Talk:Big Trouble in Little China

Themes
Is a random huffpo article really relevant enough for an entire section? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.62.60.2 (talk) 23:16, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

Wang Chi
Added Wang Chi's fiance's name and did some minor rewording.


 * Great. Given this movie's cult following, it's high time the article was improved. I added a bit more as well. -DynSkeet (talk) 15:39, August 4, 2005 (UTC)

Trivia
The machine gun used in the movie was a modified Carl Gustaf M/45, not a modified Intratec TEC-DC9, but the TEC-DC9 is also made using parts from the M/45. It may be OR, but I've met the designer and he told me so. He actualy made a living making custom guns. But the TEC-DC9 was developed during the same period, so it's not suprising they have a simmilar look. The TEC-DC9 was a yet unnamed (as far as I know) prototype by 1989. // Liftarn

''Can you provide anything else to back this statement up? It sure looks like a Tec-9 to me. Also, the Tec-9 page shows it as being in production in 1985, and the ATF knowing of it's existence in 1982. Is that wrong?'' --JOK3R 16:50, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

On a cursory examination of pictures of the various weapons, the length of the weapon used seems more in line with that of the Gustaf than that of the TEC-9.

I don't know, unless they pushed the magazine feed much closer to the handle or theres a variant that I'm not finding pics of, it bares very little resemblance to a Gustaf and a strong one to a TEC-9. Infact, some of the links on the TEC-9 article seem to have pics that look exactly like the gun in the movie. Also, he uses the gun semi, and a TEC-9 is a semi. In addition, I'm not sure a guy you met is a sitable resource. Anyways, I'm gonna change it for now and correct the machine gun part, neither type are machine guns. Highlandlord 02:51, 9 July 2006 (UTC)


 * He's not citable per Wikipedia standards so I guess it will have to go. // Liftarn

It seems that almost immediatly after I made the change someone else cut away everything but that a TEC-9 is seen in a poster for it, is that even worth having at all? Highlandlord 03:30, 9 July 2006 (UTC)
 * That was me. If it's a TEC-9, then it's not remodeled or specially made for the film.  It's just a bog standard TEC-9. :-) The trivia section isn't really supposed to exist at all in film articles, according to WP guidelines, so the interesting stuff should be integrated into the text and the useless bits should be deleted.  Geoff B 06:16, 12 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Notice the front of the gun. The protection around the barrel. That's directly from the m/45. But then the TEC-9 is a redesigned m/45 so it's difficult to tell just by looking at them. Also check Interdynamic MP-9. // Liftarn

The perforated jacket around the barrel is typical of TEC-9s pre-1994. Not to mention that the style of perferations are totally different to those on the M/45. The initial KG-9 model was changed to KG-99 in the mid 1980s (when BTILC was made) and designated the TEC-9. If you go to tyhe TEC-9 page here on WP, the pic is of an AB-10 model, which lacks the perforated jacket around the muzzle. There would be no reason on Earth to use a modified M/45, as the TEC-9 was already in production. Geoff B 20:54, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

Several of the links from the TEC-9 article show pics more similar to the one used in the movie. Once again, now that all it says is "The gun used by Jack Burton and shown on the movie poster is a Intratec TEC-DC9." is that noteworthy enough to be in the trivia for the movie? Highlandlord 20:48, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

For this article to get GA status the Trivia section needs to be integrated into the rest of the article or eliminated. I've placed it here for safe keeping until this happens. J.D. 01:06, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

✅ I have started a section on Costume and Props for this. Colonel Warden (talk) 09:23, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Trivia

 * The final storm Lightning dies when Egg Shen drops a stone Buddha sculpture on him. Upon Lightning's death, bolts of electricity surge through the air. On close examination, the last few lightning bolts form Chinese characters. These characters read "carpenter" – presumably a reference to John Carpenter, the director of the film.


 * James Hong, the actor that portrayed David Lo Pan, reprised the role in the 2001 Sci Fi Channel series The Chronicle episode "Here There Be Dragons".


 * One of the film's Associate Producers, James Lew, is also listed as "Chang Sing #1" in the cast credits.


 * Egg Shen's bus tour agency is named Egg Foo Young Tours, presumably a reference to the well-known Chinese dish.


 * The gun used by Jack Burton and shown on the movie poster is a Intratec TEC-DC9. ✅


 * The weapons Lightning uses in the street fight are called emi piercers. ✅


 * Kim Cattrall was surprised when she got to the set for the prison scene one morning, as no one told her she would be hogtied for the entire scene. She endured it like a professional, occasionally having her gag removed so she could drink water.  When asked by John Carpenter whether or not she was uncomfortable, she simply replied 'I've been in tighter situations than this!'


 * Both green-eyed characters are actually wearing contact lenses. ✅


 * VIZ Media made a reference to this film's title when they released the first Ranma ½ film, Ranma ½: Big Trouble in Nekonron, China.


 * Kurt Russell's Chinatown T-shirt was declared one of the funniest--and most appropriate--movie T-shirts of all time. ✅


 * Professor Frank from Brad Neely's Professor Brothers' "Substitute" cartoon mentions he is needed at the Wing Kong exchange immediately.


 * In the film "Death Proof", part of the double feature "Grindhouse", Kurt Russell's tank top from the movie can be seen hanging up on the wall by the jukebox where the girls are sitting. ✅

Origins of the Story
The wiki article suggests that this was originally a cowboy movie. However the IMDB suggests that this was originally the sequel to Buckaroo Banzai, known as Buckaroo Banzai vs. The World Crime Syndicate. Which is correct?
 * According to the film's commentary, with Kurt Russell and John Carpenter, the script went through a few incarnations.

JC: "It was originally a Western, with a cowboy riding into town...he does the same basic thing, he gets involved, they steal his horse or something so he has to go into this underworld...it was modernised by W. D. Richter (sp?) and his rationale was Rosemary's Baby worked because it was the modern day, so why wouldn't this?"

KR: "Had he done Buckaroo Banzai?"

JC: "He had done that."

So it was definitely a Western originally, but it may have been adapted by Richter to be a BB sequel before being changed again. Geoff B 06:34, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Several articles that appeared in Starlog magazine around the time the film came out also back up the origins of the screenplay as being a Western. Count Ringworm 13:12, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

I added some more specific links in the Screenplay section of the article. I don't think my changes are controversial though. DirectRevelation 04:45, 4 November 2007 (UTC)DirectRevelation ✅

World of Warcraft trivia paragraph
I've re-written the WoW paragraph so that the movie references are followed by the game references - since that is the chronological sequence. [Sorry that I forgot I wasn't signed in at the time.] I have also hyphenated "Six-Demon" and "Upside-Down" on what I concede are solely my personal stylistic preferences. If anyone can cite a published screenplay or studio-based movie website to the contrary, that's great. But the mentions in WoW, being derivative works, would not be authoritative. Ribonucleic 19:39, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

Egg Shen's designation as a magic practitioner
The article currently describes him as a "magician". Aside from the term's unfortunate rabbit-from-the-hat associations, is there any textual basis for this designation - as opposed to "wizard" or "sorcerer"? Although Lo Pan sneers at Egg's "peasant magic", I don't believe this establishes anything. And FWIW - admittedly next-to-nothing - the top Google match for "Egg Shen" describes him as a "sorcerer" and "alchemist". Ribonucleic 00:44, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Lo Pan calls him a 'little bastard sorcerer', not that it makes any difference whether he's called a magician, wizard, sorcerer or conjurer in the WP article. He's a man that does magic. Whatever the Chinese language term(s) for that are, I doubt any of them translate neatly into those English language terms. They all have rather unfortunate associations. Geoff B 02:13, 28 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Now that I check, The American Heritage Dictionary doesn't seem to make any distinction between "sorcerer", "wizard", and "magician" either. Although I would have sworn that "wizard" had some kind of higher status than the others deriving from the ostensible course of studies involved. And the film - even apart from Lo Pan's perjorative comments - does seem to suggest that what he and Egg do aren't exactly the same thing. Combining 1) Lo Pan's "bastard sorcerer" remark, 2) the "sorcerer" identification in the top Google match, and 3) my personal judgment that it's the most Chinese sounding of the three choices, I'm changing the description of Egg from "magician" to "sorcerer". Since you've stated it doesn't make a difference, I trust you won't have any objections. Ribonucleic 04:15, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

By all means, do so. I'm sure there are technical distinctions between the terms, but I don't think it really matters here. Geoff B 05:04, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Merge with Jack Burton article
Since "old Jack" doesn't appear in any other works that I'm aware of, I don't see how he justifies his own article - especially when it's only a stub [and not a particulary well-written one IMHO]. So I've heeded the encouragement to Be Bold and brought in what I thought was the best that article had to offer. This required an extensive rewrite of the Plot summary - which still needs the Lo Pan plot explained a lot better than I can do at the moment without watching the movie again. Ribonucleic 05:17, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Bluff vs. Buff
from The American Heritage Dictionary:

bluff (adj) - Rough and blunt but not unkind in manner

buff (adj) - (slang) Having good muscle tone; physically fit and trim

While Jack meets both descriptions, I thought the first was more germane. Also: although I can't locate one, I assume there's a rule of article style that rules out slang. So I'm changing this back. Ribonucleic 14:19, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

Slightly more appropriate, yes. :-) Geoff B 15:06, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

Italicization instead of quotation marks on The Pork Chop Express
If I may be indulged this typographical nitpickery, I believe that vehicles with proper names are italicized rather than put in quotation marks. For example: The General Lee. Ribonucleic 16:28, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

Chinese names and titles
Hehe, it would be nice to see the Chinese names of people in this movie added to the article. Actors, sure, but the characters especially. Is the name of Lo Pan "indeed" spelled 羅盤 as one article suggests??? In the movie, I catch a brief glipse of graffiti which says, "樓something舘". I can't make out the middle character on my small screen, but it's not 下. (So his name is Lou, not Luo...?) Anyway, any further clarifications of the names in the movie would be funtimes. ^.^ WuShufei 23:05, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

David Lo Pan = 大衛羅盤 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.138.30.204 (talk) 01:19, 11 May 2018 (UTC)

Other media
This info kinda falls under the Trivia section and is either not cited or, in the case of the video games, is cited but really can't have its own section as there isn't much info so I'm putting it here until it can be expanded. --J.D. (talk) 20:06, 18 January 2008 (UTC)


 * An official video game based on the movie was released for the ZX Spectrum, Amstrad CPC and Commodore 64.


 * Jim Butcher, author of the Codex Alera novels, has confirmed he based the name of the elemental entities in his books (Furies) from dialog in this movie.


 * In the first bar from the movie Death Proof, Jack's shirt is seen hanging on the wall several times behind the table the girls are sitting at. ✅


 * James Hong, the eccentric Lo Pan, has gone on to be a very popular Asian stock actor, appearing in Seinfeld and many other television programs. He also played "Lo Pan", a wheel-chair-ridden eccentric, rich "godfather of Chinatown" in "Chuck Vs. the Sizzling Shimp"", an episode of the sci-fi geek series Chuck.

In popular culture
This section is unsourced and reeks of trivia so I've moved it here until it can be cited and integrated back into the article.

The Six Demon Bag also appears in the MMORPG World of Warcraft as an obtainable Rare item. It is also the name of Philadelphia band Man Man's 2006 album.

The character of Lightning from the film was the inspiration for Raiden in Mortal Kombat, and Lo Pan was the inspiration for Shang Tsung, both according to developer Dan Forden.

===Films===

The t-shirt worn by Kurt Russell in the film can be seen hanging on a wall during a scene in a bar in Quentin Tarantino's Death Proof (2007). ✅

===Video Games===

In World of Warcraft, players can collect a trinket called the 'Six Demon Bag' containing "...wind, fire, all that kind of thing!"

In World of Warcraft, there is a hidden, normally inaccessible room under the crypts in Deadwind Pass with the name "The Upside-down Sinners," influenced by the movie.

The Fighter Raiden (Mortal Kombat) from the Mortal Kombat series was heavily influenced by one of the villains in this movie, Lightning.

In the in the game Fallout 2, players encounter Lo Pan in San Francisco.

In City of Heroes and City of Villains, there is a piece of Rare Invention salvage dropped called "Black Blood of the Earth."

--J.D. (talk) 13:33, 29 August 2008 (UTC)

Obvious fact
Since this is clearly the greatest film ever made, perhaps some discussion of this monumental fact deserves mention in the article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.157.182.253 (talk) 18:22, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

Agreed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.138.30.204 (talk) 01:20, 11 May 2018 (UTC)

Soundtrack
John Carpenter received a Saturn Award Best Music nomination for this film. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.48.171.20 (talk) 03:50, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

Goat Butts Against Hedge and It's Horns Becomes Entangled
"I don't think I've had the pleasure" - Gracie Law.

I didn't realise this quote (goat butts..) was part of Chinese fable - something called "I CHING" - 9 in the 3rd place or something. Anyway it seems to be quite appropriate - with Jack Burton acting like a goat - charging into situations, and getting entangled.

Really adds another dimension to the movie, I think. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.131.115.46 (talk) 22:39, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

References to Chinese mysticism
The section cites a 1986 issue of Starlog, and links to the Starlog wiki page. The two page spread of the specific issue of Starlog is viewable here as of this post, but it never goes into detail about the exact mythology things are based upon. However, the page on Qin Shi Huang does not mention Lo Pan or a "shadow emperor" beyond the fact that he (Qin Shi Huang) was mentioned in the film.

I searched around the net a good bit, and the only things I could find on mentioning that Lo Pan was a 'real' historical figure as stated in the section, are people saying pretty much what's said here about him, with no citations. I also found in one place someone stating that the character name is simply a variation of Lu Ban, a Chinese saint of carpentry (Seems like a joke for the sake of John Carpenter's name), as there is a Lo Pan Temple, which is based around the Chinese saint Lu Ban.

The section seems a bit flimsy to exist in my opinion. It would be great if the section pulled specific things from the film and cited their historical references, but as it stands it seems like it just doesn't really have a leg to stand on. --Rainalor (talk) 13:42, 8 September 2011 (UTC)


 * It looks like added the content here, but he has not edited since July. If you think that the section does not correspond with the reference, go ahead and remove it! :) Erik (talk &#124; contribs) 14:01, 8 September 2011 (UTC)

Plot Summary
I streamlined the excessively detailed plot summary, bringing it down under the 700 word maximum, per WP:FILMPLOT. Despite being concise and factually accurate, it's a bit boring, and it doesn't do this great film any justice. In the film, Jack Burton is portrayed as a comically inept braggart, while Wang is humbly competent. If someone could insert examples of this in the plot summary, that would be very helpful. I'll try to remember to do so, but I think I need to rewatch the film, if I'm going to insert anything that detailed or do any major rewrites. NinjaRobotPirate (talk) 01:46, 5 May 2013 (UTC)

"Egg sets off to China." No, he doesn't. They have a whole conversation about this. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 142.120.12.26 (talk) 05:23, 8 October 2021 (UTC)

Some requests from a general user to improve article...
Hi. I'm just a Wikipedia fan with a couple requests which I think would improve this article.

1. Change phrase 'sex slave' in first paragraph of 'Plot' section by incorporating 'human trafficking' and adding link. The term 'human trafficking' is a more widely accepted/understood term than 'sex slave'. I think this would add to the article.

2. Incorporate the phrase Chinese 'black magic' into the article using Black magic. This is one of the first phrases used in the film and after reading the Wiki article on black magic, I believe it accurately represents some of the key plot-points and storyline.

I'm sorry I didn't make these changes myself, but I'm not comfortable in changing/editing a Wiki article mostly because I don't want to register as a user. I hope my suggestions are well received from another Wiki user willing to make the suggested changes.

Thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 204.118.135.30 (talk) 16:12, 17 August 2015 (UTC)

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"Centuries ago"?
Centuries ago, Lo Pan, a great warrior and even greater wizard, was defeated in battle by the first sovereign emperor Qin Shi Huang.

I mean, this is not wrong, but does this wording come from the film? "Millennia ago" would be better, wouldn't it?

Hijiri 88 ( 聖やや ) 06:32, 18 June 2017 (UTC)

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