The Martial Artist
Live Free or Die Hard (2007)
Being considered as the subversion of the motif “All Asian knows martial arts” (World Heritage Encyclopedia n.d.), the case that Asian actresses being casted as martial artists in Hollywood motion picture was no longer unexpected, and an action movies with extreme fighting scenes like Die Hard series was no exception. In its fourth sequel, Live Free or Die Hard, Mai Linh — the Chinese cyber-terrorist villain undertaken by Maggie Q — manifested not only a deluded hacker but also a killing machine. Mai worked under Thomas Gabriel, who was also her love interest. The tough martial artist quality was typical in this story, where she showed no mercy on her rivals and suffered no physical pain from the brutal fights. She clashed with the main series’ hero John McClane in several encounters, in which she was outsmarted and sent to death in the last scene. The most controversial issue in this Asian female martial artist storyline was that it also diminished the feminist power, where she was used as a killing tool for her boss and so-called lover, who eventually showed no grief over her death.
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