‘Finally!’: Michelle Yeoh is All of Us Getting Hyped for ‘Shang-Chi’

The 58-year-old Malaysian actress expressed her joy for Asian representation in Marvel during an interview with BBC, according to Comicbook.

 

“I am very, very happy that finally we have our own superhero,” Yeoh, who has been included in the BBC 100 Women list for 2020, said. “You have Black Panther, right? You even have the Hulk, Thor, Black Widow.”

“Finally, yes! Shang-Chi,” she added.

Yeoh once expressed the same emotion when Marvel finally revealed they were making “Shang-Chi” as part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe last year.

“When that [movie] was announced last year and they introduced who they were doing as the Marvel superhero and it was an Asian superhero, it was like, ‘Yes, finally!’ When do we get to be represented like that?” Yeoh told TIME in August.

For Yeoh, this was made possible after the massive success of the film adaptation of “Crazy Rich Asians,” a part of a novel series created by author Kevin Kwan.

“When Crazy Rich Asians came out, it changed the map. It changed the whole way Asians were represented and seen. We were no longer invisible. We were no longer just a token. We were really represented in a contemporary [way],” the actress said. “Not just in period pieces or flying across rooftops or something like that, but in a way little girls and little boys look up and go, ‘Oh my god, I can see that’s me up there.’ That is very, very important.”

Although she is still keeping details under wraps, local outlets alleged that Yeoh traveled to Australia in August to resume filming for the upcoming Marvel movie, Variety reported.

“Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings” was initially planned for a February 2021 release, but Marvel put a halt in production amid the COVID-19 pandemic, RadioTimes reported.

The film, directed by Destin Daniel Cretton, will be released on July 9, 2021.

Featured Image via Getty (left), @simuliu (right)