• Tony Leung revealed he argued with director Destin Daniel Cretton over Wenwu’s fighting style on the Shang-Chi set.
• Leung wanted his 1,000-year-old character to use a combination of martial arts styles — like MMA — rather than traditional ’70s-style kung fu.
• Cretton’s response shut it down immediately: “This is Marvel.”
• Leung also opened up about the emotional core of Wenwu, rooted in grief and his character’s complicated love for his children.
• Shang-Chi director Cretton has since moved on to helm Spider-Man: Brand New Day for Marvel.

Tony Leung has a note for Marvel. They just didn’t take it.

The legendary Hong Kong actor, who played Xu Wenwu — the 1,000-year-old leader of the Ten Rings organization — in Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, is opening up about a creative disagreement he had on set that ended about as quickly as it started. Speaking to Vulture, Leung recalled pushing back against the film’s fight choreography, only to receive a three-word response from director Destin Daniel Cretton that made clear there was no room for debate.

“At the very beginning, I argued with the director: ‘If a guy comes from 1,000 years ago, the way he fights must be a combination of all martial arts, like MMA today, because he lived through all that time,'” Leung said. “And the director said no. I said, ‘Why not? Why just typical kung fu in the ’70s?’ He said, ‘This is Marvel.’ I said, ‘Okay,’ and I didn’t argue anymore.”

It’s a fair point, honestly. A warrior who has been alive for a millennium, amassing power and influence across continents and centuries, would logically have picked up a few more tricks than what you’d see in a Bruce Lee film. But Marvel had its vision, and that was that.

A Very Different Kind of Film Set

For Leung — an Oscar-nominated icon whose career spans decades of acclaimed Hong Kong cinema — stepping into the Marvel machine was a culture shock in the best and most bureaucratic sense. “The production was much bigger than what I had experienced before, and the people were very professional, and we had to finish everything on time every day,” he said. “It’s very efficient, but you can’t improvise. You can’t even change a word.”

That’s a significant adjustment for an actor with Leung’s pedigree. He’s built a career on nuance, instinct, and collaborating with directors who prize personal vision above all else. “To me, the script is not important. The director is more interesting,” he said, describing his broader philosophy on filmmaking. He trusts directors over pages — which may be exactly why, once Cretton made his position clear, Leung let it go.

Even so, the fight choreography note wasn’t the only thing Leung brought to the role. Despite his frustration with how Wenwu moved, what he gave the character emotionally is what made the performance land.

The Question That Unlocked Wenwu

Despite the creative friction, Leung found genuine depth in playing Wenwu — not as a villain in the conventional sense, but as a man consumed by grief. The character’s menace, it turns out, was always secondary to his heartbreak.

Leung recalled a moment on set that crystallized everything. “I remember one day the director suddenly asked me a question when I just passed by: ‘Do you love your kids?'” he said. “I said, ‘Yes, but I don’t know how.’ So that’s the relationship between me and my kids in the film. Because I immersed myself with the death of my wife.”

“I don’t care about any other thing,” he added. “So maybe that brings the romance of that character. He is always living in the past.”

That answer — “yes, but I don’t know how” — is quietly devastating, and it’s exactly what you feel watching Wenwu on screen. He’s not a man without love. He’s a man who has forgotten how to give it.

Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings grossed $432.2 million worldwide in 2021, an impressive number considering theaters were still finding their footing post-pandemic. The film’s fight sequences were widely praised, even if they didn’t quite match Leung’s original vision for the character.

As for what’s next: Simu Liu’s Shang-Chi is confirmed to appear in Avengers: Doomsday, and Liu has publicly insisted a full sequel will happen — though Marvel hasn’t made anything official. Wenwu, meanwhile, has shown up in the animated series What If? and Marvel Zombies, voiced by a different actor. There’s no indication Leung will reprise the role anytime soon.

Cretton, for his part, has moved well within the Marvel system since — he’s now directing Spider-Man: Brand New Day and co-created the Disney+ series Wonder Man. Apparently “this is Marvel” works as both an explanation and a career path.

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