Due to its worldwide box office success, The Forbidden Kingdom is getting a sequel. This chop-suey of Chinese fable will reunite the two big Chinese martial arts stars, Jet Li and Jackie Chan, and will likely feature a romance between Jet Li and Li Bingbing‘s characters, according to the Beijing Times report. Wait, the romancing of the Monkey God and the Grey Haired Lady aka Moonlight Witch? Now that’s a first. A better storyline would be to have Jet Li play a mute guy. This is certainly fitting since he uttered no more than 10 sentences in the first movie, and most were incomprehensible. 

Speaking of Jet Li, didn’t he announce to the press that he would not do any more martial arts flicks after Fearless? Not only does he have this planned sequel, he also has The Mummy: Tomb of The Emperor Dragon coming out this summer. I guess it’s hard to walk away from the lucrative Hollywood deals.

Don’t get me wrong, the fight sequence in The Forbidden Kingdom was definitely entertaining, but the plot was a different story. The story was crap not to mention the corny fortune cookie-ish dialogue (all the time I was waiting for one of the characters to say, “Confucius says, man who goes to bed with itchy..."). But when you have guys in the audience clap and cheer that this was one of the best movies they had ever seen, you know a sequel is inevitable. 



9 Comments

I agree. While the first incarnation got decent reviews, 62% on Rottentomatoes, it was really a horrible film plot-wise. And plot has been known to make a difference in the quality of a movie.

so so sad. There was so much talk in the years leading up to this movie. You would think between these two great actors, there would be a lot more money to pay for better writers.

lol, Confucius says...don’t make the sequal raspberry

I thot it was ok. I wasn’t really expecting the next Crouching Tiger. The girl who spoke in 3rd person was pretty stupid imo.

i couldn’t stop laughing when i heard the girl talking in third person. usually sequels are bad so i wonder how bad this one will be

hrm i wonder what it’ll be about now…

The movie had Jet Li peeing on Jackie Chan. nuff said.

Perhaps if you give them a second chance...but how often do movie sequals do better than the original?

If Jet didn’t do martial movies, what movies would he do? I don’t see him in Speed Racer or X-Men… There’s not that much opportunity for Asians in Hollywood in general.