Shang-Chi #1

Shang-Chi #1

Marvel Comics 2021

Written by Gene Luen Yang

Illustrated by Dike Ruan

Coloured by Triona Farrell

Lettered by VC’s Travis Lanham

After the events of his latest series, Shang-Chi has finally taken his place as the leader of the Five Weapons Society but using an evil secret organization as a force for good won’t be easy. And it’s about to get a lot harder when Shang-Chi’s fellow super heroes from Spider-Man to the X-Men to the Avengers, start to question his motives! Don’t miss what happens when Shang-Chi and his newfound family of warriors collide with the Marvel Universe’s biggest heroes!

The only issue I have with this one is the title, I’m tired of this whole vs. The Marvel Universe mishegas it has been done to death, I would have much preferred this just being a good old fashioned Shang-Chi book where he happens to have to reestablish himself as a good guy while trying to reverse his fathers organisation from being evil to a force for good. If of course he can actually do something as massive and change the course of such a mighty river. I’m just thrilled that Shang-Chi is once again getting the spotlight he deserves.

I am enjoying the way that this is being told. The story & plot development that we see through how the sequence of events unfold as well as how the reader learns information is presented exceedingly well. The character development is phenomenal! The way we see the dialogue, the character interactions (which Shang-Chi and Spider-Man is mindbogglingly well done) and how they act and react to the situations and circumstances they encounter do wonders in fleshing them out further as well as creating one heck of an interesting dynamic. The pacing is superb and as it takes us through the pages revealing the story and introducing the cast of characters it is easy to really find yourself engaged and involved in what we see.

I am really enjoying seeing how this is being structured and how the layers within the story continue to grow, strengthen and emerge. Even better is that those from the last arc are easy to follow along with even if you’ve not read that one, yet. How everything works together to create the story’s ebb & flow as well as how it moves the story forward is achieved incredibly well. There’s a great flow to the overall way we see this book and it really is fantastic.

The interiors here are a traditional comic book style but they work exceedingly well. The linework we see is strong, crisp and clean and with the varying weights being utilised to create the detail work that we see is extraordinary. There is some great creativity and imagination on display throughout as well and an infected Spider-Man is a prime example of this. How we see backgrounds utilised and with how they work within the composition within the panels bringing us depth perception, a sense of scale and the overall sense of size and scope to the story is marvellous to see. The utilisation of the page layouts and how we see the angles and perspective in the panels show a remarkably talented eye for storytelling. The colour work is beautifully rendered. How we see the various hues and tones within the colours being utilised to create the shading, highlights and shadow work showcases a brilliant eye for how colour works.

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What a marvellous issue this is and I love the idea behind the series, that Shang-Chi is trying to reroute his fathers morals and ideas into something positive and good. How we see this beginning to happen and how his sister mocks him every step of the way just adds more to the series dynamic than you could possibly imagine. The writing is really rather exceptional and the solid interiors bring the whole thing to life with such aplomb. This is how you make mine Marvel people.