At one time, you knew where you stood with a movie – it had a start, middle and definite end. Then, many filmmakers started sharing stories of how their movie could have ended differently, or in some cases how they shot a different ending that didn’t sit well with test audiences, and with the birth of home video these alternative endings became part and parcel of the filmmaking process for many. Marvel are no exception, as there have been many times that they have come up with alternative storylines, endings and even characters, and it looks like Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings is no exception as director Destin Daniel Cretton has revealed that there was an alternative ending for one character who didn’t make it out of the movie alive.
Speaking to Entertainment Tonight, Destin Cretton revealed that in one version of the film, Shang-Chi’s father Wenwu, aka The Mandarin, doesn’t meet his end. While in many ways, the death of the leader of the Ten Rings is necessary for the Rings to end up with Shang-Chi, but there are always ways around this kind of plot device, and in a potential alternate reality, there was an option for Wenwu to live.
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“Some things just work and some things don’t. We’re constantly searching for the version of the story that feels most authentic to the characters,” Cretton told Entertainment Tonight. “I mean, even though these characters are operating on a very operatic level, there’s still things that you try that just feel like cheats. And that was one of them. But, you know, also in the MCU, anything can happen.”
In the movie as it stands, Wenwu has his soul sucked from his body by Dweller in Darkness, which passes the Ten Rings on to Shang-Chi and eventually allows him to defeat the evil dragon. How this could have all come about if Wenwu lived is something we may or may not find out when the movie is released on Blu-Ray and DVD, when the alternative outcome could be one of the expected deleted scenes to be included.
With Wenwu gone, the movie sets up a new leader of the Ten Rings organization, which it is promised will return in future, and also in the post credits there is a big hint that the notable absence of the dragon Fin Fang Foom in the movie could have been on purpose, and he may appear in a subsequent outing for Shang-Chi, as teased by Cretton in his additional comments.
“If you look into the comics, if you watch that end-credit sequence, it’s not– You don’t have to dig very deep to at least point yourself in a direction. (Laughs.) It’s definitely there.”
The post credits of the movie also bring Shang-Chi directly in contact with two members of the Avengers team, aligning him up nicely for when the next collaborative Avengers movie rolls out sometime in the future. Meanwhile, as we know with Marvel, there is no telling exactly where Simu Liu’s hero will turn up next, but we will continue to watch the developing MCU as we head deeper into the multiverse and towards the much rumored Secret Wars spectacle. This news comes from ComicBook.com.
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