A Musical Note: Monkey King Released

We continue this irregular series of public posts with "Monkey King Released" from the soundtrack of The Forbidden Kingdom.

The Forbidden Kingdom, a  Westernized movie based on The Journey West, is perhaps best known for its spectacular martial-arts battle between the two great stars of Hong Kong Action flicks, Jackie Chan and Jet Li. I enjoyed the movie -- it was well done with some excellent action and a deeper plot than might have been expected -- but in some ways it was the soundtrack and the imagery of the Monkey King that influenced me most. 

The movie was released while I was working on Grand Central Arena, and as I had already decided that Sun Wu Kung, the Monkey King, was one of the Hyperions, this movie went right into the mix of background that made him -- even though it wouldn't be until years later that I would actually use the character himself, when writing Spheres of Influence. The music particularly influenced me, and as I mentioned in the very first A Musical Note, pieces of the soundtrack became set pieces or themes that actually provided the structure of scenes that I wrote.

This particular piece is one of the climactic events of Spheres, in which a mass of Arenaverse creatures have inexplicably intruded into the battle between the Blessed's small fleet and Orphan's Zounin-Ginjou. Previously, Wu Kung was lost -- thrown into the endless void by the flagship Thilomon. Now, in the midst of this chaotic battle, Thilomon's bridge window is, impossibly, shattered, and a figure is seen emerging from the mist and dust: Sun Wu Kung has returned. He pauses to apologize for failing Ariane -- who naturally says that doesn't matter, what matters is that Wu is safe. And that is enough to ignite Sun Wu Kung's irrepressible spirit anew and send him on a one-man assualt on the crew of a battleship.