YMMV / The Paper Tigers

• Awesome Moments:
  • Despite being out-of-practice and disabled, Hing actually puts up a good fight against a younger, stronger opponent.
  • Carter might be a Smug Snake Arrogant Kung-Fu Guy, but it's hard not to cheer for him when he defeats all three Tigers after the way they treated him as a kid.
  • Jim proposes slowing Zhen Fan down by knocking over his motorcycle, which weighs four-hundred pounds. The Tigers stare in shock as he lifts it up with one hand.
  • Dan defeats Zhen Fan.
    Dan: "The fiercest tigers cannot share the same mountain." Keep your damn mountain.
• Funny Moments:
  • As teenagers, Sifu Cheung tells them to hold a squatting stance until Hing farts.
  • The many times the Tigers get into fights and try to show off their skills, only for their aging bodies to fail them.
  • Dan mocks Carter as "a fortune cookie made with white flour."
  • Hing says he found the medicine Danny needed "behind his gonorrhea pills."
  • Carter defeating Hing, removing his Dodgy Toupee with a spear, and knocking it away like a hockey puck. We later see the toupee attached to the head of the same spear.
  • Jim's understandably negative reaction when Zhen Fan says he'll throw both of them off the roof if they lose. Dan reassures him by saying he'll go first and cushion Jim's fall.
  • Jim offers Dan "performance enhancers" while he's losing to Zhen Fan. When Dan refuses, Jim admits they were fake and he was just trying to invoke the Magic Feather trope.
  • Jim psyches Dan up by making him declare over and over "I believe that I can win. I believe that I can win!" Cut to Zhen Fan breaking bricks with his bare hands.
    Dan: I believe he's going to kill me!
• Heartwarming Moments:
  • Dan and Hing offer Sifu Cheung's ashes to Sifu Wong as they think he'd be happier having his ashes in a place where kung-fu is practiced, even if it's a place belonging to a rival clan. At the end, we see home videos of Dan teaching kung-fu to his son in the garage with Cheung's ashes and picture in the background.
  • On his way to duel Zhen Fan, Dan calls his son for what might be the last time and teaches him over the phone to make a fist and throw a punch.
  • The Three Tigers going back to their roots at the end of the movie. Jim is seen teaching kung-fu after giving it up for Brazilian jiu-jitsu. Hing is seen giving free checkups for seniors after he gave it up in favor of a well-paid security guard job. And Dan is seen spending time with his son teaching him kung-fu in front of Sifu Cheung's shrine.
• Rooting for the Empire: Smug as it he is, one can't help but feel at least some sympathy for Carter as he handily beats the Three Tigers, considering how they treated him the same way when they were teens. Director Bao Tran says this was intentional, to show how being an Arrogant Kung-Fu Guy isn't as much fun when you're on the losing end and that this is the Three Tigers getting a taste of their own medicine.
• Tear Jerker:
  • As the Tigers investigate Sifu Cheung's death, they learn more about how much they hurt him when they left him one by one.
    • The three teens who made a scene at Cheung's funeral reveal they greatly respected him and that he refused to take them as students due to his bitterness at "ungrateful disciples".
    • Dan reveals to Jim that Cheung actually disapproved of them going to the tournament in Japan as he felt kung-fu should not be used to make money. The argument led to Dan and Cheung's falling out and Dan's guilt led to him abandoning Jim in Japan.
    • Hing reveals he put his well-paid job as a hotel security guard before Cheung and their free healing clinics and they just gradually lost touch.
  • As Dan leaves to confront Zhen Fan, he calls his ex-wife and son one last time. He agrees to any kind of custody agreement his wife chooses and teaches Ed to make a fist and throw a punch over the phone.