Secret Level Season 1 Episode 2, “Sifu: It Takes a Life,” opens on a busy street in China where a young man (Parry Shen) sits and plays a game with an old woman (Lydia Look) running a food stall. When the young man asks why her food is so good, she explains it is because she puts 60 years of her life into it. The old woman wins the game, and the man calls her lucky. She says she has been lucky for five days straight and will continue to be lucky until whoever he is waiting for shows up.
Secret Level, “Sifu: It Takes a Life”
As if on cue, three burly guys knock around a random person on the street and cockily strut away. The young man notices a red handprint tattoo on one of the men’s forearms and this triggers a flashback.
The animation changes to a sketchy black-and-white style as a burly brute with the same marking snaps the neck of another man. A boy hiding in the closet calls out to his father, attracting the thug’s attention. He opens the door, laughs, then swings a machete at the screaming child just before we return to the present.
The Club
The young man follows them, determined as the old woman warns that those men will kill him to which he replies, “You get used to it.” He follows them into a neon-lined nightclub where he finds the goons already causing trouble with a lady at the bar.
“Where is he?” the stranger asks which prompts one of the brutes to take a swing with a nearby bottle. The challenger deflects the blow, takes the bottle, and smashes it across the goon’s face. For good measure, he slams his head down to the bar using the rest of the bottle.
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Our friend exchanges a few quick blows with the second thug and takes him down pretty easily. However, the last brute wields a knife, and after a quick scuffle, the ruffian gets the best of the stranger and slits his throat. He gurgles and falls to the ground causing everyone to rush out of the club. While the gangster calls his superior to tell him what happened, the stranger stands behind him. A string of four coins hanging from his waist glows as he rubs his now-healed throat.
The Price of a Life
After another quick scuffle, the stranger manages to get the knife a make a quick slice across the thug’s chest. The brute makes a run for it up some stairs, but the stranger throws the knife right into his back, laying him out in a glass hallway. As the stranger looks through the glass floor, he makes eye contact with another gangster who is covered in bandages.
Suddenly, a group of armed thugs rushes into the hallway, and the stranger puts up a fight but is quickly overwhelmed. The group takes turns beating him with weapons as the bandaged thug watches from below.
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A final blow sends the stranger into some sort of alternate realm. Here, an older version of himself shows the previous fight over and over. As he lies on the ground, one of the golden coins breaks into pieces. He returns to the present fight as an older, wiser version of himself.
Learning from his vision, the stranger corrects his mistake and takes out a few more thugs. The stranger goes down again and returns with one less coin (now down to two) to finish off the group.
Leaving the carnage behind him, the stranger limps into a large room where the bandaged thug sits and waits. The stranger is now significantly older, and the gangster calls him an old man. He taunts the stranger by telling him to bring it on since his life means so little. They square up to fight, and the screen cuts to black.
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Was It Worth It?
The stranger, now elderly (Ping Wu), returns to the food stall where the old woman says she served his grandson. The old man says his “grandson” told him they were the best dumplings in town because she put 60 years of her life into them. He asks if it was worth it and as realization washes over the woman’s face, she reaches for his hand and says, “You tell me.” As the camera pans out, a puddle of water on the street shows the stranger’s reflection is that of a young boy.
Secret Level is now streaming on Prime Video.
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