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Edited by Mrph1 on Jul 29th 2024 at 3:09:00 PM
Which would be a stupid thing to avoid. Kung Fu Hustle is literally one of the best films ever made.
"All you Fascists bound to lose."Although I wouldn't expect it to be quite that zany, I kind of think/hope that the movie will be fairly comedic.
While of course, he doesn't necessarily "have" to be playing a similar character, Simu Liu's character in Kim's Convenience is a somewhat dense "gym bro", and it makes me think of obvious parallels with Chris Pratt playing Any Dwyer in Parks and Rec and then later Starlord.
And while she can play serious roles well, Akwafina is definitely a comedic actress.
And as illustrated by Kung Fu Hustle, the wuxia genre itself can be kind of zany.
Edited by Hodor2 on Apr 1st 2021 at 6:03:24 AM
Well, I don't know if you've seen KFH (or if you remember it, it was released basically 20 years ago), but Kung Fu Hustle actually isn't that far from a "Marvel film" in some points. It's just a lot more violent (rated r after all) and a lot zanier, but the film is also incredibly dramatic and serious. Kung Fu Hustle includes this as one of the main centerpieces of its soundtrack after all:
It is both incredibly zany and also incredibly touching and sad at times.
Kung Fu Hustle is also part of a long, storied tradition of Hong Kong comedy since the days of theater, and Kung Fu films in particular have always had an outlandish and mildly-self-referential nature. I'd find a lot more insulting if they just decided to do a plastified, idealized pale shade of Kung Fu Cinema rather than an actual look at the genre, but then again, the CCP is backing this so it's possible (Kung Fu Cinema has gone down the drain since the Hong Kong film industry is in the CCP stranglehold).
"All you Fascists bound to lose."It really comes down to if the character is the butt of the joke. Heroes and fighters can be part of comedy but still feel important and threatening as long as the joke isn’t that they’re the morons. Shang Chi could pull that off, the straight man to a more comedic foil.
Of course, a lot of that depends on the film itself.
Having recently watched a Bruce Lee movie or two, imo that kind of 70's "Bond movies but with martial arts" would be an interesting avenue to take. That style was campy but intense, character focused but still maintained decently sized casts, and works pretty well for the concept of Fu Manchu they're going to be adapting the Mandarin to.
Jettison the sexism and such, and I think it'd make a nice medium between a grim and gritty brutal martial arts film and something wild and unfettered like Kung Fu Hustle.
Edited by KnownUnknown on Apr 1st 2021 at 4:34:54 AM
The director is of Asian descent, albeit not necessarily experienced with kung fu movies in particular. I do think it'll at least fare better than the Mulan remake which was both joyless and inauthentic.
Hong Kong kung fu films are known for having a lot of physical comedy, and the Cantonese language in particular lends itself naturally to wordplay-based humor and absurdist comedy
. Because the MCU is so infamously reliant on being a World of Snark (or its more deadpan equivalent in the case of the Captain America sub-franchises), then if it can get a handle of any of these three forms of typical Cantonese humor, then it will get points in my book for genuine efforts at authenticity and for diversification of its content.
From Bruce Lee Enter the Dragon would probably be the best basis. Bruce Lee is pretty restrained when it comes to mysticism though, so that's more of an open question. I'd like something like the films by the "Venom Mob" allá Five Deadly Venoms and Crippled Avengers, films that usually did feature more overt superpowers (Five Deadly Venoms borders on a superhero film with its laser-focus on the clash between a bunch of superpowered individuals) and extraordinary figures.
Hell I'd like to see The Five Venoms in the film (probably not the actors, most of them are dead, but it'd be awesome to see if they could get the living ones). Bring me the whole nine yards of The Five Venoms, The Axe Gang, a drunken master somewhere, chambers of Shaolin, Pai Mei, just all the classic elements.
The strange choice is that the director is of Japanese ancestry. The screenwriter at least is of Chinese ancestry, but he's worrying for more obvious reasons (namely that his track record is abysmal and he was once sued for falsely claiming credit for the script of The Expendables)
Edited by Gaon on Apr 1st 2021 at 4:56:02 AM
"All you Fascists bound to lose."From what I remember about his original series (which the movie is an adaptation of), his cast is largely composed of the detectives who are trying to bring his father to justice, and sometimes fellow agents of his father whom either, like Shang Chi himself, realizes the error of their ways and became allies, or just pretended to to manipulate him.
That said, the characters on those toys are more recent. In fact, several of the characters listed for the film (including Xialing, who is on one of the toys) seem to be original. But then, particularly with Xialing, since a bunch of Shang's supporters are secret agents, it could be Leiko Wu under an assumed name (or just a composite).
Edited by KnownUnknown on Apr 1st 2021 at 5:20:49 AM
It's a long
and tortuous story
, but the short of it is that Stallone may or may not have based his Expendables script on a old script of Callaham (the writer in question), but the similarities are reportedly rather minimal and part of the court battle involved emails in which Callaham apparently admits they were rather minimal. It's hard to tell here, but while I think Stallone's Republican ass can go fuck himself, it's more likely that he is right from the looks of thing. It's certainly not a good look for Callaham, particularly considering he lost the case in the end.
But aside from that legal mess, Callaham's track record is:
- The Doom adaptation which needs no introduction (with Wesley Strick).
- Forgettable thriller Horsemen.
- A thriller I legitimately had never heard of called Tell-Tale.
- Zombieland: Double Tap (with Reese and Wernick).
- Wonder Woman 1984 (with Patty Jenkins and Geoff Johns).
The upcoming Mortal Kombat movie is also by his hand but that's a bleak record right there.
"All you Fascists bound to lose."In the original '70's comics, there's four major recurring characters. Sir Denis Nayland Smith, the guy who pursued Fu Manchu in the books, now elderly an in a wheelchair; Black Jack Tarr, Smith's burly right-hand man and something of a Noble Bigot; Clive Reston, a dashing secret agent who is implied to be the son of James Bond and the nephew of Sherlock Holmes; and Leiko Wu, Clive's ex and Shang-Chi's romantic interest.
Sir Denis Smith is unlikely to be included in the movie, naturally. Maybe Clive Reston will make an appearance, but they'd likely have to cut the whole business about his relatives.
Trope Editor (he/him)The funny thing is that he went to go hide on a farm planet with little apparent technology after he did the snap, just assuming everything would be good forever
He had no real plans for follow through
Forever liveblogging the AvengersI keep wondering how much deaths were indirectly caused by the Snap (such as the crashing helicopter in the Infinity War stinger), and whether Hulk counted them as victims of the Snap when he brought them back. There is an awful mine of Fridge Horror there...
Whatever your favourite work is, there is a Vocal Minority that considers it the Worst. Whatever. Ever!.

If he has Rapid-Fire Fisticuffs, they could animate them like that.
That, or a Buddha Palm as an homage to Kung Fu Hustle.
Watch Symphogear