The following article contains major spoilers for Rebel Moon — Part One: A Child of Fire.
In Zack Snyder's Rebel Moon — Part One: A Child of Fire, swoony swashbuckler Kai (Charlie Hunnam) is introduced similarly to the loveable rogue of Star Wars, Han Solo, in a raucous bar on a desolate alien planet. There's an alluring air of trouble about him, with his devilish grin and apparently gung-ho attitude. After Sofia Boutella's Kora wins out a bar brawl against a handful of alien thugs, he offers his services as a spaceship pilot in Kora and the rebels' upcoming battle against Motherworld, the fascistic interplanetary alliance of Space Nazis who rule over the galaxy with an iron fist. So far, so Harrison Ford. (And Star Wars, for that matter.)
Then comes a Seven Samurai-esque recruitment drive in which Kai, Kora and Gunnar (Michiel Huisman), a lowly serf from Veidt, the farming planet threatened with destruction by Motherworld, traverse the stars to collect the best warriors in the galaxy to defend Veidt's simple villagers. Along the way, they collect drunkard ex-general Titus (Hollywood-fave character actor Djimon Hounsou), the threateningly named Bloodaxe siblings (Ray Fisher and Cleopatra Coleman) and Tarak (Staz Nair), an animal whisper with a knack for piloting alien dragons.
But then comes the big twist for Kai. His selfish instincts take him to the dark side: on their final stop before heading back to Veidt, he hands his new friends over to Motherworld's Space Nazis, led by Ed Skrein's menacing Atticus Noble. “For as limited screen time as it is, it's actually a meaty journey that Kai goes on,” Hunnam tells GQ. “First he has to ingratiate himself, and gain trust. And then it starts to trend in a way that might actually suggest that there could be a romance between he and Kora, which was very important to me. So I relentlessly flirted with Sofia in every scene. And then when Kai makes his final turn, I really thought it was delicious stuff.”
It's implied that Kai is killed in the subsequent fracas after he's strapped into one of the Space Nazi's deadly torture devices (which we saw break the neck of another character earlier in the film). But we don't see a body. “You do not see a body. You know, I hedged my bets and said a line that I believe may or may not make it to the extended cut,” Hunnam says, transitioning to Kai's Irish tones: “If you think I'm handsome, you should see my twin brother.”
“So, we'll see. There could be Kai [in Part Two of Rebel Moon], or there could be Stai. I've been pitching Stai, who lost his eye in some sort of accident. He wears an eyepatch, and is a very sort of slick version of Kai, who comes back and fucks things up for our heroes. I'm not sure how much traction it's getting in the studio,” Hunnam jokes.
There's always the chance that we could see Kai outside of Part Two, I suggest to Hunnam – after all, Snyder has spoken about his desire to expand Rebel Moon into an expansive cinematic universe, akin to a Star Wars or an Avatar. Have they spoken about a Kai-centric spin-off? “No, we haven't. But I really loved Kai. I fell in love with him,” Hunnam says. “And I had the best time just messing around, playing that character. So I'd be up for it.”
Rebel Moon — Part One: A Child of Fire is now on Netflix.
