Wolf Gnards

Ever since my David Carradine tribute, people have been asking me if the Five Point Exploding Heart Technique is a real kung fu move. The simple answer is “no.” The slightly more complex answer is “Of course, it’s not real, are you some sort of mental!” A good rule of thumb is if a martial arts move involves some sort of flying, laser beams, or chi energy, it probably is not the real deal. However, it did get me thinking about my favorite fictional martial arts styles. These are some of best moves to watch and to pantomime with friends in grand pretend battles.

10. Shaq Fu

If you’re a big guy doing some fake fighting, you’ve probably broken out some Shaq Fu (as well as a wide array of Andre the Giant signature wrestling moves). Around the time Shaq was pretending to be a genie, he also got really into pretending he could fight. While Shaquille O’Neal is fully capable of picking me up and dunking my ass through a basket, I don’t think I have to worry much about his basketball kung fu style. There are no Shaq-urikins or inferno kinks, and Shaq is certainly not a martial arts expert. Although, I definitely wouldn’t mess with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.

9. Iron Fist/Leopard Blow

Iron Fist is one of the most proficient martial artist in the Marvel universe. The iron fist maneuver focuses all a person’s chi energy into the hand, creating an iron-like impervious punch. It may be hard to believe, but the iron fist is a very real maneuver, however, to attain the powers of the iron fist one must plunge their hand into the molten heart of a dragon. So, good luck with that. The DC answer to Iron Fist is Richard Dragon. He uses a dragon amulet to focus chi energy (hmmm… sounds familiar). Richard Dragon, along with Lady Shiva and Batman, know the most powerful martial arts move in DC comics, the leopard blow. The Leopard blow is depicted different by almost every artists, all we know for sure is that it’s bad ass and can kill almost instantly.

Follow up:

8. Buddha Palm

The Buddha Palm or Buddhist Palm is a staple of fake kung fu. It’s basically a simple open palm strike, except (and this is where the fictionalized element comes in) pumped up on chi energy. If a move requires chi or qi or ki energy, it’s a safe bet that it is not real. Now whether or not you believe in chi is irrelevant, and whether or not chi energy actually exists is also irrelevant. Actually doing anything useful with said chi energy is the issue and that issue is just not happening. For good examples of the Buddha Palm check out Kung Fu Hustle or the Tekken video game series.

7. Flight (Wudang)

Wudang is a real style of martial arts named after the Wudang Mountains. It’s a “soft” style which uses your opponents strength and aggression against themselves. However, soft does not mean feather light. After years of training, few ever master levitation. In fact none have. Well, not if you don’t count David Blaine. After your black belt, please, do not expect to fly, balance on trees, or walk on water as demonstrated in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.

6. Gun Kata

Popularized in the film, Equilibrium, Gun Kata is based upon the premise that the trajectories of gun fire are statistically predictable. By memorizing positions, one can fire at the most likely location of an enemy without aiming at him and not be in the path of return fire. As silly as it is useless in a gun fight. Gun Kata is essentially the full realization of Gun Fu: The dual wielding, slow motion jumping firearms of John Woo films. Awesome, but useless if actually under fire.

5. Five point Palm Exploding Heart

The Five Point Palm Exploding Heart Technique is why this list was started. The move in question was created by Pei Mei of the White Lotus clan and is said to be, “Quite simply, the deadliest blow in all of martial arts. He hits you with his finger tips at five different pressure points on your body and then lets you walk away. But once you’ve taken five steps, your heart explodes inside your body and you fall to the floor… dead.” Fun to watch, fun to say, but impossible to do. A Touch of Death, or Dim Mak, can be found elsewhere in fiction like Fist of the Northstar or Xena: Warrior Princess. Most demonstrations of Dim Mak have been verified as scams.

4. Ohinemuri Touch, aka The Big Sleep

While the Ohinemuri Touch falls into the Dim Mak category, it’s actually my favorite example of a death touch, so it gets its own little entry. Batman the Animated series has done more for canonizing Batman mythos than any other medium. Some of my favorite episodes involved Bruce Wayne remembering his past training (Zatanna’s sexy legs anyone?), his martial arts training in particular. Kyodai Ken, Bruce’s arch rival in martial arts training, sets out to find a scroll containing the forbidden art of Kiba no Hoko (The Way of the Fang), but can only decipher its death blow, the Ohinemuri Touch. The move, of course, doesn’t exist, and the show’s Japanese translations are questionable at best. Still DC needs to bring Kyodai Ken to the comics.

3. The Glow

Berry Gordy’s martial arts masterpiece The Last Dragon features “The Glow.” The glow is the final level of the main character’s martial arts training represented by, you guessed it, a glow around his body. I’m not sure what it does besides making a few sparks; he does catch a bullet with his teeth, but that could just be from drinking his milk. The film’s hero, Leroy Green (Bruce Leroy) and the shogun of Harlem, of course, face off at the end with dueling glows. Much like Star Wars, bad guys glow red; pretty convenient color coding. However, the glow pails in comparison to the might of little Ernie Reyes, Jr.

2.Crane Kick

The Crane Technique is the ultimate in fake karate maneuvers. Who hasn’t practiced this move on a stump. In fact, wherever there’s a stump, rest assured I’m on it doing the crane. Mr. Miyagi states, “If do right, no can defense.” Of course, doing it right involves your little blond opponent running full steam into your foot. The Crane Kick was created by fight choreographer Pat E. Johnson purely for film and bares little resemblance to any actual crane fighting style.

1. Hadouken

The Hadouken is the special attack of Ryu and Ken in the Street Fighter series. The hadouken creates a spirit fireball by harnessing (what else!?) chi energy, or more precisely down, forward, punch. This is a favorite playground fighting move for any 10-year-old boy. It’s related to Dragonball Z’s equally famous Kamehameha (Turtle Striking Wave). The hadouken though is preferable in a fake fight to the kamehameha because the kamehameha simply takes too long to charge. It’s just too long and too slow to say “Ka-meeeeeh-a-meeeeeh-a!”

If flight and death blows were possible the streets would be littered with far more dead bodies with culprits flying away into the night.

But with enough training though, greatness is possible…