It’s always tough when something you’re really loving feels like it’s being ignored, maybe especially as a critic. It isn’t some terrible pain or whatever, more like a nagging annoyance that people don’t just gravitate toward good things for whatever reason. That was my experience with Shang-Chi by Gene Luen Yang while it was running. Why wasn’t @magnetowasright69 tweeting enough about it? Why wasn’t comics twitter ablaze with love for Dike Ruan, which they surely would have felt had they read his perfect art?
Of course, I know (and knew) that online discussion is basically meaningless as far as comic success goes, and that all I really need out of a comic is intrinsic enjoyment, not wider popularity. In reality, would I even care to interact with any fandoms at this point, and are they not the majority of the people discussing these things?
Me knowing not to discuss some things with people
Marvel Comics
And so, freed from the shackles of others’ thoughts, I take this opportunity to simply put: Shang-Chi by Gene Luen Yang is one of the best comics Marvel has published in years, up there with Hawkeye by Fraction and Aja, Immortal Hulk, and House of X/Powers of X.
Yang and co. accomplish this by being primarily focused on family, how it affects us, and how much we need them. The way it discusses those themes is particularly refreshing with the way so many stories in the last decade or more have focused on found family, and how special those relationships are. In contrast, Shang-Chi discusses the way shared upbringings and trauma bond you with your siblings literally and figuratively, in a way that is more difficult to replicate with even very close friends. Shang sees great and wonderful things in his siblings, and wants to be more like them, but he also sees great and horrible things in them that makes him question himself and his journey within the Five Rings.
They, in turn, see Shang as an outsider who has different beliefs than them. There is a cultural divide between them, and much of the joy I found in the collection had to do with their clashes and how Shang chooses to bend or not in those situations. My favorite part of the series is when one of these moments happens where Shang is stuck between the Avengers and his brother, Jiangshi. Shang has to decide between protecting his brother or turning him in, and the comic treats it with the complexity it deserves. It doesn’t feel like Shang makes the perfect decision, and he gets (deserved) flak for it, and it’s a really nice moment amidst it all.
The book is generally broken into three acts–the volumes as they were published–with the first two being stronger than the third. It doesn’t become a bad comic by any means, but it does feel like the actual plot gets buttoned up, then we get one very pulpy arc that doesn’t really lead-in to the (very good!) finale in any meaningful way. Still much better than many comics, in any case.
Three panels and his whole deal is summed up, and also completely redefined. Genius.
Marvel Comics
While Yang certainly knows how to make a great comic, so much of the quality here is due to the two main artists, Dike Ruan and Marcus To. Ruan’s work in particular feels like the kind of work that should have netted him the best jobs in the industry (note: working with Mark Millar does not count as that). His action is well-staged and perfectly legible, and his line work really is as good as basically anyone’s. His art on Shang-Chi is like Checchetto’s on Daredevil, Mora’s on World’s Finest, or Larraz’s on House of X where it’s just immediately one of the definitive superhero works of the decade. Really excited to see whatever he gets up to next.
Classic Kung-Fu stuff. And look at that face!
Marvel Comics
Marcus To had a lot to prove going next, and to be honest, I was initially disappointed. Which is probably fair, given Ruan’s generational talent. This time around, though, I was surprised to find To to be much closer in quality to everyone else on the book, and that he was a really good fit for his issues in the series too.
To especially did a great job of matching the Kung-Fu film vibe that Yang was going for later in the series. Once the story winds down, we get a tournament arc that To is basically perfect for. His action is excellent, he poses characters in dynamic ways, and like Ruan, his action is all as legible as anyone’s. Sure, he doesn’t match the highs of his counterpart, but he does deliver a great comic that I love on its own terms.
Impossible to not love this work.
Marvel Comics
Maybe the thing that was most discussed during Shang-Chi’s publication was the idea of forced synergy between it and the film. We can point to everything from the existence of a Shang-Chi comic, to the pedigree of creators, to the redefinition of the Ten Rings as proof of corporate influence on this book. It’s impossible to argue this project wasn’t reeking of synergy from beginning to end. What I’m here to say, however, is that maybe synergy is good. If it can deliver a comic this good, even once a decade, maybe it’s worth all the trash it also creates in the meantime. Or maybe I’m wrong and it just depends all the time.
Whatever, Shang-Chi by Gene Luen Yang is an absolute banger and deserves to be enjoyed by many more people.
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