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Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings
161 Plays3 years ago
We're back and ready to talk about superhero movies! In this episode, Perry is joined by Jessica Fong of Comic Book Resources to watch and chat about Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings. While Perry provides the comic book background, Jessica comes at the film from the perspective of an Asian American and a fan of wuxia and Chinese cinema. You're not going to want to miss this episode!
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Transcript
Audible's Solution for Busy Readers
00:00:00
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00:00:19
Speaker
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00:00:35
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Personal Stories and Humor
00:01:31
Speaker
By the time I was 14, I could barely remember what life was like before she died. That's how old I was when he sent me on my first assignment. I was willing to do anything he wanted. If he asked me to burn the world down, I would have asked him. Beef or vegetarian? Roll out of the chicken, so I can only offer you beef or vegetarian. Um, vegetarian would be great. Same.
00:02:03
Speaker
So... Oh. We're out of the vegetarian, too. Now we only have beef. Beef. Because that's all you have, right? Okay. You'll have the beef. Yes. And the beef. Two beefs. Did you go through with it? I knew that I couldn't go back to him, so I just...
00:02:34
Speaker
I know this is a lot to dump on you. I'm sorry about your mom. I should also probably mention that my name's not technically Sean.
00:03:04
Speaker
What is it? It's Shaan Ji. Shaan Ji? Shaan Ji. Shaan Ji. Shaan. Shaan. Shaan. S-H-A-N-G. Shaan. Shaan? Yeah. You change your name from Shaan to Shaan? Yeah, I don't.
00:03:27
Speaker
I wonder how your father found you. I was 15 years old. All right. What is your name change logic? You going into hiding and your name is Michael. You come on change it up. Hi, Joel. That's not what happened. It's like, hi, my name's Gina. I'm going to go into hiding. My new name is Gina. Yeah, I'm in. Oh, yeah, you can hear me.
New Beginnings in Japan and Comic Debates
00:03:50
Speaker
Welcome back to the Superhero Cinephiles podcast. It's been a little over a month since the last time we've had a new episode, but I'm finally back, finally back in Japan, finally out of quarantine and ready to talk about some superhero movies with a brand new guest. And that is Jessica Pong. Jessica, how are you doing today? Hi, I'm good. Thanks for having me on. Oh, thanks for coming on. So our association, you know, online association began
00:04:19
Speaker
You know, I'm an old man so you can forgive me if I'm misremembering things, but I believe it was on some comic book thread on Facebook where people were complaining about Iceman being gay and you and I kind of jumped in in that and we're talking about how this is actually not that surprising for that character. And then after that, we kind of struck up a friendship from there. That's right, that's right. Oh my God, that was so long ago.
00:04:46
Speaker
And believe it or not, those arguments are still going on. I saw one. I'm not surprised by that.
Jessica Pong's Background and Influences
00:04:54
Speaker
But before we get started into today's movie, why don't you tell people a little bit about yourself? Sure. So I'm Jessica. I live in the Bay Area in California. I'm not a huge comics nerd, but like I've always enjoyed, you know, anything nerdy, anything geeky.
00:05:17
Speaker
And right now I actually write for comic book resources. Oh, nice. Yeah, CBR. Although I'm not, I don't write for the comics section. I write for the TV and movies. And sometimes I dabble a bit in the gaming and anime sections. And yeah, I just, I'm Chinese American. My parents are from Hong Kong. They immigrated here in the seventies when they were young adults. So, you know, I grew up watching
00:05:47
Speaker
Jackie Chan films, of course, Wuxia films, all kinds of like Hong Kong cinema. Like they really brought that Hong Kong pop culture, like history with them and like instilled that, you know, into me and my brother's lives as we were growing up. Oh yeah. Like I'm just really excited to be here today to talk about Shang-Chi because it was, I was so emotional the first time I saw it. I mean, you know my post on Facebook.
00:06:15
Speaker
Yeah, that was why I was really, really keen to get you on to talk about it based on, because I know tons of people who are familiar with the Shang-Chi and the Master Kung Fu comic books, and I've read some of them myself. But I figured like I could bring some of that background here, but having the perspective of someone who's coming at it from a completely different angle, I thought would be a lot more, make for a lot more interesting discussion. Because we do a lot of the, you know,
00:06:39
Speaker
what it was like in the comic stuff here already. And so this brings a very, very kind of fresh perspective to it, I think.
Shared Interests in Comics
00:06:47
Speaker
I will do my best. One thing you said in there, so you mentioned that you write for for CBR, we've actually got another guest on here who's come on once before, and he's actually gonna be on the next episode. Stacey Dukes, he also writes for CBR on occasion, I believe. Oh, cool, cool. Yeah, there are a ton of us, so I don't know. Yeah, yeah.
00:07:07
Speaker
That's really awesome. So how did you, I mean, you said you like nerdy stuff. How did you kind of, what was kind of your gateway drug into it? How did you get into that kind of stuff? Hmm. Well, aside from the usual, you know, fairy tale, you know, when you're like a little kid, I would say probably Harry Potter was the first like big obsession that I had.
00:07:34
Speaker
just, you know, as a young kid and like that kind of brought me into the whole world of YA fantasy. And of course I always loved watching like Star Wars and just anything that was like fantastical or that kind of pushed the boundaries of possibility. I was just always into that. Like I had a huge fantasy life as a kid. And yeah, yeah. Was there anything superhero specific that kind of got you into it?
00:08:04
Speaker
Oh, I definitely watched a lot of the Saturday morning cartoons of like Spider-Man, you know, Batman. I was always drawn to the little bits of female representation that were in these like superhero stories like Poison Ivy and I just thought they were so cool and so powerful and I don't,
00:08:31
Speaker
Yeah, like I said, I'm not an expert, but I definitely grew up soaked in that kind of atmosphere of superheroes. And when the Marvel Cinematic Universe started, I was really excited. I had always wanted to get more deeply into the world of supers. And I thought it was really cool that this more unified take was going to be coming out. Yeah.
00:08:59
Speaker
you know, kind of streamlining it into one more comprehensible storyline. So I've been enjoying the MCU. I know that there are issues and I have my own issues with each of the different installments.
00:09:11
Speaker
Yeah, Ivy, we're big MCU fans over here, back from the beginning of this show, because, and just like you, I got into it with like those, pretty much those exact same cartoons, like Batman, Spider-Man, X-Men, of course, as well. Oh yeah, X-Men, for sure. Yeah, and when you mentioned female representation, that was one of the first things that came to my mind, because, especially in the comic books, Claremont did a lot of stuff with that. I mean, there were sometimes when, there were lots of times when the female members actually outnumbered the male,
00:09:40
Speaker
which I really loved. I mean, you look at other stories that you're exposed to as like a kid in the 90s and you don't often see women just being unapologetically powerful. And also complicated, like you bring up X-Men and I always think back to Jean Grey and the Phoenix saga and Phoenix saga. And I remember seeing that on TV as a kid and just being like, wow, like,
00:10:07
Speaker
She's going, you know, she's dark. She's powerful. She's conflicted. Like, I don't see things like this in other media. So yeah, it was those shows. It was it was such a mature level of storytelling, especially compared to.
00:10:22
Speaker
what we got in kids programming before, because I think I'm maybe a little bit older than you. And, you know, I came in like the early, the late eighties and the nineties. And just looking back on it, when you're a kid, you don't know this, but looking back on it now and seeing just like the big leap in storytelling and maturity from like Ninja Turtles to Batman, it was just amazing.
Mature Storytelling in Comics
00:10:44
Speaker
No, absolutely. Yeah. Yeah.
00:10:46
Speaker
And that was definitely something that I noticed as a kid. And I was like, I remember thinking like, am I allowed to watch this? It's really dark, like wow. I'm grateful for that. So like you mentioned, today we're talking about Shang-Chi. And like you mentioned, you didn't have really any, you went in pretty much cold with this character, right? You had no familiarity with him before. Yeah, like I had obviously heard the name because
00:11:16
Speaker
They'd been talking about the project for quite some time. I think I read the other day that they'd had his name in their slate of superheroes that they wanted to make films with at the beginning of Marvel Studios.
00:11:32
Speaker
And I was always like interested because there aren't any Asian superheroes, like really, like he's the only one that I can think of off the top of my head, right? Like there's, he's not Asian. No, no, he's not Asian. I mean, there are some here and there, but they're very, very, they tend to be very obscure characters. So like you've got Sunfire with the X-Men and the whole big hero six crew, those all came out of Marvel originally. Oh God, I love big hero six.
00:12:02
Speaker
They're they're very different. You might not want to want to you might not want to read the old comics because they're oh, no, they're it's it's well intentioned. Right. It's the but it's it's very much written by white guys whose only image of Japan comes from from movies and anime. Right.
Asian Superheroes and Representation
00:12:20
Speaker
Right. Yeah. There's a lot of that kind of stuff in there. I mean, and being I first like I first encountered the characters here and there through comic reading over the years, but
00:12:29
Speaker
after moving to Japan is when I actually sat down and read those comics and they first appeared in Alpha Flight and then they had a Sunfire in Big Hero 6 that was their first miniseries and in that they introduced the whole crew and one of them you know the word for in Japanese for
00:12:50
Speaker
for Egg is Tamago. And they had one of the characters whose power was like, she spins really fast and she kind of looks like an egg when she moves. So her name was, ended up being Gogo Tomago instead. And just like- Right, her, yeah. Yeah. So just like- I didn't realize that was the genesis of her name. Yeah, yeah. It's just little things like that. And it was just very, very stereotypical, almost offensively. So, and so, so it's,
00:13:20
Speaker
And Disney made a lot of well-understood changes when they did that. Yeah. Yeah. I did end up looking a little bit into the changes that were made. Definitely think that they made really good decisions with letting Asian-American voices lead the way on how to reinterpret these characters and that, like you said, were created with, well, maybe with good intentions.
00:13:49
Speaker
with ignorance. Yeah, I mean, and Claremont wrote one of the miniseries after they first appeared, and he's very much part of that too. Very well-intentioned, but not as culturally sensitive as he could have been back in those days. Yeah, and I mean, like, that was in the 70s, that when Shang-Chi was first. Yes, yeah. And so that was around the same time that Hong Kong cinema
00:14:14
Speaker
becoming popular here in the West. And of course we didn't have the internet back then. So, right. Yeah. It was a lot harder to get that direct cultural exchange. So this version is like coming over and being made into products. And there's like a lot of similarity there between Big Hero 6 and Chang Chi. Yeah. Yeah. And that's a, that's a really good transition you mentioned there because
00:14:38
Speaker
This did, Shang-Chi did start in the 70s. It was Steve Engelhardt, who had been a really progressive writer for his time. Looking back on it now. But one of the things he did was he had actually approached DC about doing a comic book
00:14:58
Speaker
version of Kung Fu, the TV series. Yeah, because DC's parent company Warner Brothers owned the rights, but DC at the time, they thought, oh, this is a fad, it's gonna die out, so we're not gonna commit the resources into doing a comic book. So then Engelhardt went over to Marvel and he suggested doing a Kung Fu series with all the, like you mentioned, all the Kung Fu stuff that was coming out at the time.
00:15:23
Speaker
And so that was kind of the start of Master of Kung Fu and Marvel had, they had two mandates for him. The first was that Shang-Chi had to be half white. Oh my God. Which is since, which was pretty much ignored for the most part by most of the writers. And then the current writer, Gene, I'm blinking on his name right now, but
00:15:48
Speaker
He's an Asian American writer. And he just basically, after the movie, he just basically flat out came out and said, no, his mother's actually Chinese. So I love that. But the other mandate Marvel had was because they had recently required the comic book rights to a very infamous character known as Fu Manchu.
00:16:08
Speaker
And so
Shang-Chi's Evolution in Comics and Film
00:16:10
Speaker
the other mandate was that you have to work Fu Manchu and those characters into the comic book. So Englehart had introduced Shang-Chi as the son of Fu Manchu, who was raised thinking his father was a good guy, and raised in isolation, trained, and then sent down into the world on his first mission when he found out that, no, actually, your father's a piece of shit.
00:16:34
Speaker
And then he ends up joining up with MI6 and some of the other characters who originated, like Dennis Nalen Smith, who originated in the Fu Manchu books. And then the real classic run was Doug Monick was the writer and Paul Galacy was the penciler. And basically from that point on, you've seen Enter the Dragon, I assume.
00:17:00
Speaker
Um, yes, yes. Yeah. It's basically enter the dragon in the Marvel universe from that point on. Um, right. They even, they even modeled him after Bruce Lee, after Paul Galasi took very heavy, because at first he looked like nothing like Bruce Lee. He had kind of like this mop top haircut. Um, and then once Galasi came on, he just pretty much drew him like Bruce Lee from that point going forward.
00:17:21
Speaker
Right. Weren't they going to do a Shang-Chi with Bruce Lee at one point? I don't know. I mean, I assumed that was probably something they would have loved to do, but I don't know if there was ever actually anything in the works about that. Right. I think they just wanted to do it, but they weren't able to make it happen. Yeah, probably. And then, you know, the Master of Kung Fu series eventually kind of died out. And then what happened is
00:17:48
Speaker
Marvel lost the rights to publishing Fu Manchu, so whenever Shang-Chi appeared after that point, they could never call his father Fu Manchu, so it was always just known as Shang-Chi's father, something like that. Until finally, Ed Brubaker took him up in Secret Avengers, and then he officially gave his father the name Zengzhu, and that was the character's name from that point forward.
00:18:14
Speaker
And then they gave him a new name for the movie. Then they, yeah, they completely changed his name for the movie, which, uh, which I thought was interesting, but they had, um, um, and I was looking this up last night to figure out why they didn't just go with the Zengzhu name. And, um, but it turns out that the screenwriters had found like the name Wenwu, apparently the characters in it, one means like, um,
00:18:38
Speaker
One has something to do with like, one has something to do with military and the other has to do with like service or something along those lines. Oh yeah. That my Chinese is not the best, but it's plausible. Yeah.
00:18:51
Speaker
they changed the characters in the rings as well? Yes. The rings were changed because they wanted to avoid any comparisons to the Infinity Stones because they felt the Mandarin's rings in the Infinity Stones were a little bit too similar. So they got the idea for these rings from another movie called The 36th Chamber of Shaolin. Which I haven't seen. I haven't seen it either.
00:19:21
Speaker
Yeah, but the training bracelets are totally like a thing. A lot of kung fu movies where they're like weighted bracelets and they help with like developing strength. And Marvel had done a lot. They were able to do a lot of cleanup with this movie actually, which I thought was really interesting because you've got Shang-Chi in the movie and you can't use Fu Manchu. And you know what? Honestly, you probably shouldn't. Yeah.
00:19:49
Speaker
So, so good on them for deciding not to do that. But so then you had the issue with, well, how do we handle Shang-Chi's father? And then they had another competing issue that kind of came up and they kind of, and they found a good way to do kind of clean up with this because earlier Marvel had introduced the Mandarin in Iron Man 3 and the Ten Rings organization introduced in the first Iron Man movie. And, you know, fans were very upset with how the Mandarin turned out in Iron Man 3.
00:20:18
Speaker
Oh yeah, I remember that. I was gonna be upset too. Yeah, I was too. I understood the criticism of the character. He definitely has very complicated history, very racist overtones in his creation, but the more modern comics have definitely kind of eschewed all that. And even in his more recent appearances, he's not even wearing any Chinese orientalist specific clothes or anything like that. He's very much just a guy in a suit with alien space technology, basically. Right, right.
00:20:48
Speaker
Yeah, that yellow peril like origin of Fu Manchu is just really painful. Yeah. A lot of us Chinese Americans, just that really caricatured portrayal, you know, with like the whiskey mustache and yeah. So yeah, I really loved how they cleaned that up in Shang-Chi. I mean, I thought it was really brilliant to bring a slattery back.
00:21:16
Speaker
a sort of like to acknowledge like, yeah, we kind of messed up. And he's a different character. And, you know, there's actually a more like real person behind all of this. And like you said, I love how he's now just like a guy in a suit. That is, you know, we're all in the modern world now, like nobody in China. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. Like we're not going around in our like cheap house and stuff like ridiculous.
Tony Leung's Impactful Casting
00:21:43
Speaker
So
00:21:43
Speaker
Yeah, I think they did a really good job at like humanizing this character. That was something I mentioned to my students here in Japan all the time when they ask about depictions of Japan. And I mentioned how like, well, you know, a lot of times they've got, when they have comic books or something like that, you'll see women walking around in kimono. And I'm like, and nobody does that here. Yeah, like that is a very specific, like special occasion. Like we don't, we're just, yeah. So I really like how they fix that. And I really feel that
00:22:13
Speaker
bringing Tony Leung in was just genius. That guy, he's incredible. Like, I don't know how much, have you seen Wong Kar-Wai's films? I've seen 2046 and I think I've seen some other ones too, but I definitely 2046. Okay. Yeah. I mean, his films are amazing. I grew up watching a lot of his movies, especially, and I'm blanking on the name, but the one, the one that, uh,
00:22:43
Speaker
is more of a romantic comedy and I don't think, I'm blanking on the name right now, but Tony Leung is in that one and he's like so emblematic of a certain spirit of Hong Kong youth, like disaffected youth. I see. It's just really cool seeing like his gravitas being brought to this movie and
00:23:11
Speaker
And Michelle Yeoh as well. Like it was like seeing a childhood like kind of level up and bring their, their legendary status to this movie. So yeah, I just, I got really emotional.
00:23:24
Speaker
seeing Tony lung as one woo and his, his eye acting is incredible. I'm sure the internet discussions about that. Yeah. Um, and I, I came to Tony lung from a hard boil. That was my introduction to him. And then obviously infernal affairs too. And 2046. So, and it was funny because a lot of the predictions I made about this movie actually didn't seem to come true because, um, when they had had the issue with the Mandarin and they had done, um,
00:23:54
Speaker
After Iron Man 3, they had done this short film called All Hail the King. I'm not sure if you ever saw that. Yes, I did, actually. After Shang-Chi, I went back and watched that. Yeah, and that was this great little, it does a little bit more about Trevor Slattery in prison. And Ben Kingsley is just having a ball doing that. Yeah. And you see him in his failed NBC pilot, Cage Teeth.
00:24:20
Speaker
I love it. It's just so nice to see just this, you know, actor with such gravitas, Ben Kingsley, just like, you know, having fun playing this, doing this, you know, proving that he's got this skill for comedy that I don't think anyone ever imagined that he had that much comedic timing. Oh yeah, absolutely. I mean, he was such an unexpected, like, comic relief in the second half. And very needed, I think, because, you know, things get more heavy. Yeah, yeah.
00:24:49
Speaker
goes on and he he brings that lightness and that meta humor that is very much needed. And very much commenting on the failures of the past like when he mentions you know I did what now I realized to be a very unflattering portrait of your father.
00:25:05
Speaker
good stuff good stuff and uh but one of the great things about that was they had hinted that there was the real Mandarin out there at the end of that movie um and and and I was my feeling at that point was like oh this is awesome but they're probably never going to do it because they're not going to be doing another Iron Man movie so
00:25:22
Speaker
But then, and my thought at the time was, well, you know what? If they want to do Shang-Chi at some point, this could be the perfect way. You have Shang-Chi as the son of the Mandarin instead of the son of Fu Manchu. And I even said to people in debates back about the Mandarin stuff, I'm like, you know, if you get a really good actor like Tony Long, he can make this actually work. And then both those things ended up happening. You were psychic. I was psychic, yeah. That's impressive.
Authenticity in Shang-Chi's Portrayal
00:25:50
Speaker
I mean, he was one of the names I threw out there. Cause he's just one of those actors who's, you know, he's got, like you mentioned, he's got such gravitas and just such that you could totally see him owning a role like this. Yeah, absolutely. He's got like a Shakespearean, like classical type of vibe to him. When you think of his reputation and.
00:26:09
Speaker
Asian cinema. Yes. Yeah. And, and I loved what I, I knew he was going to kill it when they announced that he was going to be the Mandarin, but, or I should probably switch over to saying one more now, but, but I knew he was going to kill it when they announced that he was going to be the character, but just, I'd never expected such a nuanced and layered performance that they gave and backstory they gave this guy. Oh yeah, absolutely. I mean,
00:26:39
Speaker
The range that he shows as when we were like, he's the ruthless warlord. He's the disappointed like emotionally abusive father. So like this lovestruck guy with, with their mother who
00:26:55
Speaker
the actress did such an amazing job playing her. That opening sequence, I just, can I like rant for a second? Go right ahead, yeah. That opening sequence took my breath away. I mean, I was so blown away. I ended up seeing it twice in theaters because I was like, I'm in love with this movie. And both times I was just, I just loved the opening sequence so much. I mean, the fact that it's all in Mandarin is incredible. Like it doesn't even feel like a Marvel film.
00:27:23
Speaker
Yeah, it felt so much like, and I'm not as familiar with Wushu films as you are, but for me, it was very much like I got a very much like a Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon vibe from that kind of thing. Yeah, no, absolutely. It definitely had that Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon vibe, and that fairy tale kind of feeling.
00:27:46
Speaker
The key element of Russia is like having that sort of elevated magical element to it while still having the down to earth like fight choreography. Yes, fine. And they really really nailed that.
00:28:01
Speaker
Yeah, I was just blown away. And just mention the the credit is the Fala Chen was the actress who played Ying Li. That's right. Yes, yes, yes. And in fact, because I read that Michelle Yeoh was in this movie and for the first like because she's wearing the face covering at the beginning in there. So I'm like,
00:28:18
Speaker
I'm staring at her, I'm like, is that Michelle Yoo? Did they do some de-aging stuff? And I'm like, wait, no, that's not Michelle Yoo. And I'm staring at her face every time she's on screen. I'm like, that's not her. I'm like, when's Michelle Yoo going to come in this? And then she pops up in the second part. Just when you think they've run out of amazing surprises, they bring in the second act. Yeah, it's incredible. And that's another thing about this movie. We don't just get one Asian woman or Asian-American woman
00:28:48
Speaker
a whole spectrum, a whole array of Asian women, of Chinese women. And it's incredible. I almost can't put into words how it feels. It's like that people talk about feeling seen. I really felt seen by this movie in a way that I didn't think was possible in our current time of Hollywood and all that.
00:29:16
Speaker
Very specifically, it felt Asian American to me. Yeah, please go into some of the stuff that specifically you were thinking about with that. Yeah, just like starting off with this extended Mandarin wuxia sequence, it kind of reminded me of my upbringing being told stories and being exposed to these stories from our home countries.
00:29:46
Speaker
into Shang-Chi's adult life in San Francisco. I mean, I live in the Bay Area. So first, I'm already freaking out being like, oh my God, it's Chinatown. Like this is where I grew up. Like this is like where I went every like weekend to see my grandma. Like the apartment that Katie's family lives in is like a carbon copy of my grandma's apartment in Chinatown. Like emotional just seeing like
00:30:14
Speaker
the shoes outside the door and the multi-generational living where everybody's at the dinner table, at the breakfast table, having Joe, having Jook. And just the friendship and like the camaraderie between Katie and Shang-Chi, how they're kind of, they understand like the burdens that each of them has
00:30:45
Speaker
in trying to uh live up to the ideals that their parents and their grandparents are asking of them and just all those complexities like the dynamics that they captured in that sequence that's just so I mean it's I really really felt seen like yeah um and there's there's a lot of universality to the to the because of like the the scene with the grandmother um it's
00:31:12
Speaker
I think there's this thing about immigrant grandmothers. I think they're like all very similar. Because my grandmother is from Turkey, Greek via Turkey. And very much the same way, right? Always asking like, when are you and your best friend gonna get married at all? And the way they put those different expectations, how Katie doesn't have
00:31:42
Speaker
a warlord terrorist as a parent, but, you know, she does have those other expectations from her parents. And the way they contrast those two is it really just kind of gives that kind of grounding to the movie. And it gives like a real world parallel to what Sean's going through. Yeah. Yeah. They were so skillful in weaving in that theme through the whole movie. And like I was just rewatching it the other day.
00:32:09
Speaker
the scene at the breakfast table in Katie's apartment where they're talking about how being on is an American concept. The kids are like, you know, oh, just like, you know, move on. And that actually ends up being like the emotional like struggle at the heart of the movie that when Wu is unable to move on, that concept doesn't exist for him. And also Shang-Chi is trying to move on too much.
00:32:35
Speaker
Yes, yes, yes. And finding that balance. That is such a, like, that's something I related to so much of like trying to find the balance between these two or three different places that you've, you don't quite belong in, but you do, or you should, and just not knowing like where you're supposed to stand in the middle of all that. Yeah, as children of immigrants, that's something that, you know, we, that's something that is a struggle that we kind of experience. I mean, I experienced it to a lesser degree with, you know,
00:33:05
Speaker
My family, both my parents were immigrants, but my mom came when she was a baby. And my father came from England, but it's just like that. We had much more of the Greek influence growing up because of my mom's family being so close by. And then just like as a kid, like, you know,
00:33:24
Speaker
being made fun of. I remember one, we had a culture day thing where I wore the classic Greek costuming and kids making fun of me because I had a skirt on it and that kind of stuff. And that kind of stuff and just like, and that kind of running away from that side of your culture. And there was a lot of that in there that really spoke to me. Oh yeah, yeah. I remember as a kid, I would have friends
00:33:52
Speaker
carpool with me home from school and my mom would be playing her Cantonese pop. And I'm embarrassed. Like it would be like, I have to explain what this is. Or like, um, it's like a different language that like you don't normally hear. Cause you know, most people think of Chinese, they think of Mandarin, they don't think of Cantonese. So that already was like another layer of like, this is a weird new thing that I have to explain. Everyone was really, was really cool about it, but I definitely felt like,
00:34:20
Speaker
very conflicted and I grew up in a very white area here in the suburbs. So it was just a different world. That was something I really appreciated about the movie was Katie's character. When John John calls her an ABC or he's like, I speak ABC,
00:34:44
Speaker
I laughed so hard because that is totally my experience growing up like meeting kids who were who are from China or from Taiwan and having that kind of gap between us, even though we're the same age and them being like, oh, you're an ABC accent when you speak Chinese.
00:35:05
Speaker
Your Chinese is not that good and me just feeling like I'm such a failure like I'm like, what am I like I'm this weird hybrid creature and I'm not I don't really belong to any of these worlds and it was just really cool to see a character like Katie.
00:35:21
Speaker
Yeah, I did not catch that until later. I had seen somebody talking about it on, I think it was Reddit and they'd mentioned what that meant. And I just assumed it was like, you know, it was a joke, like Ronny Chieng just finding a different way to say I speak English. Yeah, yeah. And I think that's what a lot of people who don't have that experience assumed. So I don't think you mentioned it in your description there, but what does ABC actually stand for? So ABC is American born Chinese.
00:35:51
Speaker
And yeah, it is a very specific term that, like you say, like the general audience probably wouldn't cotton onto that being a specific meaning. And yeah, like that's, it's a little bit, a little bit derogatory, not like more of like a teasing kind of vibe. Like, yeah, so that was very special, like having that term just be really casually tossed in there. And like, if you didn't get it,
00:36:20
Speaker
it was fine, like the movie's gone, but for people like me, it was like, oh, like we're here, like we've seen, and they get it, yeah.
Cultural Resonance in Shang-Chi
00:36:31
Speaker
Another thing I really liked about, there are two things I really liked about Katie. One was just her general style, like I just love how Awkwafina is dressed and has like these really weird clothing combinations, and they don't try to like, you know, Hollywood her eyes, however- Yes.
00:36:49
Speaker
It's just this very like, you know, she's walking around with the fanny pack and the bright green pants. I love it. Yeah. I was going to say the fanny pack was iconic. But one other thing I really liked about it and what I really appreciated is there's the movie doesn't put any pressure to link Shang and Katie together. Yes. And being as someone whose best friend is a woman, I really appreciated that aspect of it.
00:37:18
Speaker
like being expressing that idea of you can have, you know, completely platonic relationships between straight men and women, it's okay. Yes, yes, absolutely. Yeah, their friendship was so warm and authentic and just very grounded feeling. And I definitely, like, I was seeing like friendships I've had with other Asian American kids.
00:37:44
Speaker
presented on the screen. And like I said, like the understanding, like the unspoken understanding between the two of, like two or however many of you, of the pressures that you're facing for generation.
00:37:57
Speaker
was just so, so well done. Also in where they go to karaoke. Yes. I saw people complaining about that scene. I couldn't understand why. I mean, I thought that was such a, that was such a wonderful scene. It was such a, it was such a humanizing moment. And yeah, that is such an Asian American thing. We all love to go to karaoke. Like we're, Boba and karaoke are like the things that were like, um, we should be responsible. No, we're going to go.
00:38:26
Speaker
I can't believe people are complaining about that. I think it was, I don't know. You know, there are some people who just like to find things to nitpick about, but I thought that scene was amazing. And then bringing it back at the end. Yeah, with Wong. I love what the MCU has done with Wong. It's how they've completely filled him up as his own character, as opposed to how he originally started off being Dr. Strange's man servant, which is actually the term they used.
00:38:54
Speaker
Oh, yikes. Yeah, yeah. So I really like this different version. And now we find out in, I'm not sure if you saw No Way Home, but we find out in that that he's actually the Sorcerer Supreme.
00:39:06
Speaker
Oh, so I actually haven't seen that yet. Okay. So that's just, I won't say anything else about it. Okay. But that's just, it's not like a big deal in the movie, but they make a mention of the fact that Peter goes to Dr. Strange and he says, I thought you were the source Supreme. And then, and then Wong, and then they say, no, it's actually Wong now because, because strange was gone for five years. So they had to pick someone else. That's amazing.
00:39:29
Speaker
But, so yeah, he's the Sorcerer's Supreme. And I love that they brought back the abomination from the incredible ones as well. And gave him a bit more of a comics accurate look. That was a deep cut, I mean.
00:39:41
Speaker
Incredible Hulk. I don't think I've even seen that one. I actually had to do some research on the character because I wrote an article for CBR about it. Oh, okay. Yeah, that was, and I think they actually brought back Tim Roth to do the motion capture of that. Right. Yeah, yeah. I mean, good on him for coming back just for a non-speaking role and just do the motion capture. Right? Yeah.
00:40:05
Speaker
or how poor they have between Wong and the abomination. Like, you didn't have Wong or something. And he does that thing where he's like, you know, next time we gotta work on your punches. Yeah, yeah. And I didn't notice it the first time, but this time I was paying attention to the portal he opened when he takes abomination back. And it looked like he was taking him back to prison. So it's like, this is like some sort of like prisoner work release or something. Oh, okay. I didn't notice that.
00:40:34
Speaker
Yeah, if you look very closely, because yeah, I didn't notice it either, but this time, because this is like the third or fourth time I've seen this movie. So this time I'm paying very close attention to the things I didn't notice before. And I look in the portal, and I think I see like the outlines of some of some cells. Okay, okay, that makes sense. Yeah, because he should be still in jail afterwards. He should be, yeah. So yeah, it'd be kind of irresponsible if Wong's hanging out with this wanted criminal who broke free of prison.
00:41:04
Speaker
Yeah, it makes more sense that he's just kind of taken him under his wing. Yeah. And let's talk a little bit about Simu Liu as Shang-Chi is the main character here. Now, when they had announced that he was cast, that's when I started looking into him. And because of that, just by coincidence, Kim's Convenience had just come on Netflix shortly before they had announced this. So right away, I started watching Kim's Convenience to see what he was like. And I just fell in love with that show.
00:41:35
Speaker
Yeah. You know, I have some conflicted feelings about that show and I'm sure you've heard the discussions that have been happening since it kind of crashed and burned. And I was, I really wanted to love it and things about it that I loved. I loved the cast. I loved the concept and like where it had come from, like the play, the original play. But,
00:42:04
Speaker
as I think most people know now, it became pretty clear that the writer's room was not very diverse and that they weren't representing the authentic experience and they weren't listening to the cast of that identity. You would think that their input would be somewhat valuable at least. And I was watching all of this happen also through Simu Liu's posts in the Subtle Asian Traits Facebook group.
00:42:33
Speaker
I don't know if you're familiar with that group. No, no, no, I never heard of that. Yeah, it's called Subtle Asian Traits. It's a huge, huge group. I mean, thousands, hundreds of thousands of members. And like every Asian kid that I know is in that group.
00:42:48
Speaker
it's kind of become like this unofficial hub for us to talk about our experiences and our identity. Yeah, Simu started posting in the group pretty frankly and openly about what he was going through with Kim's convenience and with other aspects of just trying to build his career. So just seeing him like having a really rough time and him and the rest of the cast having a rough time on the Kim's convenience set and then like moving on to this, to Shang-Chi
00:43:18
Speaker
and how much that project has been for him. Yeah, really great. And Jean Yoon, who played the mother on Kim's Convenience, she post signed a lot of what he had said. And yeah, someone who did have those experiences, who literally is a Korean Canadian woman.
00:43:37
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. And apparently got quickly just blown off whenever she tried to contribute. Yeah. And especially weird that they decided to do a spin off with the only white character in the show.
00:43:49
Speaker
don't get me started. I like understand the logic behind that at all. She's not even that interesting of a character. Sorry. No, I mean, like, I mean, she was, she was, you know, Nicole Powell was good in that role, but yeah, it's very much just a supporting character. She's not strong enough to, to anchor her own show. So I'm not sure. Not at all. Yeah. I would have thought Kimchi would have been the character that they would run. Yeah. Kimchi would have been much more interesting as a, as a, as a spinoff. But,
00:44:18
Speaker
especially when they had done more with his character as the show progressed and he had became a little bit, he started becoming more mature. I think there was definitely a lot more stuff to explore with him. But anyway, but then yeah, you're right. Those are definitely lots of issues about it. But coming at it from someone who doesn't have that background, I really enjoyed the show for what it was.
Humor and References in Shang-Chi
00:44:45
Speaker
And I thought the trick cast was great in it.
00:44:48
Speaker
especially Lou. I really loved his performance in it. And I love how they had kind of a little nod to the show. I'm not sure. Maybe it was just me looking too much into it, but they're always commenting in the show about how he's walking around without a shirt on or that kind of stuff. And see where Ronnie Chung makes Shang-Chi take his shirt off, and then he walks out into the arena, and Katie's like, what happened to your shirt? And he's like, I don't know. It's a period. That just happened.
00:45:17
Speaker
Yeah, that was great. Yeah. And yeah, I seem to lose a great like every man vibe that he has. And while also being, you know, like ripped and awesome, like they really like struck gold there with
00:45:33
Speaker
with, with finding him and he, he actually like pretty actively campaigned for the role. I mean, like he was kind of joking and like on Twitter about it, but like it was, it was kind of like, I'm kidding, but also I'm like not kidding, you know? Yeah. And it's just really cool to see how that all worked out. Apparently like, apparently he auditioned once and then they weren't sure. And they were like looking at a few other people and they still,
00:45:59
Speaker
just kept going back to him. So he then auditioned again and they were like, yeah, this is the guy. And he had like amazing chemistry with Aquafina, which yeah, like that definitely carried through in the movie. Both of them are just a really great match. Like they feel like real friends. I mean, like you said, you know, Sima Liu has, is just such a, he's just got, he's got such a warm personality in general. I think it'd be, I think it'd be impossible to find someone that he doesn't have chemistry with.
00:46:27
Speaker
yeah that's that's true. I agree with that. And probably Awkwafina as well, I get that same kind of vibe from her with the stuff I've seen her into. Yeah, they're just like both really, really chill. Yeah, very authentic and very.
00:46:41
Speaker
like someone you could hang out with in real life. Yeah. And I really like, because Shang-Chi in the comics is very much the stereotypical silent kung fu warrior type of thing, right? Very much the, you know, speaking in proverbs, all that kind of stuff. Very like self serious and humble and all that kind of stuff. And so I'm really glad that they,
00:47:06
Speaker
they went away from that in this. And they had Simu kind of inject and create a new personality for Shang-Chi, much like Robert Downey Jr. did for Tony Stark. Right, right. Yeah, like Shang-Chi in the movie is, he just feels so real, like his confidence.
00:47:33
Speaker
his inadequacies or like his, like when Shaolin is like kicking his ass and let's reason with her. And like, like I just have, I've seen that dynamic play out so many times with brothers and sisters and like strong women in my family. I loved how human he felt. He just, and like updating him for the modern age, you know, for our time, he definitely feels like
00:48:03
Speaker
a teenager or like a young adult of our time. Yeah. While also having that like dark past and like, um, kind of being like aware of how like weird it is that he has that past and how like, uh, it doesn't really like jibe with like the personality that Katie knows of his. Um, yeah, I just, I really loved how, um,
Praise for Shang-Chi's Action Scenes
00:48:26
Speaker
updated the character. And I love that they show that you mentioned those two sides and I really like that one of the great things about the scene on the bus and we'll get to talking about that because it's so amazing in so many ways. Oh god I love that scene. But one of the great things about that is when
00:48:45
Speaker
Katie's reaction to all of that because you, and how Simu plays that scene, right? How he plays it at one moment, like, you know, being the, you know, being Sean and SF Sean. And then in the next moment, like you'd almost see like this transformation where he becomes Shang-Chi again. Even like his facial feature, even like what he's doing with his face, it's like a different, it's much more tense, much less relaxed. And- Like this whole demeanor changes. Exactly, yeah.
00:49:16
Speaker
I thought that was amazingly well done. Yeah, absolutely. It was kind of an interesting twist on the like, you're a superhero, like, like you're like, what like, I really liked that she has her own deep history with him, like, yeah.
00:49:34
Speaker
been by his side for half of his life. Right, especially when she's like, you know, he just he can't do anything because she's saved him from getting beat up as a kid. And that's the whole time not knowing that he could have been he could have actually kicked the guy's ass. Yeah, yeah. Oh, my God, that scene, though, I can't get over that scene. It's an epic, like stakes constantly rising, like
00:49:59
Speaker
just, it's already high from the beginning. And then somehow they still find a way to ratchet the stakes up like more and more. Just like the fact that it's a bus with people on it. And like all the extras did such an amazing job. Like they really just real people. And you know, I've written the Muni
00:50:18
Speaker
in SF like a bunch of times and it feels really dangerous just riding an immunity normally. So seeing this kind of like heightened fantasy version of like immunity fight was really funny on like a meta level and just like amazing on the technical level. Kind of reminds me of a brief digression, but it kind of reminds me of the scene in Homecoming when you were talking about that, reminds me of that scene in Homecoming when Peter's talk finds out that
00:50:46
Speaker
Michael Keaton is the Vulture. And the horror of that scene, meeting your girlfriend's dad, and this being an MCU version where meeting your girlfriend's dad, who's a supervillain. Whereas in this one, riding the bus is scary. Riding the bus is scary because you've got a guy with the razor for a fist coming out. So I like the way that when the MCU does that, where they find real world connections to lead you into these situations.
00:51:16
Speaker
Yeah, totally. Peter Parker is such a great example of that. Cause you know, a teenager and he's going through all these typical teenager problems, but they're heightened because he's like, yeah, yeah. And so I also want to talk about Shaolin because this is another character who she wasn't necessarily in the comics.
Character Growth and Family Dynamics
00:51:38
Speaker
Like there was, because in the comics, Shang-Chi actually has like
00:51:43
Speaker
numerous siblings because Fu Manchu got around. And one of them was Fallo Si, who was originally from the Fu Manchu novels, and they eventually changed her name to Zeng Vao Yu. And she's very, a lot of stuff comes from that character, like the whole idea of like forming her own kind of underground empire and like, you know,
00:52:11
Speaker
that kind of stuff, very similar to her. And she's very much kind of her own character. And one of the things I thought was really interesting in this, and I think you were the one who had posted the article that I found out about this, was originally they had talked about putting a red streak in her hair, and then she had that removed because there's this, it's like almost become a stereotype of a rebellious Asian girl.
00:52:41
Speaker
Yes, yes. I mean, you look back at like Pacific Rim, Tokukuchi, she's got the blue streak. Right. Yeah, it's totally like a new stereotype. Or like Rila Fukushima in the Wolverine with the red hair.
00:53:00
Speaker
It's like a lazy like shortcut, not actually giving the character a personality, just being like, she's rebellious. Like she's cool. She's bad at it. She's not some China doll, like porcelain doll, but like giving any of real content beyond that. And yeah, I was, I loved seeing that article because that really shows like the dedication that the creative team had to, oh, excuse me. I'm sorry. My phone is going off. No problem.
00:53:33
Speaker
Sorry. Okay, sorry. Yeah, that really shows the dedication that they had to allowing like all the voices to contribute because she brought that, the actress brought that up
00:53:47
Speaker
I think after a month of filming. So a month's worth of footage of Shaolin with the red streets. And after she saw a Teen Vogue article about it, which keep killing it by the way. If you- Yeah. I remember when Trump first came into office and there were all these Teen Vogue articles that were being talked about. It's like, I remember there were like tweets and stuff being like, I did not expect Teen Vogue and the parks department to be leading the revolution.
00:54:17
Speaker
But here we are, I love it. Yeah, so, yeah, she saw that article and she was like, hey, like, can we not do this because I don't want to contribute to this trend that's been solidifying in Hollywood. And, you know, all credit to them, they were like, yeah, no problem. So they went back and they used special effects to take out the red streak and
00:54:44
Speaker
Um, I just love Shaolin's character. Like she feels very, I've said this a million times, but she feels really real. Like, just, um, like that, that one line where she's like, I kept my head down and I just like, he didn't notice me and that's how I survived, like about her dad. That is such a real experience that so many, uh, young women in Asian cultures have been through where
00:55:13
Speaker
know, we're safe in our roles and any deviation or standing out is dangerous. Right. Yeah. And especially in some of the more restrictive countries as well, because you see that, I mean, even, you know, even Japan being a
00:55:29
Speaker
much freer country than some other countries in Asia, you still see that attitude being perpetuated. So yeah, I thought that was a really interesting point you made. Something else I loved about her too, and I want to make sure credit her name. Please tell me if I'm mispronouncing this, but Mengarzang,
00:55:48
Speaker
John, John, John, John. Okay, thank you. You know, all I mean, amazing that she going back to the hair thing. I mean, I think it's great that she felt because this is her first her first film role.
00:56:02
Speaker
And having the courage to stand up in your first film role and say, hey, we shouldn't do it this way. And on such a huge production too, I'm like, you gotta imagine that's intimidating. And most people- All props to her. Yeah, absolutely. Most people would probably have said, and I'm just gonna, like you said, keep my head down. I'm just not gonna rock the boat. But she, and also I think some credit to the filmmakers that they'd created an environment where she felt comfortable enough to- Yes.
00:56:30
Speaker
Absolutely. I love that this was such a like led with love, you know, like Daniel Destin Kreten, the director, he and Dave Callahan, the screenwriter, they really, like you say, they created this environment where all voices were heard and
00:56:52
Speaker
voices were encouraged to contribute. And the crew from what I've heard was all different flavors of Asian, like Japanese, Korean, like all of them. And you can really see how the love and the real life experiences of all these people were influences in the final. Yeah.
00:57:16
Speaker
And something else I want to mention here. I also want to talk a little bit about, just very briefly about Florian Montano. I'm probably pronouncing that wrong, but Razorfist. This is a character who's from the comic books and the main difference is that both his hands have machetes instead of just one. And they don't retract. So he's just got them all the time, which imagine he's got to make some aspects of life very difficult.
00:57:46
Speaker
But it was a character that, you know, you'd never expect to see that. And then just seeing this guy walk up, this like, you know, big Romanian guy and just boom, the machete pops right out. I love it. He was just, he was so great. And just like, he has like relatively small role, but he was just so awesome in the, in the time he appears and just like, the fact that it's his car that they steal. I know. Oh my God.
00:58:12
Speaker
And Katie being super excited about it. Like, I like this guy. And how he joins up with the ad and he's like, nope, we, yeah, we should work together. Yeah. Yeah. Seeing him by Shaolin side in that post-credits scene. Exciting. I can't wait to see what's next for Shaolin. Yeah. I love the fact that she's taking control of the 10 rings.
00:58:33
Speaker
Oh, yeah, it's great. And they've they've added some really interesting complexity there with her line to Shang-Chi about shutting it down and then being like, no, I'm going to reform it in my image. And the fact that even though she's the leader of the 10 rings, Shang-Chi actually has the ring. So you got to imagine that sets up potential for conflict in the in the next. Oh, yeah.
00:58:56
Speaker
Yeah, I hope they do like a TV series or something with her. Well, that's what I was wondering, because they said at the end, the 10 rings will return, not Shang-Chi will return. So yes, it made me think that would be that would be pretty cool if they did like a TV show with her rebuilding the organization. Yeah, yeah. And because also I know that because again, I'm paying more attention on the fourth viewing, but the people who are sitting right in front of her, they're like passing photos back and forth of like. So I imagine that's like potential candidates for the organization.
00:59:26
Speaker
So we could bring in new versions of some of the other characters from either the Master of Kung Fu mythos or just some of the other characters who haven't appeared yet in the MCU
Emotional Depth in Shang-Chi
00:59:39
Speaker
could possibly get wrapped up in that. Yeah, that's really exciting. It makes me want to look into the source material a little bit more, although
00:59:48
Speaker
little afraid because I mean it's it's like when you're when you're watching something like like Kill Bill or something like that you got to understand that yeah the you got to understand the time period it's in and it's if you can look past that which I know it can be difficult um it the they've got some epic collections of Master of Kung Fu and
01:00:10
Speaker
The Doug Moynk, Paul Galacy stuff especially is pretty damn good. And it's pretty good. Like if you like kung fu movies, then you'll probably appreciate it a little bit more as opposed to if you're coming in without that background.
01:00:28
Speaker
Yeah, I'm definitely interested in checking them out. I'd like to know more about Razorfist in general. I don't really have any kind of idea of why he's in the Ten Rings or why he's so dedicated to Wenwu. It's that one line where he's like, you and your sister deserve everything that's coming. Yeah, yeah. And I think that's really interesting because there's a very personal vitriol behind that one. Yeah, you're right. That's very interesting.
01:00:56
Speaker
There wasn't really anything very special. I mean, he was, I think he was just a guy who was working with, who was working for Fu Manchu, basically, is how it worked there. But I don't think he'd ever had like any sort of, you know, he's one of these characters who, one of these super villains in the comic books who just kind of appears for the fight scenes, but he doesn't really have any larger backstory or anything like that. He's just basically a glorified henchman.
01:01:24
Speaker
Right, right. So they've got interesting directions they could go with him. Yeah, yeah. Especially because of the fact that he's he's remaining loyal to the organization despite what he said about that. So yeah, that's an interesting turnaround that he ended up respecting Shaolin and just kind of being folded into her new version of the organization. Yeah.
01:01:46
Speaker
One of the things that was a little bit disappointing was the death dealer, the guy, the masked guy, because he's got such a presence on screen and he's got that fight with Shang-Chi in Macau. And it was so good. And then just to see him taken out so quickly in the end like that was kind of a disappointment.
01:02:10
Speaker
Yeah, I think they were trying to do that thing where they're like, this guy's so strong, he's so strong. And the bad guys were even scarier. Like, they got rid of him in a second, which I totally get, but like, yeah, he felt a bit wasted. And he doesn't ever speak, does he? No, he doesn't. And it's surprising because he's a really big presence in Shang-Chi in the comic books. Oh, really? Yeah, he was like, he was,
01:02:39
Speaker
working with MI6 at first, and then he ended up betraying them to Shang-Chi's father. And then after that, Fu Manchu gave him the death dealer persona. So he's got this very personal relationship with Shang in the comics, which they kind of touched on a little bit with the whole fact that he was the guy who trained him, but I wish we could have seen more of that.
01:03:03
Speaker
I thought there was going to be some, the first time I watched the movie, I thought there was going to be some kind of twist of like, he's, he's like, one of his brother, or like, you know, like his, or another son that he had. I mean, when we lived for like, thousands and thousands of years, it's kind of like amazing that he never had any other kids. Well, I think that's, that's one of the things that, you know,
01:03:24
Speaker
the door leaves open because the fact that you've been around for all this time, I mean, they've said that what Genghis Khan is like, like a third of the world or something like that. Right. Yeah. And you got to imagine and especially because they hinted him being Genghis Khan, because one of his one of the names he used to go by was Master Khan. That's right. That's right. So there is that possibility. And the fact that in the comic books, you know, the character had a bunch of kids. So
01:03:53
Speaker
Right, yeah. So yeah, there's that definite possibility, but this is just the first with, with Blake and I in her name right now, but the actress, the woman who, his mother, that was the first time that he had, that he had actually fallen in love, right? Yeah, with Yingli. Yingli, yeah, thank you. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, like that, they definitely like had, were depicting it as like his first true love.
01:04:23
Speaker
and the one that he felt it was worth it to grow old for. And I thought that was, because that was one of the things that was kind of bugging me throughout most of the movie is the fact like, why would she be with this guy? I was thinking the same thing. And then when you see how he changed and everything, I'm like, oh, now I get it. And it seems so ludicrous on paper, right? Yeah.
01:04:50
Speaker
And, you know, a lot of it goes down to goes back to Tony lungs acting because he totally says that. Yes, absolutely. And it's like the movie magic of like making something pretty ridiculous, actually feel really like emotionally affecting and very, very real. And I just I really loved the warmth in their family scenes like when they're playing DDR. Yeah, yeah. Just settling together and
01:05:16
Speaker
Um, you really, I think they did a really good job with like the dead mom trope in this one because very, uh, she felt complicated. She felt real. Um, uh, you could feel that loss, like how, how the magnitude of that loss, um, and, and why it's been so devastating for each of the members of the family. Yeah. Having this guiding.
01:05:41
Speaker
in this balancing force in their life, like ripped away in such a devastating way. Right. And how that has affected them, and especially how that affects Wenwu, where the point where is she, that you get the sense that he wasn't always the kind of like the domineering father type of thing. Yes. And that, and like when Sha Ling says like after my mom died, that he changed and
01:06:09
Speaker
Tony Long really does a good job of selling that. And that's one of the things that makes it different from the comics because in the comic books, there's no like lost love between Shang-Chi and his father because his father's a total master. But here you get that sense of they feel like they've lost a good father. And I think that was really well done. Absolutely. And like, I really love kind of a parallel for
01:06:38
Speaker
intergenerational trauma and like a lot of me, our parents went through hard things when they had to leave their countries or their parents went through hard things. And that has kind of echoed and twisted relationships all down the line. Yeah, there's like a double there of like,
01:07:04
Speaker
lost their mom and then, like you say, they lost their dad too. They lost who he was. And in returning to his warlord, like abusive, domineering personality, he also lost his relationship with his children. There's still that love there, like there's still that deep love and connection. Like when they reunite in Macau, the first thing that when
01:07:33
Speaker
not to do is touch foreheads. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And like you can see like the pain and like the conflict between them and but also like the very real love and yearning and I just, I was very emotionally affected by that, that
01:07:49
Speaker
I thought that was really beautifully done. And again, Tohong is incredible. Yeah, especially in that scene at the end when Shang-Chi tells him, your family needs you, dad. And just like that very, you know, and it's like, I'm still trying to reach out and how at the end he does kind of succeed, right? It's like a second too late, but he does succeed in the end. Yeah, yeah. And then the way that he just kind of like, he lets the rings fall off his arms and lets them pass over to Shang-Chi. I thought that was also really good.
01:08:17
Speaker
symbolic way of showing that, you know, he has changed in his last moments. Yeah, yeah, it was a it's a beautiful story. Like, yeah.
Critique of Shang-Chi's Third Act
01:08:28
Speaker
All the different layers of the movie are just so well done. Like, there's no corner of this, like, they didn't like poor love into the floor. And I was just really impressed by that.
01:08:42
Speaker
Yeah, there was one thing that for me was a little bit on rewatching this movie. Like I loved the scene the first time I watched it, but rewatching it, the third act kind of slows for me a little bit during the big... Yeah, the big Dragony stuff. Yeah, yeah. And like the more I watched it and the more I watched Tony Long and Sima Lewis, like I wanted
01:09:08
Speaker
the third act to be much more about them and just them as opposed to a big, which it's become a Marvel trope now and kind of disappointing. I'm kind of over the big, you know, battlefield scenes at the end with all these nameless characters fighting each other. Yeah, yeah, totally. I think a lot of people felt that way. I remember a lot of the people were making points about that. Just how like,
01:09:37
Speaker
the more personal stakes kind of disappear. The movie kind of reaches its climax and it just becomes about these big CG like worms. Yeah, it's tough because like the name of the game with Marvel, like they need to connect everything back to their big multiverse and the cosmic level events that are happening. And it's just, I don't really know what the answer is
01:10:08
Speaker
Uh, that big structure is what make incredible like this possible because they have the money and they have the, the cultural and financial backing, but to be able to create an amazing work of art like this, but then they still have to like pay the Piper, like, you know, make it connect back.
01:10:27
Speaker
it have the same scale as the other movies do. I think Spider-Man No Way Home had kind of found a way to do that, so I'm not going to say anything more about that climactic scene, but when you see it, I think you'll understand what I'm saying.
01:10:40
Speaker
Okay, I'm very excited to see No Way Home. I hear it's really good. It's definitely, like I did a ranking the other day because I had seen all the movies I was probably going to see in 2021 finally, now that I finally saw No Time to Die and Venom. And so I did a ranking of all the movies and yes, Spider-Man No Way Home was definitely like the top of my list. Okay, that's high praise. Yeah. So I'm very excited.
01:11:07
Speaker
Yeah, and is there anything else you wanted to mention about this movie? Anything that we didn't kind of touch on? Let me think. I did kind of touch on it already, but I really liked the feeling or the discussion of the Asian-American kids
01:11:32
Speaker
mental and emotional burden and like how they kind of dissected that with the scenes with the friends in the bar. Sue, I think is the friend's name. Yeah, it's like you need to grow up like you need to, you need to like face your or fulfill your potential.
01:11:51
Speaker
And that just felt really real like I've had so many conversations like that where it's like you're so smart and like why aren't you, you know, doing this and my parents want me to do this and I don't know what I want and
01:12:07
Speaker
Yeah, I just I really love that and I loved how they brought it home again at the end of the movie with Katie like telling them what happened and then are you joking me? Are you pulling my legs? It was just a great like bookend. The film like the film had great structure overall. Yeah. Yeah, like the the transit like they have to do some pretty crazy transitions between worlds and settings and
01:12:34
Speaker
uh, tones. They feel like they, they just nailed like bringing it home at the end and like keeping it about, uh, Shang-Chi's like personal life and journey and his friends. Yeah. Yeah. I also thought, um, I did love that, especially when, when Wong comes through at the end and he just takes her drink. Oh my God. So great. Wong was like, and like the unspoken MVP of this movie.
01:12:59
Speaker
Yeah, it just him belting out Hotel California at the end. Oh my god, I loved it. I loved it. There's also like, bringing it back to the universe connections here. I do love that we're kind of hinting at other stuff happening with the rings. And because one of the things when they had that dragon verse appear, my first thought was, oh, it's, I'm not sure if you know from the comic books, but Fin Fang Foom is
01:13:21
Speaker
like this big dragon character in the comic books. I heard something about that, yeah. So that's where I thought it was at first. And then I'm like, wait, no, no, no, no, no, that's not him. That's not him. And then so, but there's a similarity there. Then you've got the beacon at the end. So, and in the comics, the Mandarin rings are connected to Fin Fang Foon's planet, I believe. So there might be some connection there that they're building to later on. So I thought that was kind of cool.
Future MCU Storylines
01:13:50
Speaker
It was also a really cool scene, Brie Larson and Mark Ruffalo pop up again. Oh yeah, that was fun. Yeah, I'm a big role fan, so I was just really excited to see. Yeah, especially, you know, Bruce just going like, yeah, I don't really have her number. She just does this all the time. Yeah, it was great. Yeah, it's exciting to think about where they could go next. And, you know, maybe they could bring the world of tallow back. I'm really excited to explore that dimension more because
01:14:19
Speaker
Um, Michelle Yeoh does that kind of exposition dump about halfway through the movie. She's like showing them the mural. And, um, she says something really interesting, which is that they have, um, cities and they have like a thriving, vibrant culture. I'm not sure how much is still there after what happened with the dweller in darkness. Um,
01:14:43
Speaker
I can, I gotta imagine that there's more people out there in Tallow, like beyond their little village. Yeah, that's something I was wondering about too. And I wonder if maybe it's in the same dimension that Cunlun is in from Iron Fist. Oh, I'm not familiar. Well, I won't say anything else, but recently something happened where they're, have you seen Hawkeye?
01:15:06
Speaker
No, I have not. Okay, so something happens and they're basically confirming that the Netflix stuff exists in the MCU. There's some stuff in Hawkeye, there's some stuff in No Way Home that you'll know when you see it. And so those shows exist in the MCU now pretty much. And so like my entire time when I'm watching the tallow stuff, I'm thinking like,
01:15:31
Speaker
This sounds very similar to the Kunlun stuff, like the whole difficulty getting to it and all that and the path of movement once a year. Kunlun's like the exact same thing. So I'm wondering if they're like in the same dimension, if they're linked somehow. Yeah, there's like so much more ground they could cover there and very open possibilities. I'd love Michelle Yeoh's character come back. She was seriously awesome. And this is her second MCU appearance actually, because she was in Guardians 2 as one of the original Ravagers.
01:15:59
Speaker
That's right, a very brief appearance, right? Very brief appearance, yeah. Like her and Vang Rames was also in there too. And which at one point after Guardians 2, they were briefly, there's some briefly rumors that they might be trying to do something with those characters, which would be cool to see her doing that too. I mean, you get more Michelle Yeoh, it's always a good thing. I was gonna say like, I'm always down for more Michelle Yeoh.
01:16:26
Speaker
of funny how they've had like a few different instances of trying out like Asian actors in the MCU and then like having them come back in a bigger role like Gemma recently. I'm sorry say that again. Gemma Chan. Oh yeah yeah. Yeah because she was in Captain Marvel right and she had a small role in that and then she came back as Cersei in Eternals. Just love seeing more more Asian faces and
01:16:51
Speaker
I'm totally fine with them double playing roles. Like just give us more awesome Asian ladies. And especially I love Gemma Chan after I saw her in Crazy Rich Asians and then
01:17:01
Speaker
Yeah. And then seeing her in, uh, so it was really nice seeing her in Captain Marvel, but you know, like you said, it was a very kind of small role. She didn't really have a whole lot to do. And then we, I just watched Eternals like, it was like a week ago or something and it was okay, but I thought she was especially really good in it. And especially the possibilities opens up for her because in the comics, Cersei becomes an Avenger. Oh, I didn't know that. And, um, and also they had, uh,
01:17:28
Speaker
and Dane becomes the Black Knight and they have a relationship in the comics. So they're hinting at that kind of stuff. And especially, this is a brief digression, but at the end of Eternals, you'd see the post-credit scene? Yes. So do you know who that guy is who's talking to Dane? Oh, I read something about this, but tell me who it is. Who was it again? It's Blade.
01:17:55
Speaker
Okay, right, right, right. Yeah, yeah, because it's Mahershala Ali. Mahershala Ali, yes, yes, yes. There's another guy they're bringing back from something else in the MCU. Because he was- Well, they're really, they're really going back and like bringing back all the, like the deep cuts. Yeah, I mean, good for them because I love this. And it reminds me of what they did in, in crisis with Brandon Routh, how they have, they have him as Superman and him as, as the Adam. And it's just like, and it's just coincidental. They look exactly alike.
01:18:23
Speaker
Right. Another thing I just wanted to touch on, regards the universe stuff is I really liked how, because when people look at the MCU, they think it's like one big master plan and everything is carefully planned out, but it's really not. Like they have like a vague idea of where they're going, but how they get there is kind of up in the air. And I think Shang-Chi is the most obvious example of that where you can,
01:18:50
Speaker
you could see this this was not the intention with the Mandarin and all that stuff from the beginning but the way they work it in seamlessly and the whole fact that when you do the math in this movie like he you know Shang-Chi goes off at the age of 14 and then he comes back he's like what like 25 in this movie 26 something like that yeah something like that you do the math the math actually works out from Iron Man 3 because you've got that five-year gap from uh from uh endgame
01:19:17
Speaker
And so the math actually works out that, you know, and it makes sense why his father was like, you know, we'll rebuild the 10 rings as in, you know, taking it back from what they had done. So all of that math actually really works out really well. And I thought that was a, you know, really, really good writing and really good way to find a way to make all this stuff fit together. Yeah. It's amazing how it fell into place so perfectly. And I really like how, um,
01:19:45
Speaker
the MCU is kind of emulating its source medium in the sense that there's this overarching multiverse and kind of just fantastical universe of heroes. And all these different creators are being brought in to give their own spin, to do their own run, to do their own. And when you think of it that way, I just get really excited because like, I just want to see
01:20:15
Speaker
you know, more voices, more different spins on these stories like Black Panther was amazing and definitely like a blueprint for how they
01:20:27
Speaker
how the Shang-Chi project materialized. Exactly, yeah. I don't think you get to Shang-Chi and the way it's done without working on it. Absolutely, yeah.
Crazy Rich Asians and Cultural Identity
01:20:37
Speaker
And not an MCU movie, but Crazy Rich Asians, which- Yeah, I was thinking the same thing too. Yeah, it's totally like a stepping stone to Shang-Chi. I mean, obviously Aquafina is in both of them. On a more broad level, like the depiction in Crazy Rich Asians of Asian youth
01:20:56
Speaker
and it being more authentic and more grounded while also still having elements of fantasy and of movie magic. It's just, it's really exciting to see these frontiers being pushed. When you were talking about the ABC thing, that crazy rich Asians popped right into my mind, that conversation with her mom at the beginning, it's like your face is Chinese, but your heart and your mind are American. Yes, yes, very much related to that, yeah.
01:21:26
Speaker
definitely brought some of that discussion and that dynamic into. Okay. So Jessica, any final things you want to mention before we close up? I think we covered a lot of ground already. Yeah. I just, I love the movie. I'm really, really excited for where they're going to take these characters next. Please bring back Michelle Yeoh. We love, and
01:21:55
Speaker
I hope that Katie and Shang-Chi don't get together. I like his friends, like you said, and I'd like to see Katie continue to grow in her own space, in her own right.
01:22:14
Speaker
Maybe something I don't know, I think it's weird that she's an archer and like Hawkeye is also an archer and like now we've got Kate Bishop and it's kind of like a bit too much of an overlap so if we could like see her kind of grow in some other direction but I think it's a good start.
Music and Cultural Influence in Shang-Chi
01:22:30
Speaker
I also wanted to briefly mention because I was talking about the
01:22:34
Speaker
the Shang-Chi comic book, the current one, the ongoing series now, it's being written by Gene Luen Yang. And so he's Asian American. So I'd read the first book of that and it was really good. And apparently that was a mini series, but he's doing the ongoing series now, apparently too. So- I'll have to check it out. Yeah, definitely check it out. It was really good. And in the ongoing series,
01:23:00
Speaker
There, it just started like this last year, it looks like. There, and it's already up to, looks like it's up to nine issues so far. So it looks like it's still going. And that one, I think they, that's when he starts going through and clarifies the stuff about his mother and all that. Okay. Oh, there was one more thing I wanted to talk about. Okay. The music, the music and the movie. So good. Are you familiar with 88 Rising? No, no.
01:23:26
Speaker
So they're like an international like Asian youth-led record label. It was just really exciting that, so they did the whole, like they made a whole album for the movie. Have you looked at it? Sorry, say it again. You fade it out real quick. Oh yeah, sorry. They made a whole album for the movie. And like, so all of the songs that play in the movie are from this 88 Rising Shang-Chi album. Oh, okay.
01:23:57
Speaker
It's totally like worth a listen. All the songs are really good. And they got some really exciting, like young Asian artists on it. Nikki is a singer who's worked with 88 Rising. She's Indonesian. I might be wrong about that, but she's an amazing vocalist. Jenee Iiko, who is a big star here in America. She does a track on the album and also Bebe,
01:24:26
Speaker
Bibi is a Korean hip-hop artist, B-I-B-I, definitely work, she's amazing. It's just really cool seeing this like young Asian energy and like pop culture being put at the forefront and like kind of shaping the sound of this movie. Just yeah, like I was really, really impressed and excited by that. And I definitely recommend
01:24:50
Speaker
them. It's full of bops. Something else I noticed too is there's a lot of hip-hop used in the music and yes if if I'm not correct me if I'm wrong but isn't hip-hop like becomes something really big in Asian American community? It absolutely has yeah yeah both like here and across the pond in Asia and I don't
01:25:15
Speaker
I do wonder about the cultural appropriation aspect of that, because it is a Black genre. We're taking our inspiration from Black artists and Black music. But it has been really fascinating seeing how that language of rebellion and of self-expression has become a new outlet for young Asian people
01:25:45
Speaker
Right. To talk about the experiences that we have now. I mean, I think that I think that's the that's the big that's the that's the line with between like, is it cultural appropriation or is it? Yeah. It's like, you know, are you honoring what came before type of. Yes, yes. Yeah. Yeah. And I in general, I think 88 Rising does an amazing job with that. Like, OK. And they've kind of created their own space.
01:26:11
Speaker
in hip-hop that really, really fascinating. So yeah, highly recommend the album. It's great. And the feeling of the movie is very unique because of the music, like the hip-hop track that plays like during the bus scene, like it feels so San Francisco, like it feels so Bay.
01:26:29
Speaker
Like that's the music that we blast as we're like driving around in the bay. And yeah, so it was perfect.
Final Thoughts and Promotions
01:26:36
Speaker
So yeah, this was a really interesting conversation. Thank you so much for coming on and- Thank you for having me. Yeah, cause like I seen a little bit of what you're talking about in like different articles and stuff like that, but you also talked about a lot of stuff that I hadn't even heard about. So I thought all this was very fascinating. Well, great. I'm so glad it worked out.
01:26:56
Speaker
Yeah. Um, so, um, I don't know. Now, do you want to promote anything before we, uh, we wrap up? Oh, um, well, check out CBR. Um, we are putting out articles on the daily about everything nerdy and geeky. And, um, yeah. Uh, my Twitter is, um, Oh God, what is my Twitter? But I need to, I need to promote it more. Let's see.
01:27:23
Speaker
My Twitter is also linked in my author bio on CBR. Okay, so yeah, so just look for Jessica Fong on CBR. Yeah, look for Jessica Fong on CBR. And I'll be there. Yeah. Okay, great. Well, thanks again for coming on and have to come have you think this is your podcast debut, if I'm not mistaken, right? It is. Yeah. So how did it feel? It was actually not as scary as I was
01:27:48
Speaker
afraid it was going to be. I was very nervous, as you know, coming in. Yeah, so good, yeah. So we'll have to have you come back on at some point in the future then.
01:27:57
Speaker
Oh, I would love that. Thank you so much. All right. So that does it for this episode of Superhero Cinephiles. Thanks so much for listening. You can head over to supercinephiles.superherocinephiles.com is the website. You can find us on Twitter and Instagram at SuperCinemapod. And please make sure to like and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, wherever you get your podcasts. And that does it for this episode. We will talk to you next time. Bye for now.
01:28:23
Speaker
You have been listening to the Superhero Cinephiles podcast. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram at SuperCinemapod. Join our Facebook group by searching for Superhero Cinephiles, where you can interact with us and other superhero fans. If you'd like to support the show, you can become a regular supporter at Patreon or make a one-time donation through PayPal, both of which can be found at our website, SuperheroCinephiles.com.
01:28:45
Speaker
If you buy or rent any movies through the Amazon links at our site, it helps support the show. Please be sure to rate and review us on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Thank you for listening. And as always,
01:29:16
Speaker
Good night, good evening, God bless.