Shang-Chi (2021).
Directed by Destin Daniel Cretton
Written by Dave Callaham, Destin Daniel Cretton, and Andrew Lanham
Starring Simu Liu, Awkwafina, Tony Leung, and ten rings
The Stage.
Xu Wenwu, owner of the famed Ten Rings, starts hearing the voice of his wife, asking him to come rescue her from an ancient civilization in a different dimension. Obsessed with setting her free, he involves his children, Xailing - a Chinese underground fighting legend, and Shang-Chi, a San Francisco parking valet with a mysterious past.
The Review.
I should start by saying although I’m a big fan of the Marvel Cinematic Universe and was a fan of comic books as a kid, I’m unfamiliar with Shang-Chi. I had no idea who he was until this film was announced, so this review will come from fresh eyes. If you’re a fan of the character, you’ve probably seen this film already, so I guess that doesn’t really matter, but I didn’t have a connection to the source material.
Overall, I liked this movie. There are a lot of good things going here. First, it’s very cool to see a Chinese protagonist in a huge Marvel movie and I’m glad to see some more representation on display. I hope that it has the same impact that it seems like Black Panther did with young folks itching to see some positive role models on screen. Part of that representation is Tony Leung, who I’m such a huge fan of from his previous Hong Kong work. He was acting his ass off and was a strong villain, which is often a problem with Marvel films. I bought his motivation and his arc and I was satisfied with how everything unfolded.
Of course when you head into a Marvel movie, you’re looking for some great action, and this film had a lot of it. The bus fight that you’ve probably already heard about was absolutely fantastic - I loved the brutality of it along with the beats of genuine humor. The downside to a fight scene like this is that it happens within the first twenty minutes of the film and then nothing else compares to it. There’s a scaffold fight that’s pretty cool, but as you might expect in a film that deals with magic rings and mythical beasts, the final fight scenes feel so large and fantastical that it can turn into sensory overload with the amount of CGI on screen. The smaller-scale fight scenes resonated a lot more with me because seeing throwback kung-fu moves mixed with a dash of Marvel magic was really fun.
As for the plot, I thought it was fine, but as I’ve said before, I’m kind of over the whole, “…and if we don’t stop the bad guy, the entire world is doomed!” kind of stories. As Marvel films usually go, the final battle is full of faceless creatures fighting an expendable army with the hero in the thick of things going up against the big bad. There’s a pretty great call back to a character from Iron Man 3 that I didn’t see coming, and that rectification was pretty great, especially for those who left Iron Man 3 disappointed in the way that plot played out. The rings were way cooler looking than they deserved to be which is a testament to the spectacular VFX crew that worked on this. The graphics were not nearly as bad as they were in Black Panther.
The End.
Shang-Chi was funny, charming, and had a ton of great special effects, but the story didn’t really leave me wanting more from this part of Shang-Chi’s life. As a character, I think he and his powers are pretty cool - I’m excited to see him as a bigger part of whatever the multi-verse arc brings. I’m also excited to see what his sister does with her new venture as well. I liked Shang-Chi overall but didn’t love it - it’s definitely entertaining, and I can see myself gladly watching it again when my kid is old enough to comb through the Marvel catalogue with me, but I’ll probably wait until then to see it again.
