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Chun-Li

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For the member of Morning Musume, see Li Chun.
Chun-Li
Street Fighter series character
File:F chunlim 80ff5f4.jpg
Chun-Li as she appears in Street Fighter VI. Illustration by Bengus.
First gameStreet Fighter II

Chun-Li (チュンリー, Chun-Rī, based on Chinese [simplified: 春丽 traditional: 春麗] Chūn-Lì) is a video game character created by Capcom. First introduced in Street Fighter II: The World Warrior, she has since appeared as a player character in each subsequent game. Her name in Mandarin is (chun 春 "spring", lì 丽 "beautiful"), meaning "spring beauty". [2]

An undercover Interpol agent, Chun-Li enters Street Fighter II 's fighting tournament as a way of getting to its founder, M. Bison. She seeks to avenge her father, who was murdered while investigating Bison's crime syndicate, Shadaloo. Her signature move is the Hyakuretsu kyaku (百裂脚, Hundred Rending Kicks), commonly known as the Lightning Kick), which involves repeatedly kicking her opponent from a tilted standing position. Chun-Li is notable for being the first female playable character in a fighting game,[2][3] and has acquired the nickname "First Lady of Fighting Games" among enthusiasts.[4] She is ranked fourth on Gamefly's list of Hottest Chicks Ever.[5]

History

Street Fighter series

File:Chun-Li Alpha 3.jpg
The Street Fighter Alpha series depiction of Chun-Li.

Chun-Li made her debut in the original version of Street Fighter II as one of the game's eight playable characters and the sole female character in the game (before the addition of later characters such as Cammy, Rose and Sakura). Chun-Li's backstory centers around her quest to avenge her father's death, an undercover police agent who disappeared while investigating M. Bison's organization. In her ending, she fulfills her revenge and decides to return to her life as an ordinary girl. In Super Street Fighter II, the player is given the option to make Chun-Li return to ordinary life or continue her work as a police officer.

Chun-Li is brought back in Street Fighter Alpha: Warriors' Dreams, which is set prior to the events of the Street Fighter II. Chun-Li is depicted as an undercover ICPO agent who is after M. Bison and his drug cartel. Chun-Li is dressed in a Chinese acrobatic outfit in the original, although the two sequels produced afterwards: Alpha 2 and Alpha 3, features Chun-Li's original outfit as an alternate version of the character.

She appears as a playable character in Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike, the third iteration of the Street Fighter III as one of five added characters, making her one of the few Street Fighter characters to appear in all major sub-series. Set years after the Street Fighter II, Chun-Li has retired from street fighting to teach martial arts to young children,[6] but is forced to return to law enforcement after one of her students is abducted by Urien.

Chun-Li appears in Street Fighter IV as one of the returning World Warriors in the game with her brand new Ultra Move, Hōsenka (鳳扇華, Phoenix's Fan Petals). Her in-game narrative shows Chun-Li at a current crossroads in her life and her eventual return to both street fighting and law enforcement.

Other games

Chun-Li has made appearances in several other Capcom-produced fighting games including all of the Marvel vs. Capcom, where she was made an honorary member of the X-Men, and Capcom vs. SNK crossovers. She also appears in the puzzle game Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo and its sequel, Pocket Fighter. She is also a playable character in the upcoming Tatsunoko vs. Capcom game, representing her debut game Street Fighter II. She also makes a cameo in Mega Man 9 as a news reporter while Mega Man and Dr.Light were watching the news, and in Final Fight 2, where she can be found eating ramen in the first stage. Chun-Li also appears in the Tactical RPG game Namco × Capcom, where she will team up with Cammy White as you progress. She is found in almost any Capcom fighting game, one exception was the first Street Fighter III and its first iteration, 2nd Impact, until she was finally added in Street Fighter III 3rd Strike.

Characteristics

In the Street Fighter II sub-series and most of her later appearances, Chun-Li wears a qipao, an early 20th century Chinese dress.[4] In the beta version of Street Fighter II, Chun-Li was originally depicted wearing an orange qipao instead of blue.[2] The dress is modified to allow a far wider range of movement than a generic qipao. Her ensemble also includes a pair of white combat boots and brown pantyhose. Chun-Li famously wears her hair in "ox horns";[2] she wears silk brocades and ribbons in her hair, signifying the mourning of her father. Another familiar part of her ensemble are the large spiked bracelets she wears on her wrists.

In the Street Fighter Alpha games (set during the time period before Street Fighter II), Chun-Li wears an embroidered vest, a unitard,[2] and athletic shoes. She wears her ox horns unadorned. She also wears her original Street Fighter II outfit as an alternate version of her character.

Gameplay

Chun-Li is a character effective both at long and close ranges and can be very aggressive due to her speed and technique. Her moves have become an icon in fighting games, in the same way as Ryu's. In addition, Chun-Li can also leap off nearby walls; while performing a wall jump, she is able to backflip and stomp on her opponent's head.

Her special moves include:

  • Hyakuretsu kyaku (百裂脚, Hundred Rending Kicks): Her signature move, a rapid sucession of kicks,which are performed while standing on one leg. Its easy accessibility (bluntly pressing a kick button over and over again) has become a staple in many games.
  • Kikō-ken (気功拳, Qigong Fist): Also more simply translated as Energy Fist, a slow moving projectile that in some games doesn't cover the entire length of the screen. The Kikō instance in the name of the move is a reference to the Chi Kung (Qigong) concept, common to chinese martial arts.
  • Spinning Bird Kick (スピニングバードキック, Supiningu Bādo Kikku): Using her powerful legs to keep her aloft, Chun-Li spins rapidly in mid air delivering a succession of kicks. Also one of her signature moves, it was briefly known as the Whirlwind Kick in western localization, but the name was dropped and the original name adopted.
  • Hazan-shū (覇山蹴, Strong Mountain's Kick): An arcing jump kick that can fly over projectiles. Available to her only in Street Fighter III 3rd Strike, although a weaker version called Sen-en-Shū is available to her in the Alpha series.
  • Tenshōkyaku (天昇脚, Rising (to) Heaven Kick): A series of rising kicks that propel Chun-Li into the air at a diagonal angle.

Her Super moves or Super Arts:

  • Kikō-shō (気功掌, Qigong Palm): A powerful multi-hit fireball held by Chun-Li with her palms.
  • Senretsu kyaku (千裂脚, Thousand Rending Kicks): Charging toward her opponent, Chun-Li drains stamina quickly with a powerful combination of kicks. This was the first super move she was given; it is modified into the Hōyoku Sen (鳳翼扇, Phoenix's Wing Fan), in Street Fighter III 3rd Strike, in which it its faster, has more range and better overall effectiveness. In Street Fighter IV, there is an upgraded senretsu kyaku called Hōsen Ka (鳳扇華, Phoenix's Fan Petals) as her ultra combo. It looks like senretsu kyaku when the move starts, but she rises upward with Spinning Bird Kick after she kicks her opponent into the midair.
  • Hazan-Tenshōkyaku (覇山天昇脚, Strong Mountain's Ascending Kick): A more powerful version of her regular Tenshōkyaku special move.
  • Tensei Ranka (天星乱華, Heaven Star's Wild Petals): A vertical spinning multihit move. Only available to her in 3rd Strike appearance.

As with many characters, Chun-Li has been given normal moves, special or super moves other than the ones previously listed, that are available only in specific games. In some games, her taunt also inflicts (albeit very little) damage.

Appearances in other media

Live-action

Chun-Li was portrayed in the 1994 action film Street Fighter by actress Ming Na. She poses as a television reporter in order to infiltrate the nation of Ŝadoluo and kill M. Bison, a warlord who murdered her father during a peasant uprising. Chun-Li's surname in the film is Zang/Xiang,[7] though Capcom has not officially recognized it.

In October 2006, Hyde Park Entertainment and Capcom announced its intention to produce another film adaptation with the storyline to focus on Chun-Li called Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li. This film will be more character-centered and story-based rather than following a "nebulous plot."[8] Also, apparently it won't be just a Street Fighter movie with Chun-Li as the main character, along the lines of Guile in the first one, but it will be an actual Chun-Li film.[8] Screenwriter Justin Marks was attached to write a script for the adaptation. Street Fighter is set for a February 2009 release for the 20th anniversary of the fighting game series.[9] The film adaptation is part of Capcom's multi-platform launch for 2008 that will also launch video games and a potential TV series in 2008. Smallville actress Kristin Kreuk will be playing Chun-Li in the 2009 adaptation.[8] Singaporean actor Edmund Chen will play her father.

Animation

Chun-Li is a central character in Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie. An Interpol agent, she is investigating M. Bison's organization of Shadowlaw, which is suspected of murdering several diplomats. She requests to work with Guile to investigate Bison's organization. Guile is initially reluctant to work with her, more eager to pursue Bison himself. By the end of the movie, however, they have become inseparable. Chun-Li is voiced by Miki Fujitani in the Japanese release. In the English adaptation by Manga Entertainment, she is voiced by Lia Sargent.[10]

In a famous instance of fan service, an explicit scene shows Chun-Li showering in her apartment as a Shadaloo assassin, Vega, arrives to kill her. The shower scene has been censored to varying degrees in versions of the English dub.[11] Although she manages to drive Vega off — kicking him through a wall and sending him hurtling several stories to the ground — Chun-Li succumbs to her injuries and slips into a coma; she remains hospitalized for the rest of the movie. A distraught Guile promises her that he will make M. Bison pay. Following Bison's defeat at the hands of Ryu and Ken, Chun-Li pulls a prank on Guile by making it appear as if she has died while he was away. As Guile grieves beside her empty bed, she surprises him with a newspaper headline announcing the downfall of Bison's operations.

In the Japanese anime series Street Fighter II V, Chun-Li appears as the spirited tour guide to Ken and Ryu. Her character in this adaption is a far cry from The world's strongest woman, since she's mostly a Kung-Fu student under the guidance of her father, the highest-ranked police chief in Hong Kong. Chun-Li plays a sizeable role in the finale when she is brainwashed by Bison's psycho power.

Chun-Li was a regular character and a reporter as she was in the 1994 movie in the USA Network's animated television series Street Fighter. She was voiced by Donna Yamamoto.

Chun-Li also appears in Street Fighter Alpha: The Animation OVA, as an Interpol agent who investigates a mad scientist called Sadler that works for Shadaloo. She believes the trail can lead her to her father, who at the time, was missing and pressumed alive. She assists Ryu and Ken in finding a boy named Shun, kidnapped by Sadler to force him to succumb to the Satsui no Hadō.

Manga

In a Street Fighter II manga published in the 1990s (by Masaomi Kanzaki), Chun-Li remains in her established role of an interpol agent investigating Bison, yet frequently expresses her desire to earn Ryu's praise as a genuine fighter. As the Manga progresses, she eventually participates in a tournament arranged by Shadaloo, and outlasts many of the other warriors, eventually coming up against Vega, portrayed here as her father's killer. Chun-Li defeats Vega, but as in the SF II movie, she is exhausted from the fight, and she is pulled from the tournament. Her injuries prevent her from doing much when Ryu and Bison confront one another, except call off an air strike by Interpol. Chun-Li appears one final time in the closing pages of the final issue of the Manga in a panel illustration depicting her arrest of a drug peddler, she remains eager to prove herself to Ryu, and sends him a letter conveying that wish.

Much like the anime SF II movie, the story stands alone from the established canon. Chun-Li's hero worship of Ryu was later used for the character of Sakura in the Alpha games.

Chun-Li also appears in Masahiko Nakahira's Sakura Ganbaru! manga, in which she participates in a police raid to an illegal underground fighting circle. Later on, she follows the trails that lead her to an assassing which turns out to be Gen, from whom she suffers an utter defeat.

In the anime and manga based on Street Fighter Alpha, Chun-Li is again an agent of interpol as she is in almost all iterations save for the live action film. In the anime, she begins tracking down Ryu because of his battle with Sagat and Shadaloo's apparent interest in Ryu. Believing this information will in some way lead to further dismantling of Shadaloo, she seeks out Ryu and becomes involved in his struggle to defeat the temptation of the Dark Hadou.

In the manga, she encounters Ryu, who has fallen from grace when he began to give in to the Dark Hadou, and had hired himself out as a bodyguard to some drug smugglers. She winds up befriending Ryu and Birdie as well as Ken (which also happens in the anime), and Chun-Li, Ken, and Ryu begin trying to deal with the Dark Hadou, though Chun Li plays mostly a minor role in that regard. However, the three friends encounter members of Shadaloo, and Chun-Li, at the end of the first volume of the manga, rescues Cammy from being captured (or possibly killed, the manga doesn't say which, only that losers are 'stored' somewhere) after having her hand apparently crushed or at the least injured in some way by Sodom. Shadaloo in the manga is once again responsible for the death of her father, though the exact identity of the killer has yet to be revealed.

In comics

In the 1990s, Malibu Comics produced a short-lived series of Street Fighter comics, which featured Chun-Li as a starring character. She is depicted as having known Ryu and Ken since her late teens, as well as having a romantic interest in Ryu. The story primarily focuses not on Chun-Li or Ryu in particular, but rather on the events which follow the murder of Ken Masters. Due to the comic's abrupt end (it was cancelled after three issues), the storyline was never resolved.

When Udon comics picked up the comic book license for the Street Fighter franchise for American distribution, Chun-Li again became a central character, involved in the hunt for Bison and Shadaloo. However, in the new comic, it is not Bison or Vega who is the killer of Chun-Li's father, but rather Cammy, prior to her being freed from Bison's control. Chun-Li battles Cammy when they meet face to face for the first time. Chun-Li ultimately forgives Cammy for her actions, due to the fact that she was brainwashed to serve Bison at that time. As a result, Chun-Li turns her sights on Bison himself.

Chun-Li's mode of dress changes several times throughout the Udon comics, from the outfits worn in Street Fighter Alpha, to her more traditional qipao from the Street Fighter II games. She has received an invitation from Shadaloo to enter a tournament being held by Bison. The comic appears to be mixing elements of the various games together. The story is currently ongoing, though Udon has yet to release the next volume of the series.

Media influences

Music

Chun-Li has inspired some influence on the music industry. The British rock band Arctic Monkeys have an instrumental song titled "Chun Li's Spinning Bird Kick" and was nominated for a Grammy for Best Rock Instrumental Performance. Wyclef Jean sings in his version of the song Guantanamera: "If your name was Chun-Li, we'd be playin' Street Fighter." The Japanese rap/rock band Orange Range mentions Chun-Li in the Japanese side of Viva Rock. Nerdcore hip-hop artist Beefy dedicated a song to Chun-Li. In Fall 2008, Hip Hop Artist MeccaGodZilla (aka Ryu Black) teamed up with Mega Ran (PA & AZ), Masia One (Canada) & DJ Sarasa (Japan) to dedicate a love song to Chun Li.

Films

In the Jackie Chan live-action movie City Hunter, Chan's character magically transformed to Chun-Li and fought against his adversaries (he was first transformed into E. Honda).

There is a fight scene in the Shrek 2 movie, where princess Fiona performs Chun-Li's Spinning Kick against her opponents. She also performs a Shoryuken, a special move of the Ken, Ryu and Akuma characters.

Comic books

Issue #5 of the widely acclaimed comic book series Demo deals with a young woman whose physical appearance changes to match the desires and perceptions of those around her. In one scene, her body and clothing briefly change to match those of Chun-Li from the Street Fighter Alpha series.

Actresses

Promotion and reception

A Chun-Li-inspired costume for players to use in Sony's LittleBigPlanet was released on December 12th of 2008 as downloadable content for the title.[12]

IGN ranked Chun-Li at number three in their "Top 25 Street Fighter Characters" article, noting that while sexism is factored into her initial design, "[she's] come a long way over the years. She's by far the most popular female fighting game character out there, and if you try to start naming off better-known women in videogaming period, you're going to wind up with a pretty short list."[13] GameDaily listed her at number one on their "Top 20 Street Fighter Characters of All Time" article, praising her character evolution and for balanced gameplay.[14] Spike featured her in their "Top 10 Video Game Vixens" article at number four, citing a preference for her muscular thighs.[15] UGO.com ranked her ninth in their "Top 50 Videogame Hotties" article, stating "Chun Li's female presence and early dominance of the fighting game genre propelled her into the minds of many early fanboys."[16] She was awarded Hottest Babe of 1992 by Electronic Gaming Monthly, tying with Blaze from Streets of Rage.[17]

References

  1. ^ Atsuko Tanaka (seiyuu). Anime News Network. Retrieved on 2009-02-09
  2. ^ a b c d e Street Fighter Week: The Evolution of Chun-Li and Blanka. gamesradar.com. Retrieved on 2008-4-1.
  3. ^ Chun-Li Biography. IGN. Retrieved on 2008-4-1.
  4. ^ a b Chun-Li. Retro Junk. Retrieved on 2008-4-1.
  5. ^ "Gamefly Presents Hottest Chicks Ever," PlayStation The Official Magazine 13 (November 2008): 50.
  6. ^ Ending for Street Fighter III 3rd Strike - Chun Li (Arcade). VGMuseum. Retrieved on 2008-4-4.
  7. ^ Street Fighter (1994). IMBD. Retrieved on 2008-4-8.
  8. ^ a b c John Gaudiosi (2006-11-01). "Exclusive: Capcom Talks New Street Fighter Movie". GameDaily BIZ. Retrieved 2007-02-10.
  9. ^ Pamela McClintock (2006-10-29). "'Street Fighter' packs Hyde Park punch". Variety. Retrieved 2007-02-10. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
  10. ^ Sutorîto Faitâ II gekijô-ban. IMBD. Retrieved on 2008-4-8.
  11. ^ Noah Davis. Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie (1994). PopMatters. Retrieved on 2008-4-8.
  12. ^ Acevedo, Jay (2008-12-12). Weekly Playstation Store Update - December 12. Game Focus. Retrieved on 2008-12-18
  13. ^ Top 25 Street Fighter Characters - The Final Five. IGN. Retrieved on 2008-08-15
  14. ^ Top 20 Street Fighter Characters of All Time. GameDaily. Retrieved on 2008-11-13
  15. ^ Staff (2008-11-10). Top 10 Video Game Vixens. Spike. Retrieved on 2008-12-14
  16. ^ Top 50 Videogame Hotties. UGO.com. Retrieved on 2008-12-14
  17. ^ "Electronic Gaming Monthly's Buyer's Guide". 1993. {{cite journal}}: |access-date= requires |url= (help); Cite has empty unknown parameters: |month= and |coauthors= (help); Cite journal requires |journal= (help)

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