Yan Naing Lee

Detective inspector Yan Naing  Lee is one of two main protagonists of the Rush Hour series. He is a Detective Inspector for the Hong Kong Police Force   (H.K.P.F.) Yan Naing   Lee appears in all three of the films. He is partnered with Detective James Carter, who at first shunned him, but later admires him. Lee is portrayed by Jackie Chan.

Before The Series
Not much is known about Lee before the series but it is known that his father was a legendary cop in Hong Kong who Lee claimed once caught a bullet with his bare hands. His father later investigated an international smuggling case with his partner Ricky Tan (whom Lee met and befriended during his teen years). But when he discovered Tan worked for the Triads he attempted to tell his superior but Tan confronted Lee's father at gun point. When his father begged Tan to promise not to kill his son, Tan was upset by this so he shot Lee's father dead. The evidence disappeared the case was never solved and Tan resigned from the force. Lee also mention growing up in an orphanage with a foster brother named Kenji. They protected each other and were close as brothers as Lee likes to call him "Xiong Di".

Lee is revealed to have been in the H.K.P.D for some time and is a personal friend of Chinese Consul Solon Han and is Kung-Fu instructor to Han's daughter Soo-Yung.

Rush Hour
"You seem as if you like to talk. I like to let people talk, who like to talk. It makes it easier to find out how full of shit they are."

- Lee to Carter When we first see Lee he is leading a police raid at a boating yard to recapture antiques on China's history which have been stolen and collected by the mysterious crime lord Juntao. Lee successfully recovers numerous Chinese cultural treasures stolen by Juntao, which he presents as a farewell victory to his departing superiors: Chinese consul Han and British Commander Thomas Griffin. When Soo Yung gets abducted while on her way to her first day of school, Consul Solon Han invites Lee to come over to the US to help recover his daughter. With the FBI not wanting Lee's help, he gets partnered with James Carter.

Rush Hour 2


"I always dreamed of going to Madison Square Gardens, to see The Knicks play."

- Lee to Carter

Four days after Rush Hour, Lee is promoted from Detective Inspector to Chief Inspector at the police station as he gets a visit from Carter who wants a vacation in Hong Kong. However soon after he arrives a bomb explodes in the American embassy killing two U.S custom agents in the process. Inspector Lee is assigned to the case, which becomes personal when it is discovered that it somehow involves Ricky Tan (John Lone), his late police officer father's former partner on the Hong Kong Police Department. Tan, who was suspected, but never proven, of having a role in Lee's father's death, is now a leader of the Triads. Who are according to Lee "the most deadly gang in China".

Interlude
Some time after the events in Las Vegas, Lee began a relationship with US Secret Service agent Isabella Molina, who was also involved on the case. However, in 2004, when Lee, Carter and Molina were in New York, Carter accidentally (but not fatally) shot Molina in the neck while aiming for a criminal. After that, she broke up with Lee, which slightly strained the friendship between Lee and Carter (more so on Lee's end), as in the beginning of the third movie, Lee is irritated with Carter and mentions the incident.

Rush Hour 3
"I understand. I got a brother, too. My little brother, Perry. We used to be best friends. Now we don't even speak. He thinks I tipped off the cops about the chicken fights in his garage. Can you believe that? My own brother think I'm a snitch. Just because my chicken lost in the semifinals. I didn't even really care."

- Carter to Lee At the beginning of the film Lee is no longer a Chief Inspector but has been demoted back to a Detective Inspector and was hired to become the bodyguard for Chinese Ambassador Solon Han who addresses the importance of fighting the Triads at the World Criminal Court, announcing that he may know the whereabouts of Shy Shen, a semi-mythical individual of great importance to the Triads. Before announcing, an assassin shoots and Han takes a bullet in the shoulder, disrupting the conference. Lee pursues the shooter and corners him, discovering that the assassin is his Japanese foster brother Kenji. When Lee hesitates to shoot Kenji, he makes his escape when Carter (having learned about the shooting over the police radio) arrives and tries to intervene.

After Lee's childhood orphanage story involved with Kenji revealed shocking as a foster brother ended, Carter brags about how his younger little brother named Perry involved with cockfighting money gambling tournaments in his own family garage that he mentioned backgroundly. Perry's own brother (James Carter) informed the police reportedly, & putting up with it. Before Lee scolds Carter to stop talking nonsense annoyingly, Perry thinks his own brother is a tattletale, only because Carter's chicken lost in the semifinals animal fighting tournament gambling challenge, but Carter is so truly seriously apathy about it any longer.

Personality
He wields a dry sense of humor but Inspector Lee doesn’t have time for shenanigans when Soo-Yung’s life is at stake.

Trivia

 * Lee is named after Bruce Lee, this is a homage to another Warner Brothers blockbuster film that Rush Hour takes inspiration from which is Enter the Dragon (1973), a young Jackie Chan was only an extra in that movie.
 * Carter always blames Lee for their mishaps telling him "It's your fault", though Lee doesn't seem to care because he lets more important things worry him than Carter's petty ways.
 * Jackie Chan was almost killed filming the scene where he is almost crushed by metal boxes. They slammed together about a quarter of a second after his head was clear.


 * Lee thought that his father was killed in the line of duty, but it turns out he was murdered by his own partner Ricky Tan, after he discovered Tan betrayed the police to work for the Triads.


 * During the bomb scene where Lee and Carter tried to get rid of the bomb, they run up the stairwell. When Carter says "Where?", Lee says "roof! roof!", with his reference being related to a barking of a dog.
 * Lee (Jackie Chan) is taken to Grauman's Chinese Theater by Carter (Chris Tucker). In 2013, Chan had his own hand and footprints placed at the same theater.


 * Lee's father's death was reference to how his father died in the film Shanghai Knights (his role as Chon Wang) which both the antagonists of Rush Hour 2 (Ricky Tan) and Shanghai Knights (Rathbone) wanted to say how his father died.


 * Lee taking Carter's gun (as if taking a gun from a suspect) was the same move Carter had done on one of Juntao's men. In an earlier scene they had practiced doing it to each other.


 * In the films, Lee's first name is Yan Naing. In the television series however, his name is Jonathan, because Jon Foo the actor who portrays Lee is Asian-Caucasian.


 * In Rush Hour 3 Carter refers to himself as a Detective when demoted to a patrolman but Lee never refers to himself as a Chief Inspector when demoted to a Detective Inspector. Agent Sterling at the end of Rush Hour 2 refers to Lee as a Detective even though he had been referred to as Chief Inspector by Captain Chin earlier in the film.
 * In all of the Rush Hour films, Lee has fired his gun only twice, this being a shot fired at a pole beside Kenji while attempting to escape Lee's custody, and the other being an accidental bullet to Genevieve's arm in an attempt to save her from Jasmine.
 * Brett Ratner was a big fan of Jackie Chan's Hong Kong movies. He felt that American audiences would not be familiar with the jokes in Jackie's other movies, and deliberately re-used some of his gags. For example, the scene where Inspector Lee accidentally grabs Johnson's (Elizabeth Peña's) breasts is a reference to Jackie Chan's film Mr. Nice Guy (1997).
 * According to director Brett Ratner, this movie was the first movie to be released in the U.S. featuring Jackie Chan in an English-speaking role without any kind of dubbing. According to Ratner, before this movie, Chan always had his voice dubbed over in his English-speaking roles because of his uncertainty in speaking the language. For this movie, however, Ratner convinced him to forgo the dubbing, as it would lend to the authenticity of his character.
 * According to director Brett Ratner, this movie was the first movie to be released in the U.S. featuring Jackie Chan in an English-speaking role without any kind of dubbing. According to Ratner, before this movie, Chan always had his voice dubbed over in his English-speaking roles because of his uncertainty in speaking the language. For this movie, however, Ratner convinced him to forgo the dubbing, as it would lend to the authenticity of his character.