War & Peace Quote by Lucy Liu

Lucy Liu’s line lands like an unvarnished backstage observation: not a manifesto, not an apology, just a read on what happens in the room when women trade blows on screen. The phrasing is telling. “Sort of” and “kind of” soften the claim, as if she’s preemptively dodging the culture-police binary where you’re either endorsing violence or preaching empowerment. That hedging is part of the intent: she’s describing a visceral audience reaction without pretending it’s pure, academic, or universally true.

The subtext sits in the word “watch.” Liu isn’t talking about women fighting in real life; she’s talking about representation as proxy. Action cinema has historically treated female bodies as objects to be desired or rescued. A woman who can throw a punch reclaims the body as an instrument, not a display. “Empowered physically and mentally” ties together two kinds of hunger: the fantasy of being capable (physical agency) and the permission to feel aggressive, competitive, and loud (mental permission) in a culture that often punishes women for those emotions.

Context matters, too. Liu rose during the era of Charlie’s Angels, Kill Bill-adjacent aesthetics, and glossy, choreographed “girl power” violence marketed to mainstream audiences. Her comment reflects that moment’s bargain: the empowerment is real for viewers, but it’s mediated through spectacle, choreography, and an industry still deciding whether women’s strength is a novelty, a kink, or a new default. The “jazzed and excited” part admits the simplest truth: sometimes the politics ride shotgun behind the adrenaline.