Editor’s note: The below contains spoilers for Our Flag Means Death Season 2.

The Big Picture

The second season of Our Flag Means Death introduces new female pirates, expanding the pirate world and adding more perspectives. Zheng Yi Sao, the pirate queen played by Ruibo Qian, forms a tentative alliance with Stede Bonnet and his crew. Qian discusses her magical connection to her role as Zheng Yi Sao and highlights the important relationships her character has, including her romance with Oluwande and her mother-daughter dynamic with Auntie.

The Max series Our Flag Means Death, created by David Jenkins, only gave us a taste of the pirate world when it first premiered last year. While we were introduced to the misfits that make up the crew of the ship known as the Revenge, it still felt like the show had only just scratched the surface in terms of bringing in more perspectives. With Season 2, which concluded on the streamer this fall, we’ve been able to meet even more new faces, making this realm of pirates feel more expanded than ever before. (It doesn’t hurt that many of them happen to be female pirates, too!)

Stede Bonnet (Rhys Darby) and his crew initially find themselves under the command of pirate queen Zheng Yi Sao (Ruibo Qian) on her ship the Red Flag, while Blackbeard, aka Ed Teach (Taika Waititi) has made off with the Revenge. Theirs is a tentative alliance, and one that isn’t mended easily after Stede and co. decide to abandon ship in the middle of the night. But throughout the season, Zheng’s relationship with Stede — as well as other members of the crew, like Oluwande (Samson Kayo) — allows them all to realize they make stronger allies than enemies. With a potential third and final season on the horizon, and Stede and Ed deciding to leave the Revenge to become innkeepers, what’s next for both crews?

In the wake of the finale, Collider had the opportunity to speak with several Our Flag Means Death cast members, including Qian, about some of the most pivotal Season 2 moments. Over the course of the interview, which you can read below, the actress behind the show’s newest pirate queen discusses her magical connection to the role, her favorite part of Zheng’s overall look, how Zheng’s most important relationships highlight new sides of the character, and more.

Our Flag Means Death Release Date March 3, 2022 Cast Rhys Darby, Taika Waititi, Rory Kinnear, Con O’Neill Main Genre Adventure Genres Comedy, Action, Adventure, Biography Rating TV-MA Seasons 2

COLLIDER: Your character this season is so… I feel like the only word I can say is cool. Even cooler because she’s based on a real historical figure, the way that a lot of the other characters on the show are. How much did you know about this role beforehand? I’m curious about what the audition process was like for you.

RUIBO QIAN: Well, there’s a long, magical, convoluted story. I’ll give you a CliffsNotes version of it. It all starts with: I collect perfumes. I’ve been collecting fragrances for a very long time, probably like 25 years, and there’s this great indie perfumer called Marissa Zappas who’s based in New York. She was doing a giveaway of her newest collection on Fragrantica, which is an online fragrance community. I never enter stuff like this, but she had a fragrance called Ching Shih, and it had all my favorite notes in it, and it was about a female pirate. I wrote something in the comments like, “I’m not trying to be a pirate, but I’m Chinese, and I’m turning 40, and I want to learn how to embrace that power.” Long story short, I won that perfume, and when it arrived, I looked up the character, and I said, “Oh, I want to play the character. I don’t know how that would happen.”

Two weeks later, I am driving into a campsite at Big Sur with my husband, and I’m losing cell phone service as we go. I get an email from my agent saying, “Can you tape this by tomorrow morning?” So I end up taping the audition in the tent. It took me an embarrassing amount of time to figure out that Ching Shih and Zheng Yi Sao were the same person because I was like, “What are the chances I win this perfume about a Chinese pirate, and now I have this audition for a Chinese pirate?” But yeah, the rest is sort of history. From the time that I won that fragrance to the time that I was in New Zealand shooting, [it] was less than two months.

Image via Max

Speaking of not knowing that these two women are the same, it’s kind of that way in the show. We get introduced to your character, we think she’s this merchant, and then obviously her real identity is revealed in this big, pretty badass way. Did the rest of the cast know what was going to happen when they got the script, or was it initially a secret, who you were playing?

QIAN: No, all of that was revealed at the first table read with those first couple of scripts.

It doesn’t take very long for us to get the truth, but in the beginning, when we know her as Susan, she’s somebody that Stede can look to for advice, but then you see that she’s got these hidden layers, and she’s this authority figure. Was there anything that you tried to put in your performance so that when the reveal happened, it felt even more effective?

QIAN: I don’t think it was appreciably different, because she’s still the same person. I don’t think she’s trying to put on an air in any kind of way. It’s just a little bit of one level down of incognito, like one level down of just being undercover. The attire serves that purpose. There was a scene that we had also shot that was cut from that soup stand era sort of situation that would have maybe made it a little bit more obvious. But yeah, I don’t think there was really that much difference. I don’t think she needs to feign anything.

Image via Max

I spoke to the costume and hair team, as well, learning about Zheng’s costume and how that all came together, and those incredible pigtails that you get to wear. So, I feel like I have to ask you what your favorite part was of her overall look.

QIAN: I mean, the pigtails! The pigtails are cool, especially when we were doing some of the fight stuff, just feeling them whip around. It’s like an extension of her sword in a way. I thought that was such a cool and very singular look for her. When I first saw it, I was like, “Oh my god, she’s Asian Harley Quinn!”

Doing a show that is a comedy and kind of takes a more irreverent look at history, but for all intents and purposes is a period drama, and yet you still get to wear pants! [Laughs] How did you feel getting to put her costume on, and did it affect the way that you carried yourself?

QIAN: There’s such a level of detail and craftsmanship in the clothes, and when you put them on, you really feel the level of work. It’s transportive to just simply put on the clothes. You can’t help but be someone different, right? I just think that the entire design was just so, so brilliantly done, and the sourcing that [costume designer] Gypsy [Taylor] did was so brilliant. Every single detail really makes the character.

Image via Max

Speaking of things that are important to the character, I wanted to ask you about some of her relationships. Her romance with Oluwande feels like one of the genuine sweet spots of this season. It also shows that your character has a bit of a softer side in addition to that tough pirate queen that we see most of the time. What did you enjoy about getting to show those more vulnerable sides of her, in terms of this woman who can have her heart broken sometimes, and feel that pain?

QIAN: That relationship is such a brilliant addition because she’s a person, and she needs to explore her vulnerability. She needs an outlet to explore stuff that isn’t workaholism in the pirate world or whatever it is. How is she a human being, and how do those relationships illuminate other parts of her? How do you distance yourself from work? We all have to deal with that. I also think that, from her history, she’s been involved with a lot of shitty men in a lot of bad relationships. Here’s why we have an all-female crew, and here comes someone who is different from anyone she’s ever met before, probably. So, it’s really sweet. I knew I would incur some kind of wrath from the fans for digging up the Jim situation, but I love it. [Laughs]

Related ‘Our Flag Means Death’ Makes Its Best Change for Season 2 It’s time for the women to take charge!

Well, now they can maybe have a polycule or something. In terms of the crew, Zheng and Auntie are captain and first-mate, but there’s such a strong mother-daughter aspect to them, especially in the finale. What kinds of things did you want to emphasize about how important that relationship is for your character throughout the season?

QIAN: As an Asian woman, I think that just that parental figure is such an important part of, again, going back to that essence of vulnerability. What are you allowed to express emotionally? What are you allowed to sort of bring into the world or bring into the room in terms of what your emotional life is and how it’s different from having this parental, mentor type of figure? I don’t think it’s really like a first-mate situation, as you said. It’s definitely more of a familial essence, so it’s important to highlight that from a cultural perspective.

Our Flag Means Death is available to stream on Max in the U.S.

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