Shang Chi: The Legend Of Ten Rings Review: I know we have seen lots of origin movies by Marvel till now. But Shang Chi might be one of the best in that terms. Yes, it is a typical “hero’s journey” kind of movie.
But if you are a fan of Superhero movies you will absolutely love this movie. It was just amazing. You can say that I had one of the best experiences of my life while watching Shang Chi.
People had very low expectations from this movie. But I was really hyped up about Shang-Chi. Because of the unknown factor of the movie. No one actually knew who Shang-Chi is other than hardcore Marvel fans.
So, MCU could have done anything with the movie and could have taken any direction they wanted to. And I am glad to inform you that they took the right direction.
Second of all, Shang Chi looked like a brilliant action movie from the trailer. It looked like it will give us some hand-to-hand combat scenes that we haven’t seen since Black Panther.
And it didn’t fail on that part as well. Shang Chi might have been one of the best action movies I have watched in recent times. I felt that the fight scenes and cinematography were top-notch for Marvel as there was, very much, a wuxia inspiration in it.
I think you can say that the action scene of Shang Chi was on par with Captain America: Winter Soldier at some level. And the best thing was you won’t be bored with any action scenes.
Shang Chi: The Legend Of Ten Rings Review, Plot, Cast and other details
Shang Chi Review: Plot
The official synopsis of the movie reads “Shang Chi, the master of unarmed weaponry-based Kung Fu, is forced to confront his past after being drawn into the Ten Rings organization.”
Shang Chi follows the story of a man named Shang-Chi only. His dad was an assassin and ruled over countries for almost 1000 years now. But he gave up on that life after meeting the love of his life and eventually the mother of Shang-Chi.
But after the death of “Li”, Shang’s father once again gets on the dark path. And because of that, first Shang and then his sister ran away from the house.
But their father hunts them down after 10 years and asks them to destroy the only thing they hold dear. But is the story as simple as it looks? Or there is another dark side behind all of this?
We won’t tell you further as it will be a spoiler. But let me tell you the whole movie has been structured beautifully. The pacing was strong, the action scenes weren’t boring even though they were all over the movie.
And there wasn’t unnecessary humor that affected the movie in any sort. And at the end, it’s a Marvel movie, they have a certain formula and they stick with it.
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Shang Chi: What Worked For The Movie?
Action Scenes
I might be overdoing it, but I loved the action of Shang-Chi. I have already compared it with The Winter Soldier and that is the highest compliment I can give to a movie regarding its action.
There was one particular scene(won’t tell you which one), that really made me awe. And the final scene is top class too. The action was poised and somehow calm at the same time. It was something new from Marvel that is for sure.
Cinematography
As I have said, Shang-Chi might be the most aesthetically pleasing Marvel movie to date. It looked so beautiful right from the start to the absolute end. And for the first time, I was satisfied with the lighting in a Marvel movie.
I can say that Shang-Chi was almost on par with Thor in terms of how beautiful it looked. And especially the scenes in Ta Lao were things of beauty. I can watch this movie just for those scenes.
Tony Leung
Tony Leung is a very known and respected actor for his work. And he showed it here why he is so respected. You can say that he is the secret trump card of Shang-Chi.
And the fact that the villain was one of the better (non-Avengers level) villains that they’ve had, which is usually the weak point for Marvel movies helped a lot.
He might be Marvel’s top 5 villains till now and I am not even kidding. The best thing about Tony Leung’s villain is that he was right in his own right. Yes, he was hurt, he lost everything and that drove him into darkness.
He didn’t want to conquer the world or something, he just wanted his love back. The best villains are usually those who are right and with whom you can emphasize with. And Xu Wenwu was both of them.
Emotions
The last thing I expected Shang-Chi was to be this emotional. At its very core, Shang-Chi is just a family drama with lots of action scenes in it. And this is a very good family drama.
The father and both of his children are hurting. And they grew distant because of it. All of them have abandonment issues but all of them reacted to it differently.
And that is the only reason that this movie worked so well. The conflict between the character’s past and present was amazing. You can say that this is the best a drama can get.
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Music
I really think that the OST of Shang-Chi was so much better than all the other Marvel movies. And I don’t really like Marvel music that much. But Shang-Chi was different from that perspective.
The music intensified the movie and didn’t get in between my watching experience and what else can you ask for? I will be going and adding Shang-Chi’s track to my playlist now.
Shang Chi: Is It Worth It?
If you haven’t figured it out by no then, Yes!! Shang-Chi is worth all your time. It is just 2 hours long so you won’t be investing that much time anyway and it will all be worth it.
At the end of the day, if you like Marvel movies, you’ll like Shang-Chi. If you don’t like Marvel movies, Shang-Chi will do nothing to change your mind about the franchise but could still be an enjoyable stand-alone watch.
