Why Tai Lung was right in Kung Fu Panda.
A childhood favourite of mine that made Po, the protagonist way too easily.
As a chubby kid in my youth, this was a personal favourite of mine growing up. It had elements of the different kid shining the brightest and warranted feelings in hope of acceptance. One of the greatest DreamWorks’ films, I am almost certain most of us have at least had a glimpse of its clips and snippets growing up. While Po was obviously the protagonist and Tai Lung the antagonist, this is my rationale behind why,Tai Lung should not simply be seen as just the villain.
In the beginning of the film, there is a quick introduction of Tai Lung. Originally a student of Shi Fu, he had destined and committed himself to his supposed fate. But when he was unravelled and made his move, he was imprisoned for it. Within the prison and solitary confinement, he was abused by guards and society, treated as an outcast for the very beliefs that were instilled in him by Shi Fu.
Let me tell you why Tai Lung is really the protagonist:
- Parental Pressure
Firstly, the absence of a maternal figure in Tai Lung’s life made him dependent on Shi Fu teachings as the sole moral compass in the world, in most parental relationships, the maternal and the paternal voices are likely the most if not, the most important in a child’s navigation in morality and social interaction; this eventually led to Tai Lung subconsciously injecting his own undeveloped voice of opinion as the opposition to Shi Fu’s; ultimately, this lack of opposition in authority to Shi Fu is how Tai Lung managed to perverse Shi Fu’s beliefs leading to a religious belief in Shi Fu’s words.
This resulted in Tai Lung treating his training and spirituality as a means to an end and being the strongest since strength was what encompassed being the Dragon warrior as rather to keeping up with the societal definition of good. Tai Lung was the sole student of the academy with tons of training equipment and rooms. (Low admission rates?) Due to this, he became the focus of attention and eventually reached a zenith: the Dragon scroll, which became his life’s new goal.
Shi Fu’s overwhelming attention to Tai Lung led to Tai Lung’s forming a unhealthy competitive spirit and growing dependency onto Shi Fu. This propagated and allowed Tai Lung to perverse Shi Fu’s raison d’etre into his own twisted version of it. Shi Fu had, in all honesty, led Tai Lung on; Tai Lung had trained for years — firstly, for the Dragon scroll and secondly, for Shi Fu’s recognition. Yet, when it came down to it, he was denied as the Chosen one simply because Oogway had seen true darkness in his heart? And to further dismay, no support from Shi Fu. Shi Fu had completely manipulated Tai Lung into being the most desirable version of Shi Fu’s own dreams and this selfishly convinced Tai Lung that his own dreams were genuine despite Shi Fu’s constant manifestation of it, driving him into a nihilistic spiral when his Raison D’être was completely denied. Because Shi Fu had taken centre stage in Tai Lung’s life, his figure had the greatest importance to Tai Lung’s distorted growth; with much of Tai Lung’s beliefs being Shi Fu’s and when this belief system was shut down, why would we not expect Tai Lung to lose his sh*t? Additionally, what good was telling Tai Lung that he’s heart had too much darkness without any backup plan, and not anticipate the repercussions of it; seemed like a self-fulling prophecy to me.
2. Good Vs. Evil
“Evil resides in the very gaze that perceives evil as all around itself”
Spirit of Phenomenology, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
Tai Lung was robbed. Tai Lung had worked hard, not just against Shi Fu’s expectations but society’s. The small village definitely had placed him on a pedestal that had seen and expected Tai Lung to be the chosen one, given that he was some God-given prodigy. Society had originally perceived Tai Lung by Jungian archetypes as the Hero; a common figure that society often looks up to; these archetypes exist in our world as athletes or social activists.
What Hegel’s describes is a reflexivity — the gaze which sees evil excludes itself from the societal whole that it criticises and, only through this choice of evil, we then understand good. Tai Lung had perceived everyone as wrong for having denied him what he perceived as good. After he had gotten revenge, the societal perception of Tai Lung became evil bringing forward its own sense of perverse hypocrisy. The reason why I often use perverse hypocrisy, is to narrate the twisted perception of self contradiction that society brings forward; the Hero is only a hero if he serves them; is the Hero obligated to serve the people or are the people obligated to be served by the hero? The crowds that once cheered his name had now turned on him when he fell short, this is society’s superficial shortcomings.
This forms two ladders. One of which is, Tai Lung viewing the world as having wronged him and the other is society and the academy viewing Tai Lung as an outcast who wronged them all. Good and evil are all subjective and Tai Lung was the victim of heavy societal influenced upbringing upon the typical hero archetype, twisting and convulsing him into his own broken individual: making him the sad hero story of this film.Who in society has the moral confidence that his stance of Good and Evil was even correct and without doubt?
3. Po did not deserve anything
The scene between Master Oogway and Shi Fu had brought up many important philosophical elements. Master Oogway had argued that one must let go of the illusion of control. This is an element often present in Taoist philosophy known as Wu Wei (state of flow);
“What cannot be seen is called evanescent;
What cannot be heard is called rarefied;
What cannot be touched is called minute
These three cannot be fathomed
And so they are confused and looked upon as one,
Its upper part is not dazzling;
Its lower part is not obscure.
Dimly visible, it cannot be named
And returns to that which is without substance
This is called the shape that has no shape,
That image that is without substance.
This is called indistinct and Shadowy.”
XIV of Tao Te Ching.
The poem above is sourced from Tao Te Ching, a major philosophical resource for Eastern philosophy. It aligns greatly with the conceptual motives of Oogway and describes that his intuition was simply made from a state of flow. Po was destined to be the Dragon warrior off a preconceived ‘mistake’ as he had fell in during the Furious Five’s parade. Oogway furthers by saying that there are no accidents, and that Po’s decision was fated to be. This draws parallel to Taoism as it works in accordance with flow, that life is a wave like water and malleable like air, and that fate is written in stone.
These rather loose feelings of intuition furthermore abandons reason. Po was a noodle shop orphan. (I am not sure about you but where I am from, noodle shop orphans of duck fathers do not go very far.) Oogway simply had an intuition or a vision that Po was the choosen one, and instead of training the Furious five or Tigress to be the choosen one, he made some crazy wish of manifestation that a random Panda was basically God’s gift. Intuition is built from experience and the past, meaning that Oogway could have simply manifested or believed Tai Lung to be the Dragon warrior or correcting his heart to be one instead of creating a whole film of terror and abstract heroism. While he may have had a intuition with Po, it fills me with anger knowing that he had denied Tai Lung’s Raison D’etre and didn’t bother correcting it, leaving the situation as it is. (Seems very unwise when you have a aggressive prodigy snow leopard with a twisted moral compass)
While Po’s come up and individual talent was extremely admirable, Tai Lung is the victim of Oogway’s ‘visions’ and had his entire life and talent thrown away at Oogway’s will.
Oogway can symbolically be compared to a Feudal lord, deciding who will live and die by his sword of fate. This tragic fate of playing two potential futures against each other is pitiful and in itself inhumane from a position of power and respected wisdom.
Ultimately, the lack of reformation and appropriate parental-ships had caused Tai Lung’s own descent. ‘Wisdom’ by Oogway and Shi Fu had undercut Tai Lung’s growth and resulted in them combating the direct result of their own shortcomings. I find it appropriate that Oogway flutters away at the peach tree, it was strangely comparative to a pump-and-dump father: knocking up a lady and leaving the baby mama to the combined consequences of their actions. Personally, Oogway was the villain with his ridiculous levels of condescendence and wisdom, sidestepping simple answers with great ambiguity and to top the dish off, leaving the world. Oogway was definitely a package of ‘idgaf’.
This is why Tai Lung was the real victim of Kung Fu Panda.
