Legend of the Magnate

A compelling Watch!

'Legend of the Magnate' is a worthy adaptation of the original Novel 大生意人 (Dà shēngyì rén), literally translates to 'The Great Businessman', which is more suitable as a title, instead of this overbearing English title.However, the Native Chinese title of this drama wasn’t changed from the book and kept the same as it is, Dà shēngyì rén! It is indeed a business-heavy drama set in the Late Qing Dynasty in the 1860s, During & after the Xianfeng Emperor's reign,a turbulent period of wars and rebellions.

The story centers around The Main Male protagonist Gu pingyuan, a scholar who was framed during his Imperial examination and got exiled in the harsh & cold Northern land Ningguta.After 5 years of his exile, he managed to escape that place after much hardship & struggles,narrowly escaping death.In the process,he met a humble merchant family from shanxi, Chang si with his daughter Chang Yu'er, And Li Qin, son of a powerful and wealthy Beijing Tycoon,Li Wantang. Gu pingyuan,starting from the rock-bottom,gradually starts navigating the complex political and business environments of that era, getting involved with 8 big business families of Shanxi, And a Free spirited 'Rebel' Noblewoman Su zixuan.

There's not much to 'spoil' in the plot,as the plot mostly is Main-character driven, & the true focus yields heavily on the merchants and business deals,All the other aspects kinda take a backseat in the story, eg. The romance of the leads is very subtle, but one poetic scene in the Rain totally stole my heart & soul in an earlier episode.The director of this drama,Zhang Ting,who also wrote the adapted screenplay, did a good job bringing out the best of each scenes, all thanks to the veteran Actors who portrayed their roles perfectly as per characters.Chen Xiao is amazing as always, Luo Yi zhou as Li Qin was brilliant (such an acting talent to discover this year!), The Acting masterclass of Cheng Tai shen as Chang Si, Huang Zhi zhong as Li Wantang, & Liang Guan Hua as Viceroy Ruilin were truly remarkable,and this drama almost felt like a big level movie production in certain scenes.The cinematography, specially in the Mongolian grasslands and Anhui Tea making episodes were eye candy, Natural Make-up & styling with plain beautiful costumes were Cherry on Top.


There was Taiping rebellion going on in the beginning of the drama until middle episodes, Drama mentions it as "rebels of south" for obvious censorship reasons, As I've always noticed, Qing Dynasty dramas are largely scrutinised by Chinese censor board, i guess they Have their reasonings of possible historical distortion or maybe ''public opinions" surrounding many topics, the reason why I'm discussing this matter is, i found it interesting how this drama at some exact points of the story, deviated from the Novel,and deliberately changed some character arcs and omitted some definite important parts as well (eg. Li Cheng, Su zixuan & Bai yimei's individual characterizations). I read the novel quite a long while ago and liked it a lot, The Author of the novel, Zhao Zhiyu, is a Manchu descendant of the Plain Blue Banner,whose ancestor was Irgen Gioro Gagai, a founding general of the Qing Dynasty. Majoring in language & literature, zhao zhiyu actually Researched on the Commercial history & political-business relations of Qing Dynasty era for many years,Maybe that's why i found the situations of the storyline quite realistic and believable to watch.In one scene we see the Main protagonist solving a huge sum of loan issue of the 8 families by creating 'Bank drafts', Which i believe is a tribute to Shanxi merchants of the 19th century who pioneered this sophisticated financial banking system known as Piaohao (票號), which served as a prototype of modern banking system of credit and debts.Although Gu pingyuan always have a touch of luck amongst the craziest troubles, he cleverly solved matters, strategically approached things and paved his own ways out of absolute despair,which is one of the intriguing parts about his character and for overall drama. The dialogues are superbly written with depth,& screenwriter of the drama is as good as the novel author for sure....

...ehem,Till the ending episodes.If it weren’t for the last 5/6 episodes, i'd have given this drama a solid 8.5 or Maybe 9.0.The ending wasn’t satisfying to me at all. Salt trade matters in Liangjiang were dragged for long enough, some of the important character dynamics were abruptly changed in the end which made no sense at all, Gu pingyuan's Ending is even more underwhelming,some may finish the drama and question Himself, "All these to meet this end? I'm not talking about happy ending or sad ending, It's surely a happy ending, but the end mostly DOES NOT justify the character build-up and the overall journey of Gu pingyuan, who was supposed to meet a glorious ending becoming a well recognised Big Businessman respected by all merchants in the central plains.Rather than that,Drama made him a Wanderer ship merchant or what? nah,i can't accept it at all.

This is not a drama to binge watch,It's specifically for slow & attentive watchers,and it needs a rather mature audience to understand the depth & significance of the whole storyline. I enjoyed watching it and it wasn’t boring or annoying at all,there's some light comedic scenes to balance out with the seriousness, and Gu family with Chang & Liao family gave some warmth in the story to continue it,the wedding ceremony of our leads was too natural and a real happy occasion meeting all the people Gu pingyuan and Chang Yu'er met in their journey throughout northern & southern regions.I really wished they flesh out Ms. Su zixuan's character MORE, she was one of the most important & interesting strong characters in the Novel that served a purpose from soup to nuts ,but the drama sadly made her just a plot device for Main character's storyline.Another is Li wantang's character,i can't believe the character changes that were made after the Secret reveal,It wasn’t supposed to be like how it was done. Many changes in the drama story were better than the original story,i appreciate that,but then,i couldn’t end it with satisfaction as a Novel reader bcz of these vacuums.

8/10, the overall quality of the drama was great, i hope the viewers who didn’t read the novel enjoyed it more.It's very much worth watching.

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Success never goes unpunished.

It was a beautiful success story. It was well-crafted. However, it certainly had its shortcomings. Perhaps there were deficiencies in adapting the novel to the stage. Because some scenes seemed too simplistic to me. Superficiality prevailed in general. No event was explored in depth. The story felt incomplete in some way. Especially the father's story was glossed over with a barely naive and superficial narrative. However, the importance given to the mother was not given to the father; the father is at fault, but shouldn't the fault have been explored and detailed? That question remains in my mind. I also thought that the scenes were cut short because a more in-depth explanation would have required longer scenes and more episodes.

It's a success story, but our main character is a scholar. Is it possible for a scholar to act with a merchant's mentality? I don't think so. But can he be successful? Maybe. But is it possible for this scholar, in this state, to escape from a wild, reckless bandit in a remote, cold, snowy, mountainous region? No. Some things, as I said, were very superficial. People are easily deceived or persuaded. If he gets involved in a business venture, he's always successful. He makes those around him rich, and, as luck would have it, he never benefits from it himself. But when he needs money, these people he made rich help him out of goodwill. How wonderful. It's a complete dream world. Is it believable? I don't think so.

Even the Empress praises him, meets with him, and paves the way for him. It's gone too far. He never stumbled. But he's not interested in money or wealth at all. His father also turned out to be rich. But he was someone who abandoned them and hindered them. That was also strange. The meeting between the mother and father was strange. The fact that they both fell ill suddenly was strange. And they died a day apart. A coincidence? Because of the superficiality of the event, I couldn't understand these shocks and illnesses. I couldn't figure it out. Their shock, surprise, a little disappointment, a little hurt, anger during their meeting after all these years... But it's not unexpected, it's unlikely, that they would be affected to the point of illness and subsequently die. There are such strange situations in our series. However, the portrayal of a success story impressed me. It was beautifully directed, and the cinematography was excellent. The acting was also great.

The relationship between the main characters was also rather strange. It wasn't clear if they loved each other. Later, the girl made a request, but the man avoided it. Because they had an engagement from childhood. I think they separated during the imperial exams. They never saw each other again. Years passed. They changed. And the fiancée fell in love with a rebel. But the male character still insists, even though he doesn't love her. Because there's someone who loves and wants her. He knows this. He himself was affected by that girl. But for some reason, he doesn't leave his childhood fiancée. He pressures her. I think there was a sense of shame towards the parents here. Traditions were involved. While the girl didn't care about this, the man's remaining at this level, especially for a more traveled, experienced, and learned person, was very absurd.

Ultimately, it was absurd that someone who had achieved great success in business ended up in prison, that all that success was punished, even that their head was to be cut off, only to be saved thanks to the Governor, to whom they had brought so much money. I didn't like this ending. It didn't work. This ending didn't suit this success story, frankly. I didn't like it.

Chen Xiao carried the series on his own from beginning to end and was very successful. I liked him. Sun Qian did more than her share. I liked her. Luo Zhi Yhou was very well-suited to his role. I liked him. Ling Zhuo was very, very successful. He's very good at comedy. He prepared well for his role. He acted very well. Well done. Zhu Ya Wen and Julia Xiang had short appearances but delivered very effective performances. Well done. Cheng Tai Shen, Liang Guan Hua, Liu Pei Qi, Li Chun, Huang Zi Zhong, and Zhu Yin were the standout actors I liked. Overall, all the actors were quite good. I liked it.

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