Disney's 'Mulan': Will The Chinese Warrior Have A Love Interest In The Live Action Remake?

It turns out that another prominent character in the animated version of Mulan won’t be making it to the big screen.

As Yahoo Movies reports, army captain Li Shang, who also plays Mulan’s love interest in the 1998 version, has been cut from the live-action film’s storyline. In the animated film, Shang is determined to “make a man” out of all of his soldiers including Mulan, who is disguised as a male named Ping. Throughout the film, Shang takes a particular interest in Ping, which some have taken as a signal of the character’s sexual fluidity.

However, once Mulan’s true gender is exposed Shang expels her from the army and turns his back on her. That is until she helps him defeat villain Shan Yu. In the end, it becomes clear that the leader has fallen for the warrior. However, the power dynamic between the two characters didn't sit well with the 2020 film’s team.

“I think particularly in the time of the #MeToo movement, having a commanding officer that is also the sexual love interest was very uncomfortable and we didn’t think it was appropriate,” said producer Jason Reed. “In a lot of ways that it was sort of justifying behavior of we’re doing everything we can to get out of our industry.”

But don’t worry, Mulan, who is played by Liu Yifei, will still have a love interest and he will be implicitly bisexual, as confirmed by actor Yoson An. However, he won’t be the leading lady’s superior. His name is Chen Honghui and he’s an army recruit like Mulan.

“There’s no power dynamic between them but there is the same dynamic in the original movie that was with Li Shang which is, ‘Hey, I really respect you and why do I like this dude so much? And what does this say about me?’” Reed explained. “We have that same dynamic and in this movie, I actually think it plays in a more sophisticated way.”

The army captain will instead be a fatherly figure named Commander Tung played by Hong Kong actor Donnie Yen.

When the trailer for the $200 million film was released in 2019, fans were disappointed that Mulan’s sidekick Mushu, a comedic and ancestral miniature dragon, wouldn’t be represented in the film.

"Mushu was very popular in the U.S., but the Chinese hated it," said Stanley Rosen, a professor and expert in Chinese society and politics. "This kind of miniature dragon trivialized their culture."

Disney’s “Mulan” hits theaters on March 27.