See the box office is much better than expected ( will take it over $80 million for the 4 day weekend). Really good news. This movie will not have much competition for the next couple weeks, so it has a chance to keep a good box office going( like Free Guy). If it gets a China release it will do really well
Exactly, Marvel can put out a movie called, Dog **** the adventures and it'll still make money. Never doubted marvel/disney once when it comes to the box office numbers. And on labor day weekend too? They know what they is doin.
Totally agree. Usually their movies are pretty good/entertaining. I think Shang Chi and Free Guy show if you put a good movie out there people will go see it.
tl;dr at the end. So, saw the movie last night. And it was really disappointing, for me. I think maybe I hyped it up too much and watched all of the media that came out for it (all the trailers on Youtube...even the 30-second ones that the Marvel channel put out every day). Things I liked a lot: 1. Glad a significant portion of the spoken dialogue was in Mandarin. Really adds to the atmosphere. Love that they didn't just have an Asian cast speak English for the whole movie. 2. Fight scenes were great, but there should have been more. Love that they incorporated fighting with weapons (ROPE DART!) rather than just hand-to-hand combat. Things I didn't like: a lot. I had a problem with many of the characters. Katy. Wenwu (at the end of the movie). Even Shang-Chi. I'll get into why, if you care to read. Spoiler 1. As far as source material goes, Shang-Chi is supposed to be this master of close combat and weapons. Yet he basically couldn't beat Death Dealer before Wenwu showed up. He also couldn't show out against his aunt. And then he basically beat the Dweller-in-the-Dark only with the help of the ten rings and the dragon Great Protector. Literally anyone could do that. Give the rings to Katy and she could have done that. Nothing about Shang-Chi, himself, was inherently special. 2. Katy. Oh boy. So she apparently has a free pass to go anywhere Shang-Chi goes, just because she's associated with him? This needed to be explained more. I guess I can understand Shang-Chi's willingness to let her tag along on the trip to Macau. But Wenwu letting Katy live, therefore allowing her to know where the ten rings HQ is? Auntie willingly letting Katy in to Ta Lo even though it's supposed to be some super secret place? Shang-Chi and Xialing were fine to be there, since they're family. But Katy? And Trevor? C'mon, man!! That's ridiculous. And then after a day or two in Ta Lo, Katy is like, Hawkeye level proficient with a bow and arrow? C'mon, man!!!!! They should have revealed Katy to be..."greater" than she was. Maybe an agent of Ta Lo so that auntie could keep an eye on Shang-Chi. Even a member of the ten rings would have been more believable than just "plucky best friend who doesn't take no for an answer." 3. Wenwu. Imo, the best character in the entire movie...up until his death scene. So, dude was captured by the DitD and started getting his soul sucked out. Instead of fighting and trying to preserve your own life, you...just willingly give up the ten rings and just accept death? Dude has been immortal for like, 1000 years. Instead of trying to use the rings to fight against the thing that just captured you, the dude basically gives up and dies. What the holy heck is that logic? If there was literally no way out, then fine. Surrender your rings to your son. But Wenwu didn't even try. Didn't. Even. Try. Non-spoilery stuff: 1. I wish they explained the story behind the ten rings, more. What are they? Where did they come from? Do you need all ten for even one to be active, or can you be badass with just one? Does the user immediately know how to use the rings, upon getting them? Seems like it was just a MacGuffin. It took a while for the Infinity Stones to be explained, but those spanned the entire MCU; the rings seem to just be something relevant to Shang-Chi. But that post-credits scene may allude to something else... 2. Speaking of the rings, what was up with the people that wanted to kill Wenwu? Was it solely because of the rings, or did they only want to kill Wenwu? The family aspect of Wenwu was explained really well, but I wanted more backstory on Wenwu, tbh. The movie basically started with Wenwu already having the rings and then meeting Shang-Chi's mom. No history on Wenwu nor the rings. Could have explored that a bit more. After all, the movie is titled "Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings." tl;dr1. I hyped the movie up for myself too much, and was disappointed. My advice to anyone wanting to see the movie would be to not read up on anything related to the Shang-Chi property, nor should you watch any of the trailers. tl;dr2. Movie felt like the plot details of a teenager's dream movie. Dude really good at fighting, fights people. Badass female characters. Dragons and other mythical creatures. Wakanda, except Asian. Kaiju fighting another Kaiju. Machete-arm. Flying, soul-sucking creatures. Giant boss. RT score of 92/93% or so is deserved if I followed tl;dr1. Since I didn't, movie was like a 75/80% for me.
This might be D&D material so move or delete if appropriate. I have yet to see the movie but probably will either streaming or online in the future. Not because I don't want to but just that I very rarely see first release movies in the theater anymore and don't have Disney Plus. That said I'm still bothered by all the hype even among Asians about this movie and the feeling that as an Asian American I have to see this. It bugged me with Crazy Rich Asians and it bugs me now. For one making a movie about ultra wealthy Asians or Asians with superpowers to me isn't advancing Asian issues, making society more tolerant of Asians or increasing Asians. Especially a martial arts movie. I mean if having a great Asian martial arts movie is the standard of Asian success and acceptance then all Asian American issues would've been solved in 1973 when Enter the Dragon was issued. To me the better roles for Asian acceptance are Asians playing roles that aren't roles like Martial Artists or Model Minority, like doctor. One of my favorite characters was Daniel Dae Kim as Agent Tom Baker on 24. It was a very small role but it was very telling that the producers felt casting an Asian actor in a role that wasn't meant to be Asian, and which they didn't even bother changing the character name to something Asian sounding, was socially acceptable. I haven't seen it but my understanding is that Sandra Oh's character on Killing Eve is the same way. None of this means that Shang Chi shouldn't be made or released. I enjoy martial arts movies and have liked most of the MCU movies. I just think making this into some sort of act of Asian empowerment is not just overblown but backwards. Especially for Asian Americans to be pushing it so.
It helps that even their bad movies are pretty watchable. Their worst movies are 10 times better than the Justice League movie (300 with DC characters).
I think having an Asian Male Character who is considered hot is a good thing for the Asian community. Daniel Dae Kim was also considered hot by non Asians. That being said, I mostly agree with you.
Daniel Dae Kim's been getting the ladies for a long time. Even fogies at CBS recognize that. Also John Cho got some votes for sexiest man alive in 2009 https://people.com/celebrity/the-sexiest-men-alive-2009/?slide=2097403#2097403
Henry Cavil Superman was supposed to show up in the post credit scene in the first movie, there were Batman easter eggs all over the movie, Plus Black Adam is supposed to cross over at some point. I think Shazaam counts as a DCU movie.
I don't get into the politics or messages in movies ( even though it can be annoying if it's shoved down your throat). Is it a good story or not. I thought this was pretty good. Very entertaining.
It's spun as the Asian Black Panther moment, and I agree the feelings and appropriateness are vastly different. But I'd rather have this gesture than the Mandarin reprising his Yellow Menace role, esp with Covid. The fact that there was an Asian director brought in with along different POC behind the screen shouldn't be discounted as yet another Martial Arts Movie. In the last year, I've seen more PoC being cast in historical or "European Fantasy" pieces and I'm all for it. I'd imagine for the fit to work even better, you'd want a more diverse writing, editing and production crew as well. A rare big budget movie like this is also giving them the experience on paper to prove they can provide the right look. Part of the reason why I think Raya flopped was because they brought in a white director who did their Fusion thing and ended up with a message and theme that didn't resonate with anyone. It wasn't talked about nor hyped up, and there you go...
Crazy Rich Asians was trash. Please see shang chi on the big screen. It's so much action and colorful.
when they were calling it the Black Panther for Asians.. I was like uh oh. lol I get what you're saying. I often want black representation that doesn't have to do with slavery and stereotypes. Black people just existing in media without pandering is refreshing. However, I think Pandering is okay sometimes too... If the movie is good that also panders to a certain group can also be fun to watch. Just turn your brain off for a couple hours.
If you need a sexy Asian guy then how could you forget Yoshihiro Akiyama . Sexyama was a very good judoka too
Shang Chi the character was created back in the day because Bruce Lee was popular so Marvel had to make a Bruce Lee comic without using his name. Crazy Rich Asians are actually real, just book a Michelin star restaurant in California or go to the high limits table in any Vegas casino
I haven't seen much in the way of people saying this movie pushes positivity for Asians. As in, like, it'll combat the anti-Asian sentiment or anything like that. Rather, it's just good that there's simply more Asian representation in the mainstream media. And the fact that Marvel took a chance on a C-tier / D-tier superhero property and cast a majority of Asians to be in its most important roles, is incredibly refreshing.
totally agree. More asian representation means that one day, it won’t be a momentous development when there is a movie with asian lead actors or lead themes. Relative to other cultures in America, Asian culture lags in representation, acceptance, and cool factor. That has improved, particularly in food culture. But less so in media, hence the value of this kind of moving.
