DECEMBER 24, 2019 BY CHARLES MURPHY
EXCLUSIVE: SHANG-CHI Casting For Ring Announcers; Could Support Longstanding Tournament “Leak”

Shang-Chi is preparing to begin filming after the new year and is currently casting a plethora of small, supporting roles. One such role, for a ringside fight announcer, might just support one a plot “leak” that appeared on Reddit just a short while ago. You can read a transcription of the now deleted leak below:

An alien spaceship landed in China hundreds of years ago. The ship was powered by the Ten Rings, magical relics that all serve a different purpose. The rings were looted by a secret society known as the Avatars, which is led by a wise martial artist simply called the Ancestor. The Ancestor wore the rings and used them to become an expert fighter.

The Mandarin grew up hearing about the ancestor’s story and was fascinated by it, despite everyone else believing it was just a myth. He began to idolize the Ancestor, and devoted his life to finding the rings. This inspired him to form his own mafia, which is the Ten Rings gang. Basically, the point of the gang is look for the rings all around the world. He adopted his niece, Fah Lo Suee (Awkwafina) and taught her martial arts.

After years of investigation, he discovers that the legend of the ten rings are real, and that the Ancestor is dying. There was a leak a little while back that Shang-Chi is a tournament film, and that’s actually true. When the Ancestor dies, the Avatars will run a secret tournament/kung-fu trial in which the winner will be granted the rings. The Mandarin is too old to compete, and he doesn’t want to risk Fah Lo Suee’s life. That’s where Shang-Chi is going to come in.

Shang is a street urchin who meets the Mandarin after he starts dating Fah. The Mandarin takes a liking in Shang and starts training him as his apprentice. His first task, as an act of gang initiation, is to kill Trevor for impersonating the Mandarin. People speculated that they would be related, but it will be more of a Walter White/Jesse Pinkman dynamic.

When the tournament begins, the Mandarin will send Shang to win and get the rings for him. That’ll be the basic gist of the film pretty much. I know that defeating Fin Fang Foom will be an obstacle. Leiko Wu and Clive Reston will be in the movie as SHIELD agents who are investigating the Ten Rings gang. Shang-Chi will obviously betray the Mandarin and become a hero over the course of the film. He will get the ability to create multiple duplicates of himself. It will be an ‘Orphan Black’ situation, where each clone of himself has their own personality. So the fights will obviously be insane to witness.

Marvel is casting Shang’s enemies in the tournament, and one of them will be a character named Chao.
While I certainly can’t speak to the authenticity of every one of the plot points included in that “leak”, the fact that the film is currently searching for ringside fight announcers, combined with the prior knowledge that they were casting for several of Shang-Chi’s comic book kung-fu opponents could very well lend a bit of credibility to this leak and we may see an MCU version of the 90’s classic martial arts film, Bloodsport. As shocking as having Fin Fang Foom and the ability to create duplicates might seem, there is enough other evidence out there to support a dragon living in certain locations and it’s possible that one of the rings could grant Shang-Chi the power to create dupes.
So is Awkwafina in training now?