Chun-Li Actress Grew Her Thighs 6.5cm to Match the First Lady of Fighting Games for the Street Fighter Movie
Callina Liang, who plays Chun-Li in Legendary’s upcoming Street Fighter movie, revealed the protein-heavy diet and intense workout routine she followed to bring the First Lady of Fighting Games to life.
If there’s one thing Chun-Li is known for — besides being the Strongest Woman in the World, of course — it’s her thick, muscular thunder thighs, which have only gotten more impressive with each new Street Fighter game. From Third Strike to Street Fighter V and now Street Fighter 6, it’s clear the devs at Capcom have a clear vision in mind for the character’s physical appearance. (And we thank them for it.)
Callina Liang knew this was an important thing to get right, so she buckled down and began following a strict martial arts workout routine and eating a high-protein diet to help grow her muscles — to the point where she almost got sick.
"Chun-Li is all kicks. So we did a bunch of Taekwondo training, Muay Thai, and Wushu (Kung Fu). I did two hours of that a day and strengthened my legs a lot and changed my diet drastically. When I was bulking, I ate 12 eggs a day. Every two hours I had to have a meal, and I was on the verge of throwing up. But it worked. By the end of the shoot, my thighs had grown six-and-a-half centimeters each,” she said in an August interview with Empire Magazine.
That’s not all; Liang did her homework and downloaded every single Street Fighter game onto her PlayStation 5, where she recorded all of the character’s moves to make her fight scenes as accurate as possible.
"I downloaded every single version of Street Fighter onto a PS5 and I recorded all of Chun-Li's moves during fights on my phone in slow-mo, so I could play them back and study them," she added.
Liang isn’t the only actor who put in major time to make their Street Fighter performance perfect; David Dastmalchian, who plays the series’ recurring villain, M. Bison, told us that he did deep research to deliver a version of the psycho-powered dictator that leans heavily into a cult-leader archetype.
“I don’t want to be just another one of these bad guys, cut from the typical cloth,” he said. “How do you have all of these people willing to go into battle for you, die for you? …we dug in and studied really insane dictators over time, thinking about everyone from idamine all the way back to fascist Italy in World War II, and looking at not just movie characters but real, historical characters,” he said during a chat with IGN’s Tom Jorgensen at San Diego Comic-Con.
Legendary’s Street Fighter flick releases in theaters on October 16, 2026. It’ll be the second Capcom property getting a theatrical release this year, with Zach Cregger’s Resident Evil beginning screenings on September 18.
Virginia (she/her) is IGN’s News Editor. With ten years of experience reporting on games and entertainment, she’s got a storied background in the fighting game community, influencer news, and viral online trends. Find her on Twitter at @TheeMissGlaze.