Xiang Liu and Xiao Yao’s Story and Romance

Scene: Don't bite here: From literature to live action. 

In that scene in the drama, what I remember most is the way FFB calls her name Xy, pained & full of worry, frustration, lingering feelings, restrained feelings &  everything.  That's the first time I felt the magic of his voice, deep & on the other hand, the whole part of Xy just made it as if she only treated him as a sort of demon deserving pity etc. That scnece sort of failed to bring what's written in novel, but tjc acting gave justice to XL.  The scene only cemented the XL story as a completely tragic,  

Random thought of the day:

Should a faithful drama adaptation of a novel always be the goal? Is a drama adaptation that closely follows the novel always preferable over a drama adaptation that provides new insight into the novel?

 H19279:

There id noo concrete answer for this. Sometimes the novel plays as inspiration for drama/movie plot. It is often that major adjustment is required since literatural tellinf method is more unique than how a drama tell a story. And there are dramas that the adaption on screen is more logical than the original novels and vice bersa.

Drama/movie adaptation is constrained by many factors : duration of each episode, total duration, budget, technical feasibility etc

Yes, these process constraints apply to most drama adaptations. On top of that, C-dramas seem to face additional external pressures that make the process even more challenging. Balancing these known complications is already a hefty task, but with LYF’s historical aspects and broad appeal, it likely required its own approach to messaging for a mass audience.

Adding to the complexity, the LYF novel was written primarily from Xiao Yao’s perspective, while a drama demands a wider scope for filming purposes. Given all these competing needs, a drama that closely followed the novel was probably not feasible – and even if it were, would that have been the best approach? The LYF novel is a love story crafted like a mystery or an investigative detective story. Instead of solving a crime, we’re uncovering the truth about love. While the epilogue serves as a partial reveal, it still leaves many questions unanswered, especially regarding Xiang Liu.

This is where the opportunity for the LYF drama adaptation comes in. The audience for the drama  includes both novel readers and newcomers to the story. TH provides new information (or clues) for those familiar with the novel while maintaining the overarching structure for new viewers – all within the outlines of the listed requirements. If the drama had followed strictly to the novel’s narrative, it would have offered nothing new to the lingering unanswered questions. While staying true to the source can be satisfying in some ways, for a story built like LYF, the drama adaptation needed to provide some deeper insights. Simply retelling the same tale might not have been the most effective approach in this case.

 Snowcup:

Random thought of the day:

Should a faithful drama adaptation of a novel always be the goal? Is a drama adaptation that closely follows the novel always preferable over a drama adaptation that provides new insight into the novel?

 Snowcup:

This is where the opportunity for the LYF drama adaptation comes in. The audience for the drama  includes both novel readers and newcomers to the story. TH provides new information (or clues) for those familiar with the novel while maintaining the overarching structure for new viewers – all within the outlines of the listed requirements. If the drama had followed strictly to the novel’s narrative, it would have offered nothing new to the lingering unanswered questions.

I’m very critical of the adaptation of LYF, not because TH (whether intentionally or not) made it part of her world-building, but because it failed to keep her characters intact. Whatever her reasons—budget constraints, censorship, or investor pressure to make other characters more likable—the adaptation ultimately fell short on multiple levels.

You can’t spend 39 episodes meticulously shaping characters to closely resemble their novel counterparts, only to completely betray them in the end. It’s a fundamental failure in adaptation.

I also think that TH didn’t know where to focus. She was being pulled in many directions—to make CX more honorable, TSJ more courageous, and XY more likable and less fickle-hearted. The only character she was allowed to remain true to was XL. That’s why, in the end, XL became the only memorable character. 

Though I appreciated XL’s point of view, I think we lost a lot of XY’s essence, which is unfortunate. XY is a deeply tragic character, riddled with childhood trauma and depression—something she never truly recovers from. Her running away and leaving everything behind is not a sign of healing but just another excuse to escape, much like when she ran away from Jade Mountain as a child.

I don’t think TH’s work needs an adaptation as a supplementary source. If a novel requires a drama to fill in gaps or provide missing information, then the novel itself has failed in its storytelling. It’s perfectly fine for a drama or film to end with open-ended questions—great stories often do. While it's understandable that adaptations can't follow a novel’s structure exactly, failing to keep characters intact reflects poor screenwriting rather than necessary creative changes. In this regard, I think TH’s approach still feels amateurish.

When I think of adaptations that truly did justice to their source material, three come to mind:

1. The Lord of the Rings – LOTR remains the pinnacle of novel adaptations. Even now, it has stood the test of time. It is most unfortunate that LYF did not have the budget to bring the world of Dahuang to life. Since I started with the drama before reading the novel, I didn’t have many expectations. But the moment I saw Furball, I knew the CGI was lacking. When the last 23 episodes came into play, it became even more apparent that the fantastical world TH had envisioned was severely limited. Honestly, it took away some of the magic. LOTR has been the bane of Chinese cinema, with many attempts to recreate its wonderful world, epicness, and magic. LYF ultimately fell into the deep pool of Chinese fantasy that could have been. Many years from now, the drama itself will become outdated due to poor CGI and storytelling, but at least XL, as a character, will remain an icon.

1. Howl’s Moving Castle – The novel and Miyazaki’s adaptation differ significantly, yet Howl and Sophie remain true to their essence. The changes don’t strip them of their fundamental traits; rather, they complement the new storytelling approach. The novel heavily relied on a series of events that demonstrated love was inevitable. While this theme ran subtly in the background of the adaptation, with the anti-war messages being much louder and more apparent, we never lost Sophie and Howl.

2. Harry Potter series – While not a perfect adaptation, the Harry Potter films largely respected the essence of its main characters. Even when omitting or altering parts of the books, the characters still felt like their literary counterparts, allowing audiences to stay emotionally connected.

The best adaptations, even when making changes, understand that characters are the soul of the story. LYF failed in this regard.

Good storytelling requires balance, precision, and a strong understanding of character development. TH knew she was limited in both budget and episode count, yet she still spent 39 episodes meticulously setting up characters, creating an imbalance in the remaining 23 episodes. This structural issue stems from two of TH’s weakest abilities: handling the passage of time and resolving character arcs.

The first issue—passage of time—was actually done well in Qingshui Town, but considering she only had 60 episodes, there should have been more precise writing and editing to ensure a smoother narrative flow. A well-executed time jump can seamlessly transition audiences while maintaining emotional weight. For example, in Kingdom, an overhead landscape shot of the Prince and his bodyguard riding across vast terrain visually conveys the passage of months without unnecessary exposition. Another example is a Bollywood film where a song montage effectively portrays a heroine’s journey and lovesickness—using visual and emotional cues rather than exposition to show time passing.

TH’s second major flaw—resolving conflicts—is even more frustrating. Her usual approach is to simply kill off characters to conclude their arcs. But in LYF, since she couldn’t rely on death as a convenient resolution, many arcs fell flat. This led to a lack of meaningful closure and, in some cases, character regression rather than development.

XY’s portrayal in the drama is a prime example of this failure. In the novel, she is a deeply tragic figure, weighed down by her pain and powerless against the patriarchy. Readers understood her struggles and sympathized with her suffering. However, in the script, she became stubborn, unlikeable, and, as AvenueX aptly put it (and I paraphrase), a “pick-me” character. The drama’s execution of her depression and lovesickness was lackluster, failing to capture the depth of her internal turmoil. A more effective approach would have been to show her withdrawal from life—perhaps a loss of appetite, exhaustion, or an increasing detachment from reality (which the novel effectively had done so)—rather than reducing her pain to poorly acted drunkenness.

And don’t get me started on all the added scenes of XL just drinking. Drinking away sorrow is such a lazy, overused way to portray inner turmoil. It’s a cop-out. Frankly, if any other actor besides JC had played him, these scenes would have been disastrous. But even with JC’s performance, the constant drinking and solemn brooding don’t align with XL’s character. He’s a general who has accepted that if he dies, he will die with his soldiers. His fate is sealed. That’s why these added moments of self-pity feel out of place.

This makes me think of Russell Crowe’s character in Gladiator or Aragorn from LOTR. Both had loved ones, both knew they might never see them again, but neither spent their nights drowning in sorrow. Instead, their strength came from their determination to fight another day—to keep going so that, one day, they could see their loved ones again. That’s what made them memorable. I never once believed that XL went into battle expecting to be a martyr, but TH’s added scenes made it feel that way.

Ultimately, LYF suffered because TH failed to recognize her own limitations. Instead of crafting a well-paced and emotionally resonant adaptation, she overextended character setups and then struggled to resolve them. Good storytelling isn’t just about adaptation—it’s about knowing what to keep, what to cut, and how to create a narrative that feels whole.

I think the comparison is warranted. If you don’t have the budget to adapt a fantasy story, you really shouldn’t. And if you have to, why waste your budget on 60 episodes? Why not 30 episodes and use that budget to properly convey its magic?

Plus, my comparison is mainly about character consistency—Maximus and Aragorn to XL. If those characters remained true in their essence despite their struggles, why should XL be any different?

There was a time when Chinese-language cinema didn’t dumb down its narratives and themes. I’m glad that LYF and, consequently, Filter are slowly bringing back stronger narratives by testing the censorship waters, but honestly, Chinese-language cinema needs to step up or it will fall behind. Churning out copy-and-paste dramas over and over is such a bore. The first half of LYF was quite refreshing because it was like, wow, they still got it—it’s not utterly trash. But then to see it crumble in the second half was a disappointment.

As far as I’m concerned, why adapt a story filled with ambiguity only to add extra scenes for "insight"—doesn’t that defeat the whole purpose of the story? Why does a drama have to dumb down its narrative? What’s the point? To appeal to the masses? Is media literacy really that low? There are far more compelling ways to tell a story, and the storytelling in LYF (in the novel) was far more complex.

Since I'm on a ranting spree about character, can we talk about the scene where TSJ met up with XL to beg for information about his brother and FFYY? This added scene was clearly meant to highlight how desperate and incapable TSJ was when it came to solving his own problems, reinforcing the idea that he relies on money to fix everything. But in doing so, it completely undermines XL’s consistency as a character.  

XL ultimately drops the ball when it comes to telling TSJ about the affair, which feels incredibly out of character for someone as stone-cold, loyal, and decisive as he is. Betraying FFYY goes against his very nature—slipping the information like some gossiping bystander is just ridiculous. FFYY may not have been his real sister, but she treated him like one for over 400 years without malice. And we’re supposed to believe that he would throw her under the bus just like that for TSJ and XY? When he couldn’t even leave the Shennong army for XY?

 plor20:

Since I'm on a ranting spree about character, can we talk about the scene where TSJ met up with XL to beg for information about his brother and FFYY? This added scene was clearly meant to highlight how desperate and incapable TSJ was when it came to solving his own problems, reinforcing the idea that he relies on money to fix everything. But in doing so, it completely undermines XL’s consistency as a character.  

You are not the only one who takes issue with this scene; many XL's fans despise it. For me, this whole scene just makes XL look bad. Like the scene in season 1 in the dancing hall between him and Jing. 

When I was watching it, I didn't think it was meant to make Jing look bad. This character's inability to deal with his personal problems and reliance on his family's wealth to solve problems was well-established in the novel, IMO. After all, his family wealth and connections were how he helped CX and thus sustained his "in" with XY for decades.  This aspect of Jing was highlighted again when he, once again, used his money to bargain with XL to remove XY's Lovers' Bug.