Pilot

Season

1

Episode

1

Series

Kung Fu

Air date

April, 7 2021

Writer

Christina M. Kim

Director

Hanelle Culpepper

Episode guide
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-	Silence

Pilot is the first episode of The CW series Kung Fu. It premiered on April, 7 2021.

Synopsis[]

SERIES PREMIERE - A quarter-life crisis causes a young Chinese American woman, Nicky Shen (Olivia Liang), to drop out of college and go on a life-changing journey to an isolated monastery in China. But when she returns to San Francisco, she finds her hometown is overrun with crime and corruption and her own parents Jin (Tzi Ma) and Mei-Li Shen (Kheng Hua Tan) are at the mercy of a powerful Triad. Nicky will rely on her tech-savvy sister Althea Shen (Shannon Dang) and Althea's fiancé Dennis Soong (Tony Chung), pre-med brother Ryan Shen (Jon Prasida), Assistant District Attorney and ex-boyfriend Evan Hartley (Gavin Stenhouse) and new love interest Henry Yan (Eddie Liu) as well as her martial arts skills and Shaolin values to protect her community and bring criminals to justice... All while searching for the ruthless assassin who killed her Shaolin mentor Pei-Ling Zhang (Vanessa Kai) and is now targeting her.^[1]

Plot[]

For three years, Nicky, a one time Harvard University student has been living in a monastery in China's Yunnan Province, hiding from the matchmaking trip her mother sent her on. She stopped talking to her family when she realized that the “culture trip” was just an excuse to pair her off in an arranged marriage of her choosing. Not long after she ran away, she was rescued by Pei-Ling, who runs the all-female warrior team training at the monastery.

Pei-Ling mentors Nicky, teaching her everything she needs to know about fighting. But eventually she urges Nicky to make peace with her family and return home. She explains that she too had a difficult family life and that she doesn’t want Nicky to make the same mistakes she did.

That night, the monastery is lit on fire as raiders come after the warriors, but the women fight them off as Nicky desperately tries to get to Pei-Ling. As the fight rages, Pei-Ling faces Zhilan, the leader of the raiders and someone she seems to recognize. Zhilan incapacitates Pei-Ling and steals a mysterious sword from her.

As Nicky finally reaches Pei-Ling, Zhilan stabs Pei-Ling and vanishes. Nicky sobs as Pei-Ling begs her to retrieve the sword and dies.

Nicky pursues Zhilan, and the two fight. Nicky briefly holds the sword, but it makes a noise in her hand before Zhilan takes it back. As Nicky finds herself clinging to the edge of a cliff, Zhilan leaves her there and departs with the mythical sword.

After searching for Zhilan in vain, Nicky returns to her home and estranged family in San Francisco’s Chinatown where her father Jin welcomes her with open arms. Unfortunately, Nicky is quick to notice that Jin is sporting a black eye. She is further shocked to discover that her older sister Althea is preparing to marry Dennis Soong, an old high school classmate.

Nicky's brother Ryan and mother Mei-Li are both less than thrilled to see her back home, with Mei-Ling feeling especially resentful that Nicky chose to run away rather than to express her reservations about being set up for an arranged marriage. While Nicky storms out, Jin convinces his daughter not to run away to parts unknown again.

Later, Nicky reconnects with her ex-boyfriend Evan Hartley, whom she broke up with because she at the time had been feeling lost and pressured under her mother's expectations. Nicky reveals that she is investigating a new Triad gang extending their operations into Chinatown, and hoping that Evan's connections as the city's Assistant District Attorney can help. Their reunion is interrupted by Evan's new girlfriend Sabine, to which Nicky takes poorly as she confides in a vision of Pei-Ling who appears to console her and encourage her to reconcile with her family.

Nicky's soul-searching comes to an abrupt end when she discovers Jin roughed up by a local mobster in a shakedown at his family restaurant.

After taking Jin to the hospital to recover, Nicky approaches Ryan at his clinic and reconciles with him over a game of ping-pong, but not before meeting a handsome grad student named Henry. He eventually reveals to Nicky the ancient history of the sword and continues his research based on the burn scars on Nicky's hand from wielding it.

As Nicky and her siblings begin asking local businesses for more information about their father's attackers, they are accosted by armed goons who are easily dispatched by Nicky.

In the aftermath, Nicky and Mei-Li finally have it out, with Nicky revealing that it was Mei-Li that pressured her to break up with Evan and micro-managed her life until she traveled to China.

Frustrated by the authorities inability to act, Ryan goes out on his own to take incriminating photos of the Triads at the docks, with Nicky rushing after him to save him. Nicky wows Ryan with her martial arts skills, dispatching the mobsters as the police arrive.

With the mob now off their backs, the Shens happily celebrate Althea's marriage and Nicky and Mei-Li formally reconcile.

In the end, Henry reveals to Nicky the fabled magical potential of the weapon that Zhilan now has in her possession. Nicky realizes she must defend her hometown from Zhilan as her sworn enemy who seeks to unlock the mythical weapon's powers.

Cast[]

Main[]

Recurring[]

Yvonne Chapman as Zhilan^[8]

Co-Starring[]

Rene Wang as Cindy Hao
Rebecca Olson as Sabine
Valencia Budijanto as Brenda Hao
Tristan Liu as Tony Kang
Vincent Cheng as Older Man
Theresa Wong as Doctor
Colin Fooas Fortune Teller
Johnny Wu as Chinese American Man
Nicholas Wong as Teahouse Owner
Angie Ip as Tour Group Leader
Althea Kaye as Tai Chi Lady
Sunghee Lapell as Older Woman
Cynthia Zhou as Herb Shop Owner

Trivia[]

On April 7, 2021, Olivia Liang, star of The CW's new action-drama Kung Fu, said she hopes the show encourages empathy for Asian Americans. She and the rest of the show's Asian cast spoke on a recent Television Critics Association Zoom panel after the Atlanta-area shootings at three massage parlors in which eight people died. Six of them were women of Asian descent.^[9]
- Also on this day some BTS of the monastery that stood for the one in the Yunnan Province were released.^[10]
- In addition, Ryan Johnson, one of the writers for the show also revealed that the “docks” location featured in the Pilot is really an old beer factory.^[11]
On April 8, 2021, it was revealed that The CW’s reboot of Kung Fu delivered a strong debut on April 7, scoring The CW’s highest total viewership number for a Wednesday debut in 7 years since The 100 debuted on March 19, 2014.^[12]
- The reboot debuted to the tune of 1.4 million total viewers and a 0.2 in the 18-49 demographic.^[12]
- In addition, Kung Fu delivered The CW’s largest audience in the time period in two and half years since Riverdale in October 2018 (0.1, 530,000).^[12]
- This continues ratings traction for The CW as Kung Fu is the third best premiere of the season including returning series following the debuts of Walker and Superman & Lois.^[12]
On April 14, 2021 Eddie Liu revealed that in the Pilot, while Henry Yan's wardrobe of a black turtleneck and thick coat looked out of place for what looked like springtime in San Francisco, he can't complained since it kept him warm while filming his scenes. He went onto say that it was freezing in the mansion they were shooting in, and due to COVID protocols, the doors and windows have to stay open to maximize air ventilation in an enclosed indoor space. So while his cast-mates were freezing, he had the benefit of having two long-sleeve pieces of attire to keep him warm. He could in turn also hide a merino wool under-layer undergarment underneath that kept him even warm.^[13]
On April 19,2021, Hanelle Culpepper who directed the first two episodes of Season 1, and along the way, revealed several new pieces of information.^[14]
- Showrunner Christina M. Kim had a 50/50 gender-balanced writer’s room and was dedicated to a diverse production and to hiring women for below-the-line roles as well.^[14]
- The name of their production designer is a woman named Margot Ready, who was praised for doing such an amazing job. Especially in aiding with the storytelling of episodes that happen throughout the season, how they really deal with a lot of diverse social issues. For example, there’s one episode dealing with Black Lives Matter, for instance.^[14]
- Except for Tzi Ma who was already attached, Culpepper revealed she was part of deciding who the cast is for every character and their look and their wardrobe style. She worked with the costume designer for what the monk uniforms would look like, for the colors and how they layer.^[14]
- She also picked all the locations, like that beautiful monastery in Vancouver. Moreover, she worked with the production designer to find the apartment for Nicky’s ex, Gavin. Culpepper revealed how she wanted it to be brick, and feel like a loft.^[14]
- Culpepper also admitted they inherited some of the Chilling Adventures of Sabrina’s set because, at that time, they were coming in just as they were wrapping, so they went through all those sets and decided that the school set could be transformed into our community center.^[14]
- Culpepper also worked with the production designer on what colors they’d use, and how they’d change it, with the layout of the library and the books. This included minute things like choosing the wallpaper on the Shen family’s walls, and the look of Zhilan’s apartment.^[14]
- There is also a marked difference in the style and color palette in different aspects of the show, as well as the different locations.To which Culpepper admitted that a lot of that was in her original pitch. For China, and everything related to Chinese culture, she wanted color, with reds and warmth. She was further inspired by the rice fields because originally there was a scene in the rice fields.^[14]
- For San Francisco generally, she wanted to go with more neutral tones and less color, but Chinatown would have more color again.^[14]
- Culpepper further revealed that in China, where Nicky felt comfortable and safe, she wanted to shoot studio-style. But in San Francisco, where she feels out of her element and to create a sense of unease, she shot that stuff hand-held, but when Nicky’s in her fights and she feels comfortable again, she didn’t really want to use too much handhelds in those fights, so that’s why those are done with a lot more shots that are really precise and choreographed.^[14]
- The actors involved are not martial artists.^[14]
- Brett Chan is their stunt coordinator, and He was someone they hired early on because he’s done so much amazing martial arts work. Culpepper further stated that in looking at old kung fu movies, so much of it is the actors doing the action. So really didn’t want to have everything handheld, with stunt people doing everything, and cuts to close-ups on the faces of actors. In reality, she wanted to be with the actors doing the stunts. So working with Brett in terms of style, they considered which character might be more tiger in the way she attacks, or more crane? As a result, all the characters were assigned animal qualities, and he would design their fight style and movement around those animals.^[14]
- Pei-Ling Zhang for example is a tiger and crane, and Zhilan Zhang is an eagle claw. Then the other important thing to me was to have the actors actually do the fights. That was one of the things Culpepper had to fight for because initially, they wanted to start the actors a little later, but she knew they needed more rehearsal time.^[14]
- Brett also met with the actors and knew they’d need some solid training before the shoot. For Yvonne Chapman, they wanted to give her a week of fighting time. Brett said that kind of timing would be fine if we were going to use stunt doubles, but not if the goal was to use the actors in the fight sequences. So Culpepper fought to have the actors start sooner, so they could train and learn these fights.^[14]
On April 21, 2021, Radames Pera, who played young Caine, a.k.a. Grasshopper, on the original TV series, and is the last surviving member of the original Kung Fu series mentioned he only had one criticism of the new 2021 version. Although he admits he only read the script for the Pilot, he says he hopes the show uses less violence and more peaceful instances to resolve conflict. Because all he's come across recently in the script he read was the heroine choosing violence.^[15]
On April 22, 2021, Kheng Hua Tan revealed several important pieces of information in her Zoom interview with Observer.^[16]
- Tan Kheng Hua received the audition sides for Kung Fu, and found out it was a gender-flipped reboot of the 1970s series that she had watched with her late father.^[16]
- The 58-year-old Singaporean actress broke new ground with her first American series regular role in Kung Fu, which is the first network drama to feature a predominantly Asian cast.^[16]
- Tan plays Liang’s hard-bitten mother, Mei-Li, who still harbors her own resentment for her daughter’s decision to abandon their family.^[16]
- She also revealed that since October 2020, the cast had been shooting the show under strict COVID-19 protocols in Vancouver, Canada, which has forced them to lean on one another in lieu of their loved ones who are stuck back home. For Tan, travel restrictions have foiled her plans to reunite with her daughter, and she has channeled her heartache into her portrayal of Mei-Li Shen, who is trying “to love her children in the best way that she can, even if the best way might not always be the right way.” Tan has also grown closer with the rest of the cast, who affectionately call her “Mama Kheng” and, she says, “make me feel so safe.”^[16]
- While she admits that her experiences as a Chinese woman in Singapore are completely different from the ones of Asian Americans, Tan says that, through listening to her cast-mates, she has come to realize the importance of a show like Kung Fu in a time that has seen an alarming spike in anti-Asian racism. She goes onto say how, “this re-imagining is beautiful, relevant and necessary. If you’re going to re-imagine something, re-imagine something relevant for this time and this Kung Fu is relevant for this time”.^[16]
- Tan also teased viewers that, “you have to keep watching to understand what really lurks underneath everything, because there are revelations that come up, and these revelations can be quite mind-blowing,” she says, laughing. “When we receive the scripts, we all go like, ‘Oh my goodness!’ And then we all start to text each other! We take screenshots of our script and we’re all like, “Oh my goodness! Oh my goodness! Oh, I don’t believe it! What, what, what?!’”^[16]