Athena surprised with the news of her involvement in Fight Back to School 2

After a few TV-series and several mixed attempts on the big screen to capitalize on his considerable popularity, Stephen Chow's cinema career finally was launched with All for the Winner and Fight Back to School. In Gordon Chan's film, Chow is given full liberty to show his comedic talent, well assisted by a clever script and Chan's own dynamic direction. With more than 40 millions HK$ grossed, it seemed unavoidable a sequel would be put into production. Alongside a few key cast members of the first episode (Sharla Cheung Man, Ng Man Tat, Gabriel Wong) a whole new group of actors were hired for this new installment, so as to bring novelty to the formula. Athena Chu was logically cast thanks to her young age, her beauty and her acting formation background. Her part remained secondary in the whole story, as a wanna-be love interest to Chow, mostly there to disrupt the love relation between Chow and Cheung Man. Her passive part relied more on her youthfulness and beauty than her acting talent.

What a couple!

Predictably, Fight Back to School 2 was a success despite its lower quality compared to the first episode. And even if Chu didn't get to do much, the industry noticed the potential of the young actress and nominated her for the best newcomer awards (she would lose to Anita Yuen). Unfortunately, in a very typical move, producers would only typecast her as the cute love interest for several years.