Marvel Announces ‘Shang-Chi’ Movie on Same Day ‘Captain Marvel’ Trailer Drops

Marvel has gone back to the well and pulled out the next obscure comic book character created 40 years ago that’s going to be the star of of a billion dollar movie. And that character, as originally reported by Deadline, is Shang-Chi, Master of Kung Fu. Shang-Chi was created in 1973 by Steve Englehart and Jim Starlin at a time when Marvel was very big on cashing in on movie trends. The same time period gave us Luke Cage and Misty Knight who based on Blaxploitation films and Blade, Werewolf By Night and Morbius, the Living Vampire from horror/monster movies. It’s also around the time they published Giant-Size Man-Thing, which has little to do with anything but it’s maybe the most unintentionally funny comic book title ever.

Shang-Chi was created to be reminiscent of the then-popular Kung-Fu TV series as well as the extremely popular films of Bruce Lee. Like Iron Fist, the entire point of the title was to evoke the feeling of things like the Shaw Brothers films or whatever kung fu movie you might see on TV Saturday afternoon.

So here’s my plea to anyone at Marvel who is reading this, and I’m very certain you want my opinion: don’t screw this up by making it another interchangeable action-comedy. Go back to giving your films an individual identity, and make this one a 1970s Hong Kong martial arts film. Hell, make it a shot-for-shot remake of The 36th Chamber of Shaolin if you need to.

Also, let’s all be glad Marvel is looking for an Asian actor to play Shang-Chi, I know it’ll be difficult to find an Asian actor who does martial arts stunts, but it probably won’t be as hard as finding an Indian actor who can sing.

As if that wasn’t enough Marvel news, the second Captain Marvel trailer dropped during Monday Night Football, and it pretty much picks up exactly where the last one left off.

I think we all knew the old lady the star of the movie punched in the face was a Skrull, but it was still pretty cool to see. And as Marvel fans and anyone who watched Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. can tell you, the Kree are less “noble warrior heroes” and more “genetically-engineered space dicks.”

On the bright side, Sam Jackson looks amazing in this film. And Carol’s Nine Inch Nails shirts does a very good job of reminding us it’s set in the 1990s. Sure, it’s a movie we’ve seen 20 times before, but it’s still an okay movie we’ve seen 20 times before.