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Edited by Mrph1 on Jul 29th 2024 at 3:09:00 PM
In fairness, I think that descriptor was about Shang Chi, not The Eternals.
But I am side-eying the fact that Gemma Chan and Simu Liu are being cited as evidence of "pandering to China" as opposed to say Tony Leung and Michelle Yeoh. The latter are leading actors in Mainland Chinese films but the former just happen to be actors of Chinese ancestry (not to mention that anyone playing Shang Chi kind has to be of Chinese ancestry).
Edited by Hodor2 on Sep 10th 2021 at 9:48:16 AM
With Shang-Chi, there's the industrial side and the creative side. I doubt the project of Shang-Chi was conceived without the executives being sold a project that could carve a piece of the lucrative chinese market. Now, creatively, by all accounts (not mine, can't see the film with COVID-19 going on) the finished film was very much about the chinese-american experience more than any sort of perceived "chinese pandering". My guess would be that from a executive stand-point the pitch was to reproduce the success of Black Panther with the asian-american public and also to reach the Chinese market allá what Kung Fu Panda ended up being (largely by accident, mind you, the first film didn't have much pretense of being a big chinese market piece and it seemed to surprise everybody when it did). The money men (to borrow a parlance from Westworld) are a cynical bunch, so there's no doubt in my mind they would have loved to make this a prime product for the chinese market.
But, again, executives ultimately don't make the film (in theory) and the finished product (allegedly) seems largely unconcerned with this whole shindig and is much more a tale of asian-american diaspora.
Eternals I can't see from any standpoint as "Chinese pandering". There's two Chinese(-descended) people in the cast, and that's it. By that logic John Wick is chinese pandering (Keanu Reeves is partly chinese).
Edited by Gaon on Sep 10th 2021 at 7:54:35 AM
"All you Fascists bound to lose."By that logic, I am Chinese-pandering because I ate Chinese take-out once.
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"The only thing I'm loyal to with "Middle" in the name is Middle-Earth.
More seriously, just because a work has ethnic actors or is set in a foreign country doesn't mean it's "pandering" to people of that ethnicity. We're supposed to be beyond that. What is actually Chinese pandering is when a film goes out of its way to laud the virtues of China and its government... like certain (all?) Michael Bay movies.
Edited by Fighteer on Sep 10th 2021 at 10:59:51 AM
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"By pandering to China I mean that a company tries to be in good graces with the CCP and claim as much money from the Middle Kingdom as possible either by making a film that has a mostly all-Chinese cast, cast a Chinese actor in an important role or portray China as unambiguously good (in spite of the really messed up stuff that happens in the country).
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It's messed up that you think that casting a Chinese (or apparently also actors with any Chinese ancestry) is itself a proof/evidence that the movie is pandering to China.
And while I assume you think that the existence of Shang Chi being given a movie is in-principle evidence of pandering to China (which yeah, probably is somewhat true), who did you think would be cast as Shang Chi, if not someone with Chinese ancestry?
Edited by Hodor2 on Sep 10th 2021 at 10:24:11 AM
Well, there's a difference between making a film with a mostly East Asian/Chinese cast and a film that is made specifcially to appeal to the CCP/China. Crazy Rich Asians has a Chinese cast and director but it was based on a Singaporean novel and it's not necessarily meant to appeal to Mainland China. Similarly, The Joy Luck Club does have characters from China but it's An Immigrant's Tale story that could swapped out for any other group (real or fictional) and it was made before China became an important movie market.
Shang-Chi also has another audience target to consider: The Chinese-American audience (and to a lesser extent, Asian American audience). And Shang-Chi really needed heavy revisions to the comic book source simply because of how prevalent the questionable stereotypes are (including Shang-Chi himself). It's also telling how Shang-Chi is introduced in a Chinese-American society before the plot really starts moving, from disappointed parents' high expectations to heavy emphasis on family support to well, our ABCs.
If it was solely pandering to mainland China, it would have hired actors that Chinese people would consider to be super attractive. According to them, Simu Liu and Awkwafina are not exactly the ideal choice to play Shang-Chi or Kathy because they are considered "average-looking" at best. But for me and many other Chinese-Americans, the leads are more relatable to us because of it.
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...You're the one making the accusations; people are just asking you to elaborate on your opinions. "Pandering" is a rather loaded word. Mulan (2020), yes, Disney was very blatant about that one. But Shang-Chi appears to be a diaspora story through and through.
I said this elsewhere but I would be surprised if Disney hadn't already made note of the mainland's lack of enthusiasm for films that are hits with the Chinese diaspora like Crazy Rich Asians and The Farewell when they greenlit this project.
Edited by Synchronicity on Sep 10th 2021 at 10:31:01 AM
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At this point, it seems like you're simply making arguments in bad faith and then when it is overwhelmingly obvious that you are wrong, you say "fair enough" and try to move on as if that makes up for your initially inflammatory and incorrect takes.
Or, as this practice is known more succinctly, trolling.
Edited by ArthurEld on Sep 10th 2021 at 8:43:31 AM

Yeah. At the risk of being rude, Chrononaut's criteria for Shang Chi being "made for China" seems to amount of "has Chinese (American or British or Canadian) actors".