While this marks Vincent Cassel's first appearance in an Astérix film, his father Jean-Pierre Cassel previously appeared in Astérix aux Jeux olympiques (2008) as the druid Panoramix while his now former wife Monica Bellucci portrayed Cleopatra in Astérix & Obélix : Mission Cléopâtre (2002). Moreover, the character Maccabaeus in the comic book "Asterix and the Picts" was based on Vincent Cassel's features.
While imprisoned the Empress of China says "We have two lives and the second one begins when we realize that we only have one". This quote is often attributed to the famous Chinise Philosopher Confucius.
The movie cost 65 million euros, which is huge for French cinema: at the time of its release, it was in the top 10 of France's most expensive movies. Its break-even point was estimated at 6 million tickets sold, and it was reported that director Guillaume Canet would have gotten a 1 million euro bonus (on top of his EUR500k salary) if the movie had gotten to 7 million tickets sold.
While its opening week was the strongest for a French movie in 15 years, since 2008's Bienvenue chez les Ch'tis (2008), with almost 1.9 million tickets sold in its first five days, it was still far short of the objective. After five weeks, it only sold 4.4 million tickets ($32.8M) in France and 1.4 millions tickets ($6.2M) in the rest of Europe. For reference, Astérix & Obélix : Mission Cléopâtre (2002) sold 14 million tickets in 2002.
The first live-action Astérix film to be a fully original story not based on one or several of the comic books. Previously, the animated films Les 12 Travaux d'Astérix (1976) and Astérix : Le Secret de la potion magique (2018) were also original stories, although the former was written and co-directed by Astérix creators René Goscinny and Albert Uderzo.
Historically the real Emperor Han Xuandi had two daughters, Princess Jingwu and Princess Guantao Shi, who both lived in the year 50 BC (the year in which all Asterix stories are set).