The "Everybody Gangs Up On The Super-Bad Guy" wuxia ending

[Ken Cheng]

When it comes to adaptations of wuxia novels, TV and movie producers sometimes can't help going for the "Every Powerful Good Guy Gangs Up On The Super Powerful Bad Guy" ending. You know the drill: the bad guy has obtained some super martial art that makes him invincible. Even the most powerful good guys can't defeat him one-on-one, and even when ganging up on him, one or two of them must sacrifice their lives to secure the bad guy's defeat. Usually, the TV/movie producers need to radically rewrite the ending of a wuxia novel's story to make this work. Notable examples are TVB's DGSD '81 (where Siu Yeun San, Deun Yu, and Hui Juk had to team up to defeat a superpowered Mo Yung Bok, and Siu had to sacrifice his life) and LUK SIU FUNG III: THE BATTLE OF MO DONG (where Luk Siu Fung, Sai Mun Chui Sheut, Fa Mun Lau, See Hung Jak Sing, and Widow Fa had to gang up on the Jade Taoist/Old Sabre Tyrant, and See Hung and the widow sacrificed themselves). Leung Yu Sang's DRAGON INN ended this way (although I think that was true to the novel and not an innovation of the movie), but how many wuxia novels actually ended this way?

[danshu_]

I don't know about novels ending like that, but at least in movies, the "final fight scene" has become such an integral part, expected by the audience, a martial arts movie without a big final fight would probably be a huge letdown. Whats interesting in this genre is that filmmakers have no qualms about making the bad guy all powerful, and the heroes have to dishonourably gang up in order to beat him.

[Extremer88]

I don't know why, but most of the time the main villain would have some supernatural powers that is way powerful than compared to the good guys. Then we see good guys lying on the floor coughing blood, then the villain would laugh out loud...

[K2Grey]

It is sorta expected in the martial arts genre, but I find that in Jin Yong's novels this rarely, if ever, happens. The main characters tend to be more powerful in kungfu than the most powerful bad characters, you didn't see a lengthy and protracted fight between the 3 Greats and GWM for example. The only time I can think of a big protagonist vs antagonist showdown was in XAJH with Dongfang Bubai.

[TommyH]

Yes this is always what tends to happen. That's why I don't like these endings. It would be better if the antagonists are still many times stronger and the protagonists will have to run for their lives. then they live forever peacefully and happily after somewhere in japan. lol i'm exagerating.

[bloodstar]

It is sorta expected in the martial arts genre, but I find that in Jin Yong's novels this rarely, if ever, happens. The main characters tend to be more powerful in kungfu than the most powerful bad characters, you didn't see a lengthy and protracted fight between the 3 Greats and GWM for example. The only time I can think of a big protagonist vs antagonist showdown was in XAJH with Dongfang Bubai.

I've always felt that showdown was quite a let-down... after all that build-up in the earlier chapters DFBB only appeared for 2 pages and that fight only lasted a couple of paragraphs. And the protagonists had to resort to underhanded means to defeat DFBB.

[Trien Chieu]

This is one of them

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