Shang-Chi, the Mandarin and the Ten Rings, explained through the Marvel story

Marvel Studios triumphantly returned to Hall H at San Diego Comic-Con 2019 to reveal project after project in its post-final phase 4 line-up. Was chief among these films and television series Shang-Chi and the legend of the ten rings, The first film by the MCU with a protagonist of Asian origin.

It’s been a long way from comics to big screen for this particular Marvel project. The publisher’s first attempts to make a Shang Chi film go back to the 1980s Shang-Chi and the legend of the ten rings was originally scheduled for February 12, 2021 to coincide with the first day of Chinese New Year, but pandemic delays have postponed the release date three times.

But with the release of its first trailer, Disney seems confident that the Destin Daniel Cretton (Short term 12) – Director – with Simu Liu as Shang-Chi and Tony Leung as his father Wenwu, known as “The Mandarin” – will finally hit theaters on September 3, 2021.

You might think you remember Mandarin as the villain of Iron man 3, and you might think you remember the Ten Rings terror network at Ironman. But Shang-Chi offers a new take on these issues from the tapestry of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. If you’ve never heard of Shang-Chi, the master of Kung Fu, we’re here to help.

Alberto E. Rodriguez / Getty Images for Disney

Who is Shang-Chi?

When the kung fu craze hit America in the 1970s, Marvel Comics wanted to get involved. Initially, the company tried to grant the license Kung fu TV series, but Warner, who owned DC at the time, turned it down. Marvel was more successful in acquiring the rights to the notorious pulp villain Fu ManchuIn 1973, Steve Englehart and Jim Starlin founded Shang-Chi to establish Fu Manchu as a villain in the Marvel universe. Shang would be a heroic young hero who stands against his criminal father.

When he was a child learning martial arts, Shang thought his father was a humanitarian worker. When he met Manchu’s archenemy, Sir Denis Nayland Smith, he learned the truth. In the 1970s and 1980s, Shang-Chi thwarted his father’s plans and fought against his siblings The hands of Shang-Chi: Masters of Kung Fu. After reuniting with Sir Denis, he embarked on several globetrotting adventures as an MI6 agent and later helped found his own spy agency Freelance Restorations, Ltd. With the help of freelance agents, Shang eventually saw Fu Manchu die, after which he withdrew and chose to lead a simple life.

It didn’t take long. Over the years, Shang-Chi became an MI6 agent again, battling his resurrected father, quitting the spy game entirely, and joining the new Heroes for Hire. He would later join the Secret Avengers and be tasked with preventing the Shadow Council from resuscitating his father, resulting in the villain’s permanent death. During his time with the Avengers, Shang learned that his father was not Fu Manchu, but an old wizard named Zheng Zu who had assumed Manchu identity. (In other words, Marvel had lost Fu Manchu rights.)

In recent years, Shang-Chi has worn many hats. He joined the main Avengers team for fun, had an affair with the X-Men character Domino, and at some point gained the power to make copies of himself after exposure to cosmic rays. Along with several other Asian heroes like Ms. Marvel and Silk, he became a member of the hero team called Protectors. He joined a new all-Asian team of Marvel superheroes at Greg Pak and Nico Leon alongside Amadeus Cho, Silk, White Fox, Jimmy Woo and many others New Atlas agents – and got his own solo miniseries from Gene Luen Yang and Dike Ruan – and another one earlier this year.

Shang-Chi will fight the mandarin

In his solo film, Shang-Chi competes against his own father Wenwu / the Mandarin, played by Hong Kong movie legend Tony Leung.

The Mandarin made his comic book debut in 1964 Stories of suspense # 50, the work of Stan Lee and Don Heck. Born just before the communist revolution in mainland China, the Mandarin grew up in science and combat – all before he found the crashed ship of a dead alien dragon known as Makluan (seriously). By studying Makluan Science, he learned how to use ten mighty rings from the ship.

Marvel Comics

The Mandarin attempted to conquer the world several times during his supervillain career and became Iron Man’s most famous enemy after repeatedly attempting to use Tony Stark’s technology to achieve his goals. Several of his storylines come from the same orientalist trope inventory as Fu Manchu and concerned China and Chinese traditions – or a misunderstanding of the culture. He had a castle in China and a giant dragon named Fin Fang Foom under his command. Once, the mandarin was cursed with dragon claws for his hands after refusing to return his rings to the eight alien dragons who originally owned them.

Isn’t the mandarin wrong?

The Marvel Cinematic Universe has used the tangerine and the ten rings – which are not literal jewelry in the films, but a terrorist network – only sparingly. In the very first MCU movie IronmanThe Ten Rings worked with Obadiah Stane to kidnap Tony Stark. Iron man 3 controversial controversy with updating the adult comic book villain; Apparently, he played Ben Kingsley in the role, only to reveal that he actually played Trevor Slattery, an actor who was slated to appear as a Mandarin under the whims of true villain Guy Pearce’s Aldrich Killian. It seemed like the MCU version of the Mandarin was just a fiction.

Marvel Studios

But at the end of the Marvel One-Shot All greet the kingA member of the Ten Rings broke Trevor out of jail and told him the real Mandarin wanted to talk to him. From the sound of things, he didn’t seem too happy that a pretender was tarnishing his reputation.

It wasn’t the last time we saw the Ten Rings either, thanks to a deleted scene in the 2015s Ant man. When the movie’s villain, Darren Cross, tries to sell his Yellowjacket armor, a Ten Rings member with a barely hidden tattoo is present during the purchase. Neither the mandarin nor the ten rings have appeared in any other film since then.

Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige has said that one of the purposes of the All greet the king It was short to establish the possibility that there would be a comic-book-more accurate version of the legendary villain in the MCU. Shang-Chi and the legend of the ten rings confirms this. But that is exactly what the Mandarin legend has to wait for, when Shang-Chi comes to cinemas in autumn 2021.