What If... 1872?
Shang-Chi, known as Ten Rings in this universe, teams up with Kate Bishop in the old west to try to find his sister. Along the way, they save thousands of lives, inspire a new hero and face their worst fears. Meanwhile, the Council of Watchers steps in to deal after more interference from Uatu the Watcher over these universes.
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The Ten Rings
The episode starts in an old west saloon with a group of Cowboys shooting a bell. They insist it has to be ten rings before “he” arrives. After the tenth ring, Ten Rings appears in the doorway and addresses John Walker, not in his US Agent garb in other universes, about some information about “The Hood.”
Courtesy of Marvel Studios
This villain has been terrorizing the western United States in the 1800s. Ten Rings is looking for The Hood because his sister disappeared. In this universe, Xu Xialing left her father’s torturous ways and fled to pursue the American dream. However, she found very few people were accepting of her, and then she disappeared. Still, Ten Rings and Kate Bishop get the information from John Walker and pursue The Hood.
The Ghost Train
Walker’s intel turns out to be accurate, but Ten Rings and Kate Bishop arrive too late as another town has been laid to waste. Kate reveals this is exactly what happened to where she lived before The Hood killed her family. They find a boy who had been hiding from The Hood and the train when he tells them about a ghost train that rolled into town and took everybody.
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The trio look for a spot to check out this potential ghost train. It arrives and Ten Rings and Kate Bishop find a way to get on board with the child. They are shocked to see it fly over a canyon rather than crash into it and the heroes know something’s up. They find technological improvements in the train and see that it’s Stark technology. They continue through the train where they see railroad workers hypnotized and are captured by Sonny Burch and his group of Cowboys.
The Watcher Interferes… Again
Meanwhile, Burch wants to kill the child, known as Jun-Fan. The kid runs but Burch’s minions follow him as he climbs on top of the train. He can’t get away and they catch him and threaten to throw him away. However, the Watcher has decided he can’t sit back and let things happen anymore and he pushes the two goons off the top of the train. Jun-Fan is able to hide while the train takes Ten Rings to meet The Hood.
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Ten Rings vs. The Hood
The Hood agrees to meet with just Ten Rings and offers to join forces to prepare for battle against what The Hood views as the evils of the world. Ten Rings declines leading to a martial arts battle between the pair. The Hood gets the upper hand most of the time, but Ten Rings uses his adept skills to finally uncloak The Hood only to find out it’s his sister. Xu Xialing tells Ten Rings she fought and killed the original Hood and used his powers to build an army to take on those who rejected her.
While this fight was going on, Sonny Burch brought out a pocket watch that played a little tune. It starts to hypnotize Kate Bishop who starts taking her place in a seat on the train. During this time, Burch reveals that he, not The Hood, killed her family, and it was personal for him. Burch is about to have her fully under his spell when Jun-Fan rings a bell. This is done to help Ten Rings in his fight outside, but it wakes up Kate Bishop who is able to break free from the hypnosis and defeat Sonny Burch, knocking him out with the butt of her gun.
The Death of the Hood
With Ten Rings using the distraction to gain an advantage over The Hood, he sets up a perfect position to win the fight. However, he doesn’t want to kill his sister. Ten Rings throws down his weapon and gets on his knees saying his sister won’t kill him. However, The Hood insists she’s no longer his sister and picks up the knife slashing at him.
Courtesy of Marvel Studios
Kate Bishop has left the train at this point and sees The Hood slashing, so she shoots to save Ten Rings. Unfortunately, she doesn’t know this is his sister until he runs over saying her name and trying to get her back. Xu Xialing acknowledges she is his sister before dying. Kate apologizes but Ten Rings blames The Hood for his sister’s death, not Kate Bishop.
The Watchers Intervene
As Jun-Fan tells the story about what happened and praises Ten Rings and Kate Bishop as heroes, the Watcher notes this universe could be in worse shape than it is. That’s when the other Watchers arrive and call him out for interfering despite his oath to never interfere. They decide to hold him accountable by interfering with him. This leads to him being slammed into a universal orb and part of it falling, signifying a break in the universe.
Courtesy of Marvel Studios
Rating
While I wanted this to be a better episode than it was because of my love for old Westerns, plus how fun period pieces can be, this episode was only okay. It was great to see Shang-Chi and Kate Bishop in projects again as they’ve been used mostly sparingly since their debuts (although Shang-Chi did appear in the season three opening episode). And I like to see what’s going to happen between the Watchers. Still, a lot of this episode was predictable.
I could tell from the outset The Hood would be Ten Rings’ sister and Sonny Burch would be responsible for Kate Bishop’s family dying. Predictable isn’t always bad, but some episodes need surprise and others don’t. This one that could have benefitted from a surprise. Still, it’s my third favorite episode of the season so far.
Check out What If…? streaming exclusively on Disney Plus.
Article Written By: Jeremy Brown for Stelmach Brown Media 2024
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