Shang-Chi film? It’s not even a proper superhero – the character has no superpower, no costume and uses his real birth name – so there’s no “wow” moment like Iron Man’s first flight. The appeal comes entirely from the fight choreographies and they deliver for the most part (until the ending, which I’ll go back to later) but are they special enough to be worth the price of the ticket? Meh. If the film had leaned more on them, it would have been different but still. Hollywood is the best at doing films for almost every genre but martial arts movies have always been better coming from Asia, and likely always will be. Shang-Chi may have the best stunts of any MCU films but the other films didn’t depend on them the way a film about the “Master of Kung-Fu” does.
As far as the characters go, it’s a little weak for a Marvel film. I would have taken more of Xialing and a lot less of Katy. I liked Awkwafina in other projects but not here. She seemed to be playing on a different register than everyone else, as if she was asked to be a comic relief but was never given any material to create an actual character. As a result, she doesn’t have any chemistry with Simu Liu even though it should be the backbone of the film. As for Shang-Chi himself, he doesn’t leave much of an impression outside the fight scenes. This is the first role I see Liu in. He does well with the few funny lines he’s given but otherwise, it’s a vanilla performance for a vanilla character.Anyway, the biggest issue with the film is the terrible final act. When will Marvel learn? They keep trying to go bigger in every film, whether it makes sense or not, and film after the film, it doesn’t work. Kevin Feige is apparently a big Empire Strikes Back fan, and the many characters having their hand chopped off in the early films were allegedly an homage to the ending. Well, how does that film end? With a small scene: a confrontation between a son and his father who lost his way. If there ever was a time to ape The Empire Strikes Back, Shang-Chi was that time.
I actually enjoyed the final act, I thought it was smart they made the motivation for the father to be driven by grief and blindness to threaten to the unleash an unknown danger, it made the beat hit harder where Shangchi realized despite how crappy of a father Wenwu was, everything he did was for their family and his children however misguided he was. As someone with an immigrant father who speaks very little affection, incredibly stubborn and yet does everything for his family with his actions for better or for worse, it really struck home.And Katy is literally just a homegirl that’s got her friend’s back, it didn’t have to be romantic chemistry, One thing I hated about Last Jedi was how they forced a Rose Finn romance when them developing a friend bond would have been a better choice imo, earlier in the movie, Katy’s grandma asks if they will get married and its SUCH a common thing for relatives or family friends to ask when a guy and girl friends are gonna get married when they are just good friends
I’m kind of disappointed to hear that the action is still heavily cut up and features tons of CGI. I was really hoping we’d get some more classic martial arts action from this in the vein of classic Hong Kong cinema. MCU’s action scenes are often extremely boring so I’m hoping the ones here will at least be a bit more fun than normal.
You do get these. Review was WAY off in that regard.
I’m still waiting for the definitive take on the Mandarin. The guy with rings (not bracelets). Each ring has a different power. None of the powers make sense, but that is beside the point. He has rings, not bracelets. THERE I SAID IT!!!!!
I’m guessing this is one reason why they went with bracelets.
I might need a pair of these for research purposes lol
I enjoyed the overall film. I’d give it an A-minus.https://www.imdb.com/review/rw7315096/?ref_=tt_urvThe climax was dizzying with all of the CGI-related spectacle. But I think the general narrative holds up as a basic origin story.I’m glad the filmmakers were freed to create their own backstory for Shang Chi that was largely divorced from the specifics of the 1970s era comic book version. Obviously any Sax Rohmer-derived characters were off the table for legal concerns. Also, in the original comics, Shang became an agent of the MI6 spy agency and supporting cast included white British characters like Clive Reston and “Black Jack” Tarr, the latter of whom was frequently depicted referring to Shang by an ethnic slur. This was also during the era where the UK government controlled Hong Kong, pre-1997. If this film were made in another era, the studio bosses would likely have insisted on white co-characters to presumably entice white audiences to come see the film.
Side question: Which Wong Kar-wai movie is the one that ends on a complete tangent consisting of Tony Leung preparing for a night on the town against cha-cha music?
I enjoyed the movie, but when they got to the mystic city towards the end with the fantastic creatures, I started to think I was watching HR Puffinstuff. A land full of plush toys.