Originally born in the mind of the legendary Bruce Lee, Warrior was brought to life in 2019 over four decades after his passing by Jonathan Tropper, Justin Lin, and Lee's own daughter Shannon. Airing for two seasons on Cinemax, Warrior seemingly was at an end after Cinemax ceased original programming until the show was picked up for season 3 on HBO Max. As one would expect from a show conceived by Bruce Lee, Warrior is one of the most martial arts-heavy series around today, with stunt coordinator Brett Chan handling the show's astonishing action scenes.
Brett Chan has worked in stunts for over twenty years as a stunt man, stunt coordinator, and fight choreographer. His past work includes movies and TV shows like Smallville, White House Down, Shazam!, and the Snowpiercer TV series, among many others. Chan brings his vast expertise in stunts and action design to Warrior, orchestrating the action scenes of the Old West martial arts drama with the kind of energy and finesse that Bruce Lee envisioned for the show.
Chan speaks to Screen Rant on his work on the first two seasons of Warrior, the show's continuation on HBO Max, and its nomination for Outstanding Stunt Coordination at the 73rd Primetime Emmys.
Screen Rant: You've been on Warrior for both seasons, with the show now headed into season 3. How did you first join the show?
Brett Chan: I was on Skyscraper at the time with Dwayne Johnson. J.J. Perry actually got called for the show first, but he was the second unit director on Skyscraper, and the other producer Richard Sharkey knew me, we worked together on Marco Polo. He had called me and asked if I wanted to come over and meet Justin Lin and Danielle Woodrow, just to get the feel for the show. So they flew me out to L.A., I met with them, it seemed like a really good fit, and I said, "Yeah", so that's how I got onto the show. It's kind of nerve-wracking, because you're doing something that Bruce Lee was supposed to do like 40 years ago, and they're going to trust you with this vision and the look of it. So if you mess this up, it's really bad for me and my career, especially if it goes a way you're not planning, but it turned out pretty good.
Yes, and especially since the first two seasons were added to HBO Max, it's been like, "This is the show you should be watching."
Brett Chan: Yeah, and we were on Cinemax before, and Cinemax was so hard to watch, so the fanbase wasn't that big because no one could actually watch it, nobody knew at the time what Cinemax was. I was telling someone the other day, we had a Facebook petition online that had like 8,000 signatures, but the moment that HBO Max took it up and released it, within a week, it went up to like 70,000. That was the exposure and it was great.
So, looking at seasons 1 and 2, you had a lot of great martial artists like Andrew Koji, Joe Taslim, and Michael Bisping. What are some of your favorite moments in the general experience from the first two seasons with them?
Brett Chan: The first season was everyone just getting their bearings together. The writers were starting to get together, the actors were getting into their characters, the directors were getting into their groove on the show, so that was just kind of feeling it out and making it all happen, but we created this great thing with a great family on the show itself. The show topic is an anomaly, and everyone just really came together, it was so great. Season 2, they intensified the script, because obviously, they have to go bigger, but the characters were a little more grounded now because they'd been able to develop. So that's why in season 2, all their characters really come out and so do a couple of new ones. The feeling was a big family we created because even after season 2 ended, we stayed in contact all the time, we're always talking, and I think season 3 is going to have an even bigger impact, because it's a rejuvenation of the series, and the characters are going to be even more colorful.
With Warrior being in an Old West setting and based on a concept that Bruce Lee originally came up with, what's the process like of designing the action scenes of the show and making them specific to the setting and the time that the show takes place in?
Brett Chan: Essentially, when Jonathan Tropper writes his episodes, he actually writes a lot of action, because he's actually a martial artist himself, but he tells me, "Brett, I know you're going to make things different", and it changes because of the character, his mindset, what's happening in the story, if he's moving to kill or just to beat people up. That changes his movement, so I'll choreograph according to that, and I'll have a chat with the actor, and they tell exactly where they're going, mindset-wise, and that helps me develop the style because it doesn't just go, "Okay, every move is going to be the same." It's going to be completely different, because right now he's moving at a point of desperation, or right now he's angry, or now he's injured so he has to deal with moving differently as well. For the guys, it all depends on who they are, how big they are, how small they are, how they'll execute power or speed, and how they're built. The technique is still the same, but they'll look completely different. So I have to take that into account just to create the realism of the fight because if everybody is having the same impact from that one punch, it doesn't seem like it's going to be realistic at that point, unless there's a movement utilized for the power.
So, after the first two seasons, what would you say is your favorite episode so far?
Brett Chan: That's really hard to tell. The riot scene in episode 9 of season 2 is insane. One that strikes home to me is episode 5 of season 2 with the police raid.
Yeah, that kind of has a little bit of a feel like The Raid to it!
Brett Chan: Yeah, the acting points I think for these guys were so dynamic, because you had Joe, who was just out for blood because of what was happening with Mai Ling and Zing, so his fight movement was so dramatically charged with him and Zing. And Hoon [Lee] was in desperation mode trying to play his poker face and it fails. He's not a martial artist, but how's he going to survive this? Then when Joe's walking down the stairs and you had that long dagger, as he's slicing these guys going through, he knows there's nowhere to go, he's been found out, and Zing's already there, so he just has to kill Zing. Every time he moved, every time he stabbed or cut or hit someone, it was like he wanted him to feel it, and you wanted the audience to feel it, like when he stabbed the guy in the armpit. When he did that, it's how he did it and how he pulled it out. Everything was so deliberate and savage, and I coined this phrase where he wants to hit them so savagely that his ancestors will feel it. If you watch his facial expressions and how he draws weapons in that moment, you'll feel it yourself.
Well, with the Emmys coming up, how did that feel to find out that Warrior was nominated for Outstanding Stunt Coordination?
Brett Chan: It's fantastic. Season 1 we submitted, but I don't think there was enough audience base to actually watch it to know what it was about, and it didn't matter how good the stuff was in it. There wasn't exposure, people hadn't seen it, but with season 2 now, a lot of people have seen it and the exposure is out there. I'm truly honored to be nominated with all the greats up there because some of those people up there being nominated are really good friends of mine, and to stand there with them, I'm truly honored. The fact that my peers and the world really like it, and everything we were trying to express in the movement, people saw it and they felt it. That to me, that's already a big up.
And going into season 3 now, it was a little bit of a question for a while if the show would continue when Cinemax ended original programming before the move to HBO Max happened. How'd you find out and what was it like getting the call that season 3 would be happening on HBO Max?
Brett Chan: It was a trial, definitely. Season 3 was always going to happen, but then when Warner Bros. dissolved Cinemax, and at the time, HBO Max [wasn't] going to take on the show, they were just going to dissolve it and let it die there. I'm not sure if Jonathan Tropper and Brad Kane and Justin [Lin] were trying to write on these things within the actual series which relate to today's world problems or what's happening with hate [crimes] on Asians, but I think it just kind of resonated a lot, and once it got on HBO Max, the ratings went through the roof.
So I think HBO Max said, "Well, this is kind of crazy why we wouldn't take this on." It's just displaying all these things we have in our society and the fan base went through the roof. So, when Jonathan Tropper called me and said, "Hey Brett, so we don't want to tell anybody yet, but I'm having a meeting with HBO Max, and they're talking about doing this." It was I think was sometime in November last year or maybe January of this year, and he asked, "Will you be available?" I said, "Right now I am, depending on when it's going to be." I think it was announced in April, and obviously, you have to see if the actors are available, but it was such a key show for all of the actors, it was an anomaly, they were all making themselves available for the show. It was such a life milestone for all of us.
Yeah, and with Andrew Koji going on to Snake Eyes and Bullet Train coming up, he's really on his way up. Kind of related to that, after having Michael Bisping appear in season 2, and having Andrew, Joe Taslim, and Dustin Nguyen, are there any martial arts guys you'd want to bring aboard for season 3?
Brett Chan: I haven't really thought about that yet. It all really depends on characters and stuff, but I would love to see Simon Rhee. He's a really good friend of mine, and James Lew, he was already in season 1, he played Sifu. Maybe also Bolo [Yeung], even just a cameo, that'd be kind of cool. Zing, at the end of season 2, you see the cage bar in the prison cell comes loose, so definitely something's going to happen there.
So, what can you share about the general direction season 3 is going to go in?
Brett Chan: I don't even know. There's a bunch of ideas they threw out there before the end of season 2, so we talked about a few things happening which I can't really discuss. If those things happen, it would be awesome. Definitely a twist of fate in there when you start seeing what's going to happen, if they follow that line.
In designing all of the martial arts and action scenes in Warrior, is there anything you haven't gotten to do in seasons 1 and 2 that you might want to try out in season 3?
Brett Chan: You know, that's a tough one. Everything's kind of been done in theater and film and martial arts, so for me, it's going to be more about where they take the story and where the characters are going to be, because then I can create the new dimension of whatever's going to happen in the martial arts once I know that. I don't want to create fights just for the sake of just doing great fights, there has to be story and drama within the actual fights so that the audience is captivated by it and they're drawn to the characters and the fight as it's happening. They're not just sitting back and watching a cool fight.
Awesome, and season 3 is also supposed to get rolling next year?
Brett Chan: I believe they want to go to camera in September of 2022, so it would end in probably May or something like that of 2023. Then it would probably air at end of '23 or the beginning of 2024. I think it'll probably air towards the end of 2023.
Seasons 1 and 2 of Warrior are currently available to stream on HBO Max.
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