Before he retires, Jackie Chan needs to take on one specific role that he has almost entirely avoided throughout his career. The impact that Jackie Chan has had on action movies, comedies, martial arts films, and cinema as a whole cannot be overstated. Since beginning as a stuntman in the early ’70s, Jackie Chan has built an astonishing legacy of death-defying stuntwork, comedic kung fu battles, and outtakes showing that his style of action is no laughing matter.
After becoming a megastar throughout Asia, Jackie Chan became a Hollywood movie star in the late 20th century. Owing to his laundry list of injuries and older age, Chan has scaled back on his harrowing stunts in recent years, making efforts to establish himself as a serious actor in less comedic action movies, such as 2017’s The Foreigner. However, before concluding his long career in action movies, there is one type of character Jackie Chan can and should jump into to officially prove the full extent of his talent as both an action star and an actor.
Throughout his career, Jackie Chan has cultivated an image as a cheerful nice guy, playing heroes frequently in over their heads who have to acrobatically improvise their way to victory. By that token, Chan has consistently avoided villain roles. Seeking to portray a more positive on-screen image, Jackie Chan only played two villains in his early career, as he famously turned down Sylvester Stallone’s offer to play Simon Phoenix in Demolition Man.
Chan has obviously put together a winning formula for the kinds of bumbling, sincere heroes he embodies. Even his darker roles, such as in Police Story 2013, have seen him as a stalwart protagonist. While the Jackie Chan template has served him well throughout his career, seeing the hero turn villain late in his career would be the perfect curveball.
After decades of his heroic roles in frequently slapstick action-comedies, it seems all but impossible to imagine Jackie Chan playing an antagonist, which is the exact reason why he should finally take on a villain role. Few against-type castings could compare to the shock of seeing Jackie Chan’s kung fu skills wielded by a crime boss or a gang leader commanding dozens of henchmen. Chan’s desire for his acting range to be a part of his legacy makes such a villain role that much more enticing. At the least, it would truly stand out from every other character he has ever played.
Harrison Ford’s surprise villain role in the supernatural thriller What Lies Beneath was a famous sharp turn from the image he had built up as the iconic heroes Indiana Jones and Han Solo, demonstrating the impact that a star known for protagonist roles can have by eventually breaking bad. That also demonstrates just how big of a switch a Jackie Chan villain would really be. In portraying a role completely foreign to his unique style of comedy, Jackie Chan as a villain could well be one of the most memorable against-type performances of all time.
