Shang-Chi: Legacy of the Rings

Fantastic edit by Tremault. I liked the original, but definitely felt it needed to be a little more cohesive. BIggest positives from this edit is majorly toning down Katy and Trevor, and a more focused final battle. Katy is a lot more bearable when she isn't in the spotlight every scene now, and I always hated that she made that amazing shot with the arrow at the end after a day of training. I wish she wasn't part of the battle at all. This new finale is much better!

Next best thing was the changes to Wenwu so that he wasn't hearing his wife's voice, and the rearranging of the flashbacks. I can't exactly say why, but I was more invested in his character this time.

Great addition of the deleted scene with the brother and sister. I could go either way with the Wong vs Abomination fight. Personally I would have preferred to keep the car escape sequence, but I understand why it was cut. And I'm glad the postcard plotline got cut.

All in all a great edit with just a few minor nitpicks.

I definitely preferred it over the original cut and felt really smooth. Deep down under all the bad jokes I knew there was a decent movie. Some of the scene reordering also helped set up characters better.

The short of it: This replaces the theatrical version. Go, watch and enjoy!
Technically excellent. Coherent narrative. Clear character development.

There were a few moments that I missed though:
- cagefight of Wong vs Abomination. Yes it's a "WTF?" scene, but it's memorable.
- Katy's amazing arrow. Another memorable moment, and a perfect illustration of Lao Tzu's saying that opens the edit.
- Trevor playing dead on the battlefield.

The last two also would've added to the runtime of the speedy final battle. Despite missing these details, this edit wins over the theatrical with clearer focus on character development and less CGI fest.

Extra praise for tremault's openness to feedback and willingness to incorporate good points in the edit.

I had the good fortune of being invited to preview this edit, and so saw the many thoughtful changes along the way to this final version. What we get here is a faster-moving action film, one that is still fun and funny but that now allows the heart of the movie to shine. I can recommend it without hesitation to anyone as a shelf-replacer.

There are a few central strengths to this edit. Firstly, most of the forced elements and cringey humor are gone. Secondly, the supporting characters no longer threaten to dominate the story and steal focus from the title character. Finally, the narrative is cleaned up and restructured so that it makes more sense and has less obvious plot holes.

I still have a few quibbles with the edit in terms of how I view a few characters and would prefer their motivations to be portrayed, and the ending feels a bit rushed and anti-climatic to me (criticisms I discussed with the editor) but these are easily outweighed by the major benefits to the story. The narrative is now shifted to firmly focus on this one, screwed-up family, and their emotional connections with each other. Xialing now seems worthy of evolving into her comic book counterpart as Shang-Chi's main antagonist, and Katy is treated with more value and less as a walking trope.

Unless someone comes along and massively reworks this into a wild, redubbed, Warriors of Zu type wuxia romp, this is likely to remain the definitive version of the film. Highly recommended for anyone with even a passing interest.

I believe this is how Shang Chi should had been released. Definitely a lot slicker than the theatrical, and I didn't notice any jarring cuts or misses. Good job!

(Something that I personally dug was that the cut was available in the hevc x265 format, which is appreciated as it doesn't account for mammoth sized files and long download times. In my experience, I had a similar experience with Stromboli Bones, and I wish more creators offered the same..)