Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings

Directed by Destin Daniel Cretton (2021)

I heard tons of raving reviews about this movie, and I was a bit let down. I did, however, watch it on a plane on the small screen and I think generally movies like this are better suited for the theater - the visuals and sounds and fight scenes would be much more fun in that setting. And it still is a good movie to watch; I'd say it's on par with Spider-Man: Far From Home, Black Panther, and perhaps Age of Ultron. Great movies with cool heroes and awesome visuals, but not really an awesome Marvel experience in my opinion. I understand what it did in bringing Chinese actors and comic characters to the big screen, which is super important, but in terms of the quality of the movie it wasn't up with the bests for me. 

I never really felt worried about the heroes, especially in the big bad final battle. The side character played by Awkwafina seemed mostly unnecessary and had a ridiculous amount of plot-armor. Of course every character in superhero movies has some plot-armor, but they typically at least have real armor as well ... in this case she was just a normal lady who ends up essentially beating the final villain. But hey, I still watched it and enjoyed it and am excited to see where the Shang-Chi character goes and ties into the larger Marvel universe!

(12/15/21)