Simu Liu opens up about his anger and unhappiness over Kim's Convenience
This week marked the release of the fifth—and unexpectedly final—season of beloved Canadian sitcom Kim’s Convenience, which ended its run prematurely this year after the show’s producers said they didn’t know how to move forward after the departure of creators Ins Choi and Kevin White. Among the many fans mourning its departure, the release of this final dose of the show’s funny and humane treatment of Asian Canadian life was greeted with a pointed response from series star Simu Liu, who hopped on Facebook to let the world know about the unhappy circumstances under which the show was first filmed, and then concluded.
Specifically, the Shang-Chi star laid out a numbered list of grievances, calling out, among others, the show’s “overwhelmingly white” producers, who, despite their stated inability to find anyone to run Kim’s, are moving forward with a spin-off series (Strays) focused on Nicole Power’s character Shannon, the only non-Asian person in the show’s main cast. “I love and am proud of Nicole, and I want the show to succeed for her,” Liu writes. “But I remain resentful of all of the circumstances that led to the one non-Asian character getting her own show. And not that they would ever ask, but I will adamantly refuse to reprise my role in any capacity.”
Liu also noted that Ins, who developed the series from an original stage play, was the only Korean voice in the writers’ room, and that efforts from the largely Asian cast to have their input taken on their characters’ stories or the show’s general direction were rebuffed or ignored.