The year of movie delays triggered by the coronavirus pandemic seems to be drawing to a close. Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, the first Marvel film with an Asian protagonist is hitting the cinemas two months after the release of Black Widow in theaters and on Disney+ in July.


The Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) takes a big step forward with Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings. It introduces a brand new hero in the form of Simu Liu's Shang-Chi, and with a cast that is 98 percent Asian, it significantly broadens the MCU's diversity. However, the film will also serve as a sort of reckoning with the MCU's history in the form of the character The Mandarin, who acts as the film's main antagonist as well as the father of the titular Shang-Chi.

Marvel is beginning to turn up the hype machine for the film, with the premiere less than a year away. Simu Liu, who plays the title character in Shang-Chi, unveiled the first teaser poster for the film today, which shows off his Shang-Chi costume.

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A feature on the film was also released by Entertainment Weekly, which included interviews with Liu, director Destin Daniel Cretton, Marvel President Kevin Feige, and others. They provided the first information about the film's plot, which is based on Marvel's martial arts master. You would probably expect Shang-Chi to be a sprawling superhero epic that blends heartfelt family drama with defying martial arts action.

Simu Liu, a Chinese-Canadian actor, plays the young hero, who spent the first part of his life under his father's strict tutelage studying to be an assassin. He's since walked away and attempted to live a normal life in America, only to be sucked back into his father's dark domain.

Tony Leung plays Wenwu, also known as the Mandarian, his father. The Mandarin is a lifelong nemesis of Iron Man with ten rings of strength in Marvel Comics; the character in Iron Man 3 was a parody of the original concept.

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Marvel also released the first trailer for the film not long after the poster and photos were released: