Master of Kung Fu #26
☆ Be the first to review + Add to your collection — Join freeMaster of Kung Fu #26 is the comic-book debut of Fah Lo Suee — Shang-Chi's half-sister, daughter of Fu Manchu, and one of the most enduring antagonists the series would produce. By bringing her over from Sax Rohmer's pulp novels, writer Doug Moench deepened the book's thematic core: the Si-Fan is no longer just Fu Manchu's blunt instrument but a family battleground where blood loyalties, ambition, and betrayal collide. The issue also marks Moench's ongoing strategy of mining Rohmer's full literary cast to give the series a richness well beyond typical Bronze Age action fare, a creative choice that would sustain the title for nearly a decade.
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We Buy Collections ▸History
By the time issue #26 went to press (released December 10, 1974, cover-dated March 1975), Doug Moench had already begun reshaping the series after the original creative team of Steve Englehart and Jim Starlin departed following issue #17 — Englehart over editorial disputes with Roy Thomas, and Starlin uncomfortable with Rohmer's source material. Moench collaborated here with penciller Keith Pollard and inker Sal Trapani, a team distinct from his celebrated later partnership with Paul Gulacy that had just begun in issue #22. The cover was provided by Gil Kane with inks by Tom Palmer, and Roy Thomas served as editor — the same editorial figure whose insistence on using the licensed Fu Manchu universe had defined the series from its inception.
Trivia · 8 facts
- First Marvel Comics appearance of Fah Lo Suee (later renamed Zheng Bao Yu), the half-sister of Shang-Chi and daughter of Fu Manchu/Zheng Zu.
- The story is titled 'Daughter of Darkness!' and is set in El-Khârga, Egypt, making it also the first appearance of that location in the Marvel Universe.
- Written by Doug Moench, pencilled by Keith Pollard, inked by Sal Trapani, colored by George Roussos, lettered by Charlotte Jetter; cover pencils by Gil Kane, cover inks by Tom Palmer; edited by Roy Thomas.
- Fah Lo Suee is a licensed character originally created by English pulp novelist Sax Rohmer, first appearing in the 1917 novel The Hand of Fu-Manchu (also known as The Si-Fan Mysteries), and named 'Fah Lo Suee' — meaning 'Sweet Perfume' — in his 1931 novel Daughter of Fu Manchu.
- The issue also introduces Lord Robert Greville (son of the Rohmer novels' Shan Greville) and the Golden Beetle relic of the pharaoh Seth-Amon, both making their first Marvel appearances.
- The plot establishes a key character dynamic: Fah Lo Suee privately suggests to a young Shang-Chi that the two siblings might one day want their father dead — a tension that recurs throughout the run.
- Fah Lo Suee is later re-encountered in Journey into Mystery #514–516 (1997–98) operating under the alias 'Cursed Lotus,' and is formally renamed Zheng Bao Yu in The Fearless Defenders #8 (2013) after Marvel's Rohmer license lapsed.
- Issue #26 is collected in the Master of Kung Fu Epic Collection Vol. 1: Weapon of the Soul (2018), which required Marvel to reach a new licensing arrangement with the Rohmer estate — reprinting these stories had been impossible for years after the original license expired in 1983.
Cast · 4 characters
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Key issues in Master of Kung Fu
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