The Marvel Cinematic Universe recruiting one of the greatest actors of all-time to make their Hollywood debut in a blockbuster comic book adaptation was a huge coup for the franchise, and it came as no surprise when Tony Leung knocked his role as Wenwu clean out of the park in Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings.
Bringing charisma and gravitas by the bucketload to the part of Wenwu, a conflicted father who went about trying to repair his fractured family and broken heart in the most misguided and power-hungry fashion imaginable, no list of the MCU’s best-ever villains on screens big or small is complete without mentioning Leung’s performance.
And yet, when he was speaking at the Venice Film Festival to celebrate his lifetime achievement award (per Deadline), he opined on his upcoming Infernal Affairs reunion with Andy Lau in The Goldfinger (also known as Once Upon a Time in Hong Kong), where he shared his excitement at “finally” being able to play a bad guy.
He admitted it’s “very challenging to me to play the bad guy,” which is fair enough, but didn’t he literally just break bad two years ago in one of the best-reviewed origin stories in the world’s biggest franchise? Maybe he doesn’t see Wenwu as being irredeemable, but seeing as he manipulated an ancient power and bent it to his will in order to achieve personal gain, he definitely ticked the box marked “villain.”
