Continuing my MCU rewatch

[Fletch]

Shang-Chi

This is when I learned it's pronounced like "Shawng" and proceeded to pretend I'd known that the whole time.

I also think this is where Marvel *should* be at its strongest: taking a film genre and applying super-hero elements to it. Winter Soldier's espionage thriller, Ant-Man's heist film, and so on. A Marvel kung-fu movie is a terrific idea. They didn't stick the landing, but I was here just for the idea.

1. I don't know Simu Liu's career, but it's crazy to me that someone this talented got his start as a stock photo model. In general, I find him pretty charismatic and he's convincing in his emotional scenes. I kind of wish his introduction was more drawn out somehow? There's no way we wouldn't know he was a martial arts master, since that's why we're here, but it would've been fun to learn it along with Katy. Maybe little things like having the fight club the first time we see him shirtless. Not only is Katy's reaction to that priceless, but if we don't see how ripped he is doing pushups in his apartment, maybe the bus fight could still be a surprise. If they hadn't released the whole thing online before the movie's release, I mean. Anyways, I think it would've added more to his "torn between two worlds" aspect if we got to participate more in him being just a dude in San Fran.
   
   
2. I know Marvel can do better than the swingy looking wire-fu of Crouching Tiger, but using it in the fight between Wenwu and Li really sold the genre they were going for. Later fights would have more digi-doubles, but this was pure Hong Kong cinema. It was absolutely the right choice.
   
   
3. Speaking of the fights, I (mostly) loved the escalation and uniqueness to each as the story progressed. From a mostly grounded fight on a bus, to a briefer but more emotional fight with his sister, to a more cinematic fight on the side of a mirrored neon building. They each felt distinct. That feeling doesn't hold up into the final fights with Wenwu at Ta Lo, though. It's his first actual fight with Wenwu, in a fantastical land filled with mythical beasts, with two armies fighting in the background, and they choose to punch it up alone in a temple and on the lakeshore.
   
   
4. I'm not sure what we're supposed to think of Wenwu. Clearly he's described as a warlord, and we already know from Iron Man that the Ten Rings is a criminal organization, but I guess we're supposed to be happy for him when he finds true love? I think because it's all done in narration, I didn't get the full emotional impact of him giving up the rings when he found happiness with Li. More importantly, I never got the drive behind his desperation to get her back. I'd have to say that the problem was the the actor, Tony Leung, never changed expressions between scenes. He had the same face when he was a medieval warlord as when he was holding baby Shang-Chi as when he got revenge on the gang that killed Li as when he accepted his death at the end. What a stoic dude. Now, that was kind of his thing in Hard Boiled, fer instance, when he was the coldblooded hitman, but it doesn't work for me as a lost father. While I'm here, quick shout out for kung fu legend Michelle Yeoh. Big fan and glad she got to join the MCU. She's so natural here, they could've revealed that she actually is from a lost village of mystic kung fu guardians and I would've believed it.
   
   
5. Awkwafina gets a lot of flak for being here, but I really liked Katy. I found she had good chemistry with Simu Liu and kept up a good outsider's perspective of his world without going too far into just comic relief. She has a terrible scream, though. Maybe just keep it to yourself when you're hanging off a skyscraper. And I can't leave out the long awaited return of one of the MCU's anchor beings: Klev, the "do a backflip" guy who does the bus commentary. Oh, and Trevor Slattery's here, which I thought would annoy me but really didn't. It's very logical that he would wind up here, and I've come to appreciate the consistency of him being a very talented actor (off-screen). Sometimes *he* would go too far into the imbecile act, though. Pump the breaks and stop ruining the reveal of the mythical creatures.
   
   
6. Like I said, I don't like the opening narration since it robs us of the emotional impact of Wenwu's life changes, but he's not our main character and probably not worth using up screen time we need for Shiang-Chi. But that means I *can* be mad that they made a lot of Shiang-Chi's backstory narration too. I'd argue that him going on his first assassination mission at 14 years old was something we should have seen. Imagine two scenes: one where we see him standing over a sleeping body, but he drops his knife and runs away, voice over telling Katy that he couldn't go through with it; then a second version later on when he's confessing to Katy, that shows the dropped knife is all bloody. It was such a character defining moment, it was worth filming, I think.
   
   
7. What a weird place for an Abomination cameo. And Wong for that matter. I guess they were trying to say the fight club drew from all sorts of MCU elements, like the extremis fighter we saw earlier. I remember being really intrigued by them appearing in the trailer, but really disappointed to learn they were just pulling a con? But comic-accurate Abomination looks dope.
   
   
8. I teared up a bit when Xialing caught Katy falling from the building. I really liked how they connected throughout the movie. She's all "I like your pants" and tossing her Razor Fist's car keys, no questions asked. Just small little looks and nods throughout the movie said so much. It's like Katy is the first person to ever honestly appreciate her and what she's accomplished.
   
   
9. Ooh, one of Wenwu's alternate identities was Master Khan. I didn't see the Iron Fist series, was that name mentioned there at all? I also recognized the name drop for Dweller in Darkness later on. I kind of remember him from some old Dr. Strange stories, but don't remember what his deal was there.
   
   
10. Shiang-Chi is really lacking a character arc. I don't know what he wants and I'm not sure if he gets it. I really liked the "mom would've hated who I've become" line and wish that idea had been expanded on. Like, it would've been interesting if he didn't immediately think it was impossible for his mom to still be alive in Ta Lo and this could be a chance for forgiveness. Then he needs his more cynical sister to help him see reason. "Mom would never ask us to burn down her village to rescue her."
    
    
11. You know who does have a character arc, though? Katy. "If you aim at nothing, you hit nothing." It really straightened her out. Sure we see her and Sean back at the bar with their lawyer friend again at the end, but I really think she learned her value during that battle.
    
    
12. Oh my effing god, that final battle. I hate so much that it turned into a big CGI dragon fight. I'd really enjoyed the super martial-arts take in the movie and it turned into something completely different at the end. What if instead, a defeated Wenwu was possessed by the Dweller, and Shang-Chi had to learn to channel the dragon to fight him? So we still get a big fight at the end, but it's between people. Sure have all the little monsters flying around that the Ten Rings and the villagers have to team up against, let Katy make a difference in that fight, but keep the final fight on the ground. Or leaping around with rocket rings, whatever. I don't think I can oversell how much I hated this element of the finale.
    
    
13. I loved the end cameo from Wong and think they should've just saved him for that. They're just talking in the bar and suddenly Benedict Wong's distinctive voice is heard calling his name. I even liked him joining them for karaoke in the credit scene. I wasn't so crazy about Bruce being back in human form, though. Becoming the best of both Hulk AND Bruce was kind of the point of his character arc. I'm also disappointed that Danvers didn't recognize the Ten Rings, but I'll get into that later.

In the end, this was mostly a good martial arts movie, but lacked a lot of emotional connection to any of the characters to carry it through to the end. And the moments were all there: Xialing was abandoned and ignored, Wenwu gave up on peace when Li died, Katy doesn't connect at all with her Chinese ancestry, Shang-Chi became the person he hated most. It was all *mentioned*, but never turned into a thing. Mostly just getting single-line callbacks toward the end. "I'm not leaving you again" Whatever.

 

[Fletch]

I just realized I never commented on the rings themselves.

14. I miss the actual, uniquely powered finger rings, but I think modeling them after martial arts training iron rings was smart. And how they were used definitely supported martial arts action more than another Infinity Gauntlet-style "colored hand jewel glows, magic happens" effect would. And I liked that they left it nebulous how he found them, with one legend being that they came from space. Wink.

 

[fac]

Shang-Chi

1. I kind of wish his introduction was more drawn out somehow? There's no way we wouldn't know he was a martial arts master, since that's why we're here...

I think you answered your own question - I guess they figured why hide it, he is the star of the film.

1. Shiang-Chi is really lacking a character arc. I don't know what he wants and I'm not sure if he gets it. I really liked the "mom would've hated who I've become" line and wish that idea had been expanded on. Like, it would've been interesting if he didn't immediately think it was impossible for his mom to still be alive in Ta Lo and this could be a chance for forgiveness. Then he needs his more cynical sister to help him see reason. "Mom would never ask us to burn down her village to rescue her."

I agree, he needed more depth to his trying to escape his family or his destiny, so to speak...

1. I hate so much that it turned into a big CGI dragon fight. I'd really enjoyed the super martial-arts take in the movie and it turned into something completely different at the end. What if instead, a defeated Wenwu was possessed by the Dweller, and Shang-Chi had to learn to channel the dragon to fight him? So we still get a big fight at the end, but it's between people.

Yeah, this and WandaVision and Eternals started to frustrate me that everything became a CGI battle at the end regardless of the tone of the film or the circumstances.

 

[Fletch]

I think you answered your own question - I guess they figured why hide it, he is the star of the film.

I did love the fakeout reveal of the sportcar pulling up and some other dude gets out and tosses the keys to our valet hero.

I actually used nearly that exact same gag in my student film 25 years ago, so it put an extra big smile in my face.

 

[Schizm]

I really like the idea of the big evil CG dragon just inhabiting Wenwu instead. There's really no way Shang-Chi (is it disrespectful to call him just Shang?) is able to hold his own against a 1000 year old super-powered mass murderer even if said person is his father.

Now that I've typed that out, Xialing's arc makes much more sense.

I hadn't really thought about Tony Leung's expression never changing but you're right. His death was pretty lackluster - "oh, Dad's dead." And then DRAGONS. Ugh.

Also, the rings have a mind of their own and we saw them already choose Li over Wenwu, but Shang just being able to so easily woo them and work them against their MASTER felt false to me.

I don't think Shang or Xialing thinking their mother wasn't dead would make much sense - they saw her die and touched her body. Yes, mystical whatnots abound, but I'm glad they didn't go that route.

Abom/Wong - I liked their inclusion, but I think where they went wrong was putting it in trailers. It also has a fantastic payoff in She-Hulk. And would the ending have worked if viewers of this film had no idea who Wong is (that's unlikely, but...)?

The bookending bar scenes felt odd to me - they felt like reshoots to more Marvel-up this movie. I have no idea if they were.

I don't think this movie works without Katy. And I wonder, is that a good thing when she isn't the lead? Is Shang-Chi interesting enough without her? When they almost Gwen Stacy'd her I was upset. Her transformation into expert archer was way rushed and lacking, but do I regret making a custom version of her in her green pants and jacket? Absolutely not.

I am sad that the beautiful red dragon-scale suit appears to be gone by Doomsday. Why would anyone replace that with plain red leather. I saw those suits in person and they really did catch light beautifully.

Really bummed it's been four years since any update - and that we didn't get the Fight Through Time sequel or whatever it was to follow-up on the ending.

 

[Fletch]

the rings have a mind of their own and we saw them already choose Li over Wenwu, but Shang just being able to so easily woo them and work them against their MASTER felt false to me.

I noticed on my rewatch that when Mama Li first uses her tai chi to catch all of Wenwu's rings, they took on the same golden glow as they would when Shang-chi was using them. I don't know if that helps with his taking them over, but it seemed to work before.

I don't think Shang or Xialing thinking their mother wasn't dead would make much sense - they saw her die and touched her body.

You're probably right. I was scratching for some more concrete expressions of his character growth, and thought that would work with his mommy issues.

the Fight Through Time sequel

I hadn't heard any talk about a sequel. Is there more on this?

 

[Ru1977]

I hadn't heard any talk about a sequel. Is there more on this?

The title (Wreckage of Time) was registered the same time as the Sam Cap title, the original one I think, along with several others that are probably dropped. It was definitely being planned but the director signed on for Doomsday, presumably instead of Shang Chi 2, then went to the new Spider-Man instead and Shang chi 2 seems to have been dropped after Marvels "maybe not so many" mandate.

 

[Fletch]

I'm down for the "not so many" mandate, but, like I've said many times, I also wanted a "let's move on" mandate. Shelving their new character so they can give an old character* a 4th movie is neither sustainable nor welcoming to new audiences.

I'd be interested in knowing what their plans were for Shang-Chi. I managed to slap together my own pitch for Shang-Chi 2, but it doesn't have anything to do with Kang or time travel. Since I was invested in the Kang storyline, I'd like to know what path they found for Sean to include him.



* I know it's Spider-Man, but pretend it's not for the sake of my point.

 

[Ru1977]

Heh somehow I forgot he went by Sean.

 

[Schizm]

SDcomics said: (don't know why the formatting is getting so weird)
There was a plan for Shang Chi 2. It was going to be called "Shang Chi and the Wreckage of Time" and it was going to tie into the ten rings and the Multiverse saga. But then that real life thing reared it's ugly head again. The crap with Jonathan Majors happened and Kang got tossed out. So too, did the Wreckage of Time. I believe there'll be another Shang Chi but like with Black Panther, it's going to have to wait until after Secret Wars now.

This has piqued my interest. From what I can find it's mostly all rumors based on a copyright request for that title from Marvel. Is there any other concrete source on the rest of this info?

This is a real shame - this plotline makes a TON of narrative sense given the tag of the first film - unlike BSG, there WAS a plan all along! Another reason Marvel should have just recast Kang. Their refusal to recast T'Challa and Kang really shot their narrative momentum in the face.

I just rewatched Shang-Chi after reading the above rumor and I'm super bummed. A fun adventure with Shang-Chi, Katy, Sorceror Supreme Wong, possibly Carol and Kamala/Kate/Cassie? Yeah, why do that, it sounds terrible, let's just throw that whole thing away.

Xialing I guess never needs to be revisited. Her tag kind of works all on its own - if you remove the "The Ten Rings Will Return" part. She got what she wanted - her own empire AND her father's.

Quoting my post from when SDComics brought this up in the Comic Book Talk thread on October 3rd - or when I responded to it.

 

[Fletch]

I'm definitely heading down the path of those Snyderverse Bros. Ditching the Kang throughline entirely was such a huge derailing of the Saga.

Release the Council of Kangs Cut!

 

[Fletch]

And since we're on that topic anyways, I don't actually have any big changes in mind for my fanfic version of the Multiverse Saga. Nothing that I haven't already mentioned in the review, at least.

• I have had a rethink of the final fight, though, and if there's one thing I would change just for the sake of change, it's to cut out the kaiju battle.

So, instead of the two of them just sort of stopping fighting and then the Dweller breaks out (like it was just waiting for them to finish), I'd want their fight to be interrupted by the Dweller's escape.​

So they fight for a bit, Shang-Chi steals half the rings, some more fighting, and right when they get locked into this poster moment...​

... they're both distracted by the sound of the Dweller busting out (now maybe like a cave troll-sized monster). We get one of those Jackie Chan reaction beats between the two of them before they're immediately side-by-side, ready to fight the bigger threat.​

Maybe Katy notices the fight and rallies the defenders to focus on the little gargoyles powering up the Dweller with harvested souls.​

In the end, Wenwu realizes the Dweller can't be beaten by anybody wielding just half the rings, so he gives his rings to Shang-Chi, leaves himself vulnerable and is killed. Shang-Chi is now fully empowered by the training and trust of both his mother and his father and manages to defeat the Dweller. Hooray!​

• The only other change I'd ask for for the sake of my version of the Kang Saga is that Carol and Bruce not be included in the midcredit scene, and no beacon from the heart of the rings. I suspect the producers were trying to connect the Rings with Kang, but I don't have any clever ideas about that and am leaning toward them just being Kree artifacts. So it would be weird if Carol specifically didn't recognize them.

I liked the story as-is, even if the themes and arcs didn't come through as well as I would've liked. The only thing I really (really) didn't like was the dragon fight so figured I could just take this opportunity to reshape that small part.