Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings: Preview, Breakdown and Theories

    Welcome back the HLS Entertainment! Today we are covering the next movie to be added to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings. Now quickly why should THIS preview and breakdown be the one to care about? I am not someone that went to press screening and now am just posting spoilers. This breakdown is entirely off of trailers, theories and the occasional set photo leak. Never true insider information, but that has not stopped our strong track record calling the MCU. We have done previous previews that for WandaVision, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, Loki, and Black Widow this year alone. You can read them and judge our predictions for yourself. If you like those and do not want to miss out on more you can subscribe and follow me on Twitter @HaroldLStokes. 

    This movie is opening a whole new chapter for the MCU while bringing back some familiar faces and groups. The Ten Rings is group that has ben in the MCU ever since the beginning. The group that held Tony Stark captive in the cave was this same group. They also pop up in Ant-Man, one of the buyers trying to get the Yellowjacket suit from Daniel Cross was working for the Ten Rings, as evident by the tattoo on his neck. But most importantly the thing that I want from this movie is the fallout of Iron Man 3. Ben Kingsley playing Trevor Slattery playing a fake Mandarin pretending to be the leader of the Ten Rings. If you have not seen this, this is the Marvel One Shot "All Hail the King" fun pick up after Iron Man 3 that has always hinted at the real Ten Rings coming back to the MCU.

    But back to the important stuff, based on reactions director Destin Daniel Cretton seems have delivered an action packed film that we all can be excited for. I have long said that my one major complaint with the MCU is the actual action scenes in this action franchise. They have typically used quick cut editing style which is now long outdated. I am very much hopeful from what we have scene via trailers that this movie is finally dragged the MCU into the post John Wick action movie world. John Wick is the bar for how the majority of the world sees this issue but that is a very much western cinema issue. Movies such as the IP Man, Old Boy, The Raid have long had amazing action and fight choreography. I am just happy to see more films actually care to take the time to make it right. 

Locations

    This movie will have some beautiful locations but they seemingly are not "named places", as in what they are called is not the important part or either well known prior to this move. We seemingly start out in San Francisco and will have an early set piece there but it seems to be more setting than structure to the film. The one exception seems to be this second picture. I am predicting that is some sort of gateway across the water as Michelle Yeoh's character has been referred to as a guardian to a mythical city. Another possible exception is some people are saying the fighting tournament is happening in Madripoor, which we just got our first look at in The Falcon and the Winter Soldier Disney+ series.

Characters to Know

Shang-Chi - Simu Liu

    Shang-Chi is our main protagonist and newest MCU superhero, who will be played by Simu Liu (please go watch Kim's Convenience on Netflix). Forget what you think you know about hand to hand fighters in Marvel movies, Shang-Chi is THE best hand to hand fighter in all of Marvel comics and will soon be in the MCU as well. After years of mild or just blatantly racist comic stories decades ago this amazing hero is being given the respect he deserves, and will be in the limelight for all of us to see how awesome this character can actually be. 

Katy - Awkwafina

    

    Prior to watching Kim's Convenience this past year Awkwafina was easily the person I was most excited to see in this movie, though Simu Liu might have tied her now. She is an outstanding actress and I am still upset she did not get enough love for "The Farewell" where she put on one of the best acting performances of any movie in 2019. Here she will be playing our main protagonists Shang-Chi's friend/co-worker who seemingly just gets dragged into the madness of what goes down in this movie. But she will not be just a bystander in this movie, expect more from her.

Wenwu - Tony Chiu-Wai Leung

    Tony Chiu-Wai Leung plays of antagonist and villain of the movie in Wenwu. He is the current master of the Ten Rings, husband to Jiang Li and the father of both Shang-Chi and Xialing. In a tie in book to Iron Man  it was hinted at that the leader of the Ten Rings could possibly be hundreds of years old and has been running this organization for a long time and the trailers seem to confirm this. If this is the case this movie might just prove to be much more connected to the foundation of the MCU than we even realize.

    Now might be the best time to try to explain comic Ten Rings versus this movies Ten Rings. In the comics the rings are more literal rings that go on fingers instead of around the forearms. The comic rings were actually not magic but alien technology from the planet Maklu-IV and were used by the dragon like alien race to power their technology, the Mandarin found them and used them for his own devices to increase his power. Each ring had a different power and name like Spectral, which could make the wearer ghost like or even disappear completely, Spin which slowed time around the wearer giving them the appearance of super speed, or Zero which unleashes an ice beam. Now for the movies I imagine they changed it away from finger rings to not draw comparisons to the Infinity Stones.  They seemingly give the wearer different elemental abilities like we see water manipulation in the trailers. A specific prediction I have is that each ring's name is the same name as the trailer and tv spots are called such as, Burn, Breath, Run, Power etc..

Xialing - Meng'er Zhang

    Xialing is Shang-Chi's sister and daughter of Wenwu. Unfortunately not much is known about this character other than that she is Shang-Chi's estranged sister.

Ying Nan - Michelle Yeoh

    Oh wow the incredible Michelle Yeoh, this legend of the acting world will soon be gracing the MCU with another mysterious character who I have only seen thus far referred to as the "guardian to mythical city". She seems to be a mentor figure to Shang-Chi and will be crucial to the third act of this film.

Jiang Li - Fala Chen 

     Wenwu's wife and mother to Shang-Chi and Xialing. Not much is known on this character but in the trailer we seem to see a memorial set up to her on a shelf in the same scene where the water manipulation is shown off.. so she might not longer be alive come modern day of the story.

Razor Fist - Florian Munteanu

Death Dealer - Andy Le

    This and Razor Fist are two I am combining together here because not much at all is known for either aside from being cool henchmen characters to Wenwu. We can assume Razor Fist is more brute muscle while Death Dealer is more pure assassins. A fun theory I just want thrown on the record is for Death Dealer to be revealed to actually be Ronny Chieng's character, as he seems to be friends with Katy and Shang-Chi and it would interesting if he is revealed to have been spying on them the whole time. Also just want to shoutout Ronny Chieng is also in this movie I absolutely adore his stand up, go check out his special on Netflix!

Wong - Benedict Wong

Abomination - Tim Roth

    I am throwing these last two together because I imagine they are both only in a small section of the movie in the lead up to their fight and maybe right afterwards. Wong easily might have Tony Stark beat for comedic moments vs screen time. Nearly every single time we see him on screen it is a funny moment for the serious stern character, the only one that is not that pops up into my mind is when he explains the Infinity Stones in Infinity War to Tony Stark.

Plot Breakdown Filled With Crazy Theories

    Okay here I am going to go through how I believe the plot of this movie goes based on trailers. This is no guarantee just fun theorizing and piecing together.

    Movie opens with Shang-Chi hidden in America pretending to not be himself working with Katy as valets and just living life in San Francisco. One day Razor Fist and others show up on the bus looking for him and wanting the pendant he wears around his neck. Right off the bat this is where our first unanswered question comes in, what is the pendant used for? Maybe it is a "family heirloom" that activates or unlocks the portal to the city that Michelle Yeoh's character Ying Nan is guarding. There seems to be more than one as Xialing seems to be wearing one too in other trailers

    We get the fight big set piece on the bus then afterwards Shang-Chi explains who he is to Katy and we probably get flashbacks of his childhood and his history with his father Wenwu and the Ten Rings. From here we have the biggest gap in the trailers story that has been killing me WHY DO THEY GO TO THE FIGHTING TOURNAMENT. I mean is Katy just like "Oh I know where you can make bank throwing hands like that let's go make some money". Which now that I type that I could definitely see Awkwafina saying that and it would be funny. 

   

    We see Katy and Shang-Chi are at the fighting tournament. Now is this just underground normal San Fran Tyler Durden Fight Club or off in Madripoor we do not know, but I imagine we meet Wong briefly before his fight (hint for DS2? maybe this ISN'T OUR Abomination) then we see Wong v Abomination. We might get short clips of Shang-Chi fighting other people and beating them but then eventually it will come down to the main event of this tournament for us viewers, Shang-Chi vs Xialing. This will probably be the longest fight we see in the tournament until he bests her earning her respect. I imagine she holds some slight to him for staying in hiding and she wants to beat him to prove herself worthy successor to Wenwu.

   

    After, or possibly during, their fight Wenwu's soldiers show up at tournament. This is when we see the giant side of the building fight sequence and Shang-Chi fighting Death Dealer. This goes on until Wenwu himself shows up armed with the Ten Rings and takes, Shang-Chi, Katy and Xialing to his compound.

    

    Wenwu gives his speech and spiel about family being important and why they should join him, probably saying it is time for him to take over more of the world so earth can be better prepared for threats like Thanos. Wenwu tries to get Shang-Chi and Xialing to join him and use the pedants to bring something about. My big crazy theory/prediction is the pendants will unlock the realm/world where Axonn-Karr the Makluan is being held back from. This was the dragon like alien from the comics where the Ten Rings originally came from.

 

  After the initial pitch and water flexing Wenwu gives them time to think it over. During this time Xialing is thinking about it, but this is when we meet Ying Nan and she explains their family's past of the fighting between the tribes (Red v Blue). I think possibly we get Shang-Chi challenging Wenwu rashly and losing at first. This possibly could cost Shang-Chi his pendant and Wenwu uses it to unlock the portal. Maybe this is where we first see the Great Protector and then teaming up with Ying Nan comes back with the reds and take on Wenwu and his army.

   

    While battling Shang-Chi, the rings start losing loyalty to Wen-Wu as slowly he begins taking them one by one. We see Katy, Xialing and Ying Nan lead the Red army against Wenwu's soldiers. So we get the giant battle, including many mythical creatures. Eventually the fighting between the armies end with a Red victory but  the solo fight between Shang-Chi and Wenwu continues. 

   

    This is my possibly the part I am looking forward to the most  Kaijus time, I will lose it if this is a  Great Protector  and Shang-Chi vs Fing Fang Foom and Wenwu fight. that would be incredible but it seems more likely to be Axonn-Karr but FFF would be incredible. Shang-Chi fighting alongside with the Great Protector until he takes all of the Ten Rings and defeats Wenwu/FFF. I do not believe this is the end for Wenwu though, I believe he is just banished not killed. 

    Thank you so much for reading this! If you enjoyed it please share with your friends! Remember this is not any leak or from someone who has seen the movie just fun speculation and with a healthy dose of research. For more of these type blogs for the MCU and DCEU going forward be sure to subscribe and also follow me on Twitter @HaroldLStokes so you do not miss out!