Shang-Chi & The Legend of the Ten Rings is yet another MCU movie (more! gimme more!), starring Simu Liu, Awkwafina, Tony Leung, Michelle Yeoh, Meng'er Zhang, Ben Kingsley, Fala Chen, and Florian Munteanu.
Xu Wenwu (Leung) is the owner of the mystical(?) ten rings, which allow him to do some kinda mid-tier supernatural/superpowery stuff, but also to live forever, which is kinda the bigger deal. He forms the Ten Rings and does some unspecified but very much worldwide crime, until the 90s when he goes searching for the mystical village of Ta Lo, finds a magical kung fu woman named Li (Chen) guarding it, and they fall in love through the power of martial arts in a scene that wouldn't have been too out of place in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.
He takes her back to his home on Earth, puts away his rings, and they raise two children: Shang-Chi (Liu) and Xialing (Zhang), and everything is great until his old enemies stop by and murder Li, and then Wenwu is, as John Wick says, thinkin' he's back.
But this movie isn't really about him, it's about Shang-Chi, happily living in San Fransisco as a valet, hanging with his best friend Katy (Awkwafina), until a maniac with a lightsaber for a hand (Munteanu) attacks him for his pendant, and he has to go in search of his sister.
Shang-Chi is not exactly a character that many casual superhero fans would know. Hell, I'm pretty knowledgeable about superhero lore, up to a point, and I'd never heard of him. But that's actually good, it allows the MCU to fold in some new characters and mythology without running afoul of, for example, people whining because Thor Ragnorak didn't faithfully adapt Planet Hulk. As with Iron Man way back in 2008, though, all of this hinges on the movie coming together.
And I think it does! Simu Liu is a wonderful break from dour or hyper-principled characters, and when he confronts his past, it actually means something because he hasn't been keeping it close all these years. Likewise, I enjoy that he's out of his depth but by no means unable to handle himself. Katy is fun comic relief, but also there for Shang-Chi and also makes herself useful during crunch time (and, yes, you can get persnickety about how she placed a shot perfectly after just learning to shoot, but look, it was a huge target and she only had to hit once). Xialing is continually undervalued and overlooked, even to the point that she never really gets a proper confrontation with her father, and I hope that's something that comes up when we see these characters again. Wenwu is a great villain, and while his motives in this particular caper are understandable, it's never hard to forget that he's a criminal and a warlord (although, granted, his fearsome Ten Rings could have been painted as a little more brutal - he's got a dude with a blade for a hand and he never gets to kill anyone, for crying out loud).
It's not a perfect film; the third act battle between color-coded armies seems a little...I dunno, on the nose? And I like that it doesn't go on any longer than it needs to before the Lovecraftian horror pops out and they pretty much all realize they're toast if they don't work together. It rings a little false that Wenwu is punching his way into the Dark Gate and gross little demons are wriggling out and he never bothers to look up and see what the screeching is about. But these are the kinds of niggles that only come to mind because we're 20-some films into this universe.
There are few deleted scenes I wish had made it in, particularly one where Trevor Slattery (Kingsley) mentions that he feels like he's the Fool to Wenwu's Lear. In general, though, I feel like this is an injection of new blood into the MCU that works, and I'm excited to see these folks pop up again.
My Grade: A-
Rewatch Value: High
Next up: The Shawshank Redemption
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