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From Fu Manchu to 'Shang-Chi': The Unfortunate History of 'Yellow Peril' Villains

By:: Andres Diplotti

November 24, 2021

From Fu Manchu to 'Shang-Chi': The Unfortunate History of 'Yellow Peril' Villains

Representation matters. Just look at how mad some fans got when the Mandarin wasn’t represented as an actual villain in Iron Man 3. But we should also consider that the Mandarin has a history that began long before he was created in the 1960s -- a history that is, to put it in one word, yikes. And if, instead of one word, we used 15 facts, it could be these.

15

BUT... THAT'S NOT THE REAL MANDARIN! Iron Man 3 irked many fans when the Mandarin turned out to be some guy named Trevor Slattery. The fake Mandarin, however, was a nice illustration of the archetype's origin -a stereotype-laden caricature, created by white people to leverage fear for personal gain. — Source: IGN

14

THE MANDARIN CAME FROM A LONG (AND UNFORTUNATE) TRADITION. When Marvel's Mandarin first appeared in 1964, he was just the latest Oriental supervillain, like James Bond's Doctor No or Flash Gordon's Ming the Merciless. These were all rip-offs of the wildly successful Fu Manchu, created in 1913 by British pulp writer Sax Rohmer. — Source: Inverse

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13

FU MANCHU WAS BORN FROM... A OUIJA BOARD? How can I make my fortune? Sax Rohmer asked the board (or so he told the story). The toy reportedly spelled C-H-I-N-A-M-A-N. So Rohmer created the mysterious Fu Manchu, the Yellow Peril incarnate in one man - and did, indeed, make his fortune by selling tons of books. — Source: The Independent

12

ROHMER SAX WAS INSPIRED BY AN ACTUAL CRIME LORD (WELL, SORT OF). I knew that I had seen Dr. Fu Manchu! Rohmer proclaimed after briefly seeing a gentleman who may or may not have been a crime boss of London's Chinatown. Then he added, His face was the living embodiment of Satan, because judging people's morality by their faces was cool back then. — Source: The Spectator

11

FU MANCHU WAS ACTUALLY BORN FROM ROHMER'S IGNORANCE. That's not an opinion - he boasted about it. I made my name on Fu Manchu because I know nothing about the Chinese! he said to his biographer. So when he wrote about the unemotional cruelty of the Chinese, he was admittedly talking out of his butt - and yet, the image stuck. — Source: The Spectator

10

THE ARCHETYPE WAS INFORMED BY 19TH-CENTURY PSEUDOSCIENTIFIC BS. Rohmer's novels namedrop Bayard Taylor, who held the Chinese to be the most debased people on the face of the earth. Just like Rohmer, Taylor judged others by their faces - as a believer in physiognomy, he held character was reflected in the features. And he just didn't like the Chinese. — Sources: The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu, by Sax Rohmer (via Project Gutenberg), The Romance of China, by John Rogers Haddad (via Gutenberg-e)

9

ROHMER'S TIME WAS RIPE FOR A CHINESE SUPERVILLAIN. Since the late 19th century, East Asian immigrants were seen in Europe and the U.S. as an evil invading horde. Stoking that dumb, bigoted fear to commercially exploit it? That was an act of evil genius as big as anything Fu Manchu ever did. — Sources: BGSU University Libraries, Origins: Current Events in Historical Perspective

8

WOULD THE YELLOW PERIL BE COMPLETE WITHOUT YELLOWFACE? NO, IT WOULDN'T. Every single actor who ever played Fu Manchu was white - even as late as the character's last movie in 1980. The list includes Boris Karloff, Christopher Lee, and Peter Sellers. (Also, Nicolas Cage as a brief parody for 2007's Grindhouse.) — Source: Inverse

7

FU MANCHU WAS A MARVEL CHARACTER FOR SOME TIME. Marvel did more than come up with their own knock-off Fu Manchu - in the 1970s, they licensed the original character. Fu Manchu was made the father of the newly-created Shang-Chi, to give the new comic some star power. — Source: CNN

6

THE '8oS AND '90S DYED THE YELLOW PERIL GREEN. Perhaps realizing by now that the archetype was kinda cringe, cartoons decided to do something about it. So the already alien Ming from Flash Gordon was made to look more Skrull than Asian - while the Mandarin became a white dude in magical (green) yellowface. Well, points for trying, we guess. — Source: 80 Page Giant

5

Fu Manchu and the Yellow Peril IRON-MAN 3 STARTED A RE-EXAMINATION. By the 21 st century, Fu Manchu-type villains were long past their expiration date, as director Shane Black publicly acknowledged even before the movie came out. So when the Mandarin did appear, he was in-universe what he had always been in real life - a caricature. — Source: CBR

4

SHANG-CHI AND THE LEGEND OF THE TEN RINGS WAS A REAPPROPRIATION. The makers of the movie (all of them of Asian heritage) didn't just merge Fu Manchu and the real Mandarin into a single character-they also set out to intentionally destroy every Yellow Peril cliché related to them. — Source: Inverse

3

YELLOW PERIL ISN'T JUST SOME FICTION THING-IT HAS REAL-LIFE CONSEQUENCES. Historically, the idea that Asians or Asian Americans are a menace has caused hate, exclusion, and even murders. It's way easier to be violent or hateful to someone you don't see the same as you, Shang-Chi's screenwriter Dave Callaham said. We knew we wanted to change that stuff. — Source: Inverse

2

SHANG-CHI MADE FU MANCHU HUMAN. Unlike his fictional predecessors, Shang- Chi's Xu Wenwu isn't some mysterious, inscrutable, shadowy figure - he's a family man. We looked at Wenwu as a human with multi-dimensions and personal desires, director Destin Daniel Cretton said. CRACKED.COM — Source: Inverse

1

ALSO, SHANG CHI FINALLY MADE FU MANCHU ACTUALLY ASIAN. As Xu Wenwu is partly an updated, humanized version of Fu Manchu, this would make Tony Leung the first Chinese actor to play this notorious Chinese character. Ever. After an entire century.

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