Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings has quickly become one of the best-received Marvel blockbusters, both critically and commercially, in recent memory, and is currently on its way to set all kinds of Labor Day opening weekend box office records - which is a pretty damn good start for an "experiment."
During the recent global press conference, moderated by the always hilarious Ronny Chieng (who plays Jon Jon in the movie), director Destin Daniel Cretton spoke at length about what drew him to the character of Shang-Chi (Simu Liu) and why felt like he needed to be the one to bring his story to the big screen.
"I really personally connected with Shang-Chi’s journey. I love that this is a superhero that doesn’t get splashed with chemicals to get his superpower.
That it is a journey of self-discovery, of growing up, of learning how to finally deal with the pain that he’s been running away from his entire life. And, that when he is finally able to look inside into his past and embrace good, bad, the joy, the pain, and accept it all as a part of himself, that’s when he finally steps into his big boy shoes, and I don’t know. I think that’s kind of what we’re all doing as humans in some way or another. So, I really connect with that."
However, while he instantly connected with the Marvel hero, it sounds like his pitch meeting could've gone in a completely different direction when he decided to be honest about his feelings towards directing a Marvel movie. Fortunately, everything worked out, and he also had Black Panther director Ryan Coogler to thank for calming his nerves about tackling such a massive endeavor.
"I did have a giant personal fear of stepping into a movie like this. When I pitched to Kevin, one of the last things I told myself was that I’m just gonna be myself. I have a tendency to be pressured to not be myself, and I was like I’m just gonna be myself in this pitch and walk out feeling good that I did that. The last thing that I admitted was they asked me, "Have you always wanted to do a big Marvel movie?"
And I was like, 'Should I tell them?'
I was like okay, well, the truth was - it was a few weeks before they announced that they were looking for directors for this movie when I made a very real decision and called my manager or my agent and said don’t ever let me do a Marvel movie.
So, I said this to Kevin and Lou and Victoria and Jonathan in the pitch and then explained to them, that when they made the announcement for Shang-Chi something sparked in me that made me have to go in and just take a meeting and that turned into this.
When I was in the elevator going down, I was leaving that meeting, I thought you’re an idiot for saying that final thing, but when it came down to it, I did have a conversation with Ryan Coogler and I was really scared of stepping into a big studio movie like this and scared of what it might do to me. What if, you know, with the pressure, will I cave? I didn’t know. I had a lot of fears.
The thing that Ryan said to me, which really eased my mind, was that the pressure is hard. It’ll be the hardest thing potentially that you have done up to this point, but none of that pressure or none of those complications will come from the people that you’re working with or for. And that’s what I found. This is a very special place to work where - not to toot Kevin’s horn - but there is an environment of curiosity, of exploration that comes from the top down.
There is no fear-based mentality in this studio, which really allowed us to take risks and chances and be able to instill that same fearless exploration with everybody involved in this film and I think that’s a huge reason that the movie turned out the way that it did."
Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings is now playing in theaters worldwide. In our review of the movie, we said, "Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings is a genuine triumph for Marvel Studios, a true family drama with plenty of charm and a myriad of winning performances from the outstanding cast led by Simu Liu and Tony Leung. It opens a whole new world of possibilities for the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and will hopefully leaving you dreaming of the countless mystical directions the story could go next…"
Marvel Studios’ “Shang-Chi and The Legend of The Ten Rings” stars Simu Liu as Shang-Chi, who must confront the past he thought he left behind when he is drawn into the web of the mysterious Ten Rings organization. The film also stars Tony Leung as Wenwu, Awkwafina as Shang-Chi’s friend Katy and Michelle Yeoh as Jiang Nan, as well as Fala Chen, Meng’er Zhang, Florian Munteanu and Ronny Chieng. “Shang-Chi and The Legend of The Ten Rings” is directed by Destin Daniel Cretton and produced by Kevin Feige and Jonathan Schwartz, with Louis D’Esposito, Victoria Alonso and Charles Newirth serving as executive producers.