Sonny Liew both defies and engages many stereotypes about Asian Americans in The Shadow Hero. The mother in the story is the stereotypical tiger mom. She decides what she wants her son to be like and tries to create a life for him as a super hero. By forcing this new lifestyle, upon Hank, she exemplifies the overbearing Asian mother stereotype. However, towards the end of the story, she begins to develop as a character. She is proud of her son and let’s him fight without interrupting him again. Liew also portrays Americans in the United States as xenophobic towards the Chinese immigrants. He shows Hank being called a chink. Additionally the superhero before Green Turtle was caucasian.
There are some stereotypes that Liew does challenge in his book. He portrays Red Center, daughter of Ten Grand as a strong female. Normally, Chinese women and girls are deemed shy, quiet, and submissive. Red is nothing to that image. She defies her father and follows her gut by forcing Hank to fight. Not only does she rely on no one but herself, but she is very resourceful and has a will of her own. Similarly, the stereotype of the scrawny and nerdy Asian was challenged in the story through Hank’s character. After training and working to become a super hero, Hank overcame this stereotype. He became a superhero, just like Anchor Man. His heritage did not stop him.
The tradition of killing others to qualify to be the new leader was broken by Hank. Rather than killing his opponent, Hank arrested him and put him on trial. He broken the old culture and perhaps this symbolizes breaking connections with one’s home country after immigration. However there wasn’t a negative connotation behind this; I took it to mean that sometimes reform can be good.
