A Vincent and Kwai Chang Caine Parallel

[Sgt. Saunders]

“Beauty and the Beast” and “Kung Fu” are two tv series which featured strong, noble and unfailingly self-effacing lead male characters. Vincent, part man and part lion, is an individual who protects and cares for the inhabitants of the World Below, a utopian society, located under the vast New York City subway system.

Kwai Chang Caine is a Eurasian man, who was raised in a monastery by Shaolin priests in the Hunan province of China. Caine learned both martial arts and esoteric Eastern philosophy while there. Caine eventually leaves China to try and find his half-brother in the Western United States. During his travels throughout the United States, Caine encounters many people, whom he attempts to help as a caring Shaolin priest. Unfortunately, Caine encounters many hardened and evil individuals in his travels, and the kind and normally gentle Caine is forced to employ his expert martial skills to defeat the evil-doers.

I find it interesting that both Vincent and Caine are such benign and deeply thoughtful individuals. Yet, when forced into action, both men quickly and even ruthlessly dispatch their opponents, Caine by implementing his extensive knowledge of Kung Fu to defeat his foes and Vincent by employing his lethal fangs and claws to literally eviscerate his enemies.