For over 7 years I've been rooting for you! You are such a joy bringer. So earnest, sincere and full of positive energy, so underrated, you deserve all good things coming your way. Hope THEBLACKLABEL will finally do you justice!šŖ
Kwak Dong Yeon is an actor's actor. He's not only a natural talent but also has something very rare; he brilliantly elevates the performances of anyone in his vicinity, which is a very difficult thing to do. They really weren't utilizing him properly for all these years. Whatever role he takes, he never fails to leave an unforgettable impact. Its been so long and yet his potential is endless.
May I be able to see more of your scene stealing versatility in the future, may your path be rich with success, may more diverse, compelling and challenging roles find you, may your journey ahead be long and rewarding, may you not change if not for the better, and may you find joy doing what you love every single day.š
Douban is always like that. Many popular dramas have less rating over there. Douban rating doesnāt really matter…
Np :))
You can still check Douban, it's always nice to see a good score. As it means everything went right - plot, acting, lack of toxicity and no controversies. While a bad one means something went wrong.
Besides, it's usually not the first place people find dramas on. That happens initially through word of mouth and public platforms. Douban is just one of the metrics, not only. In fact when there's a big disparity between Douban score vs scores on all other platforms, it makes viewers more curious to see why. So the viewership don't suffer that badly either way.
Douban is always like that. Many popular dramas have less rating over there. Douban rating doesnāt really matter…
It's okay really, tastes are subjective. Luo Yunxi dramas like Till the End of the Moon (5.6) and Whispers of Fate (5.7) were also classified as not worth watching by Douban but people did in fact watch and loved them. They do so even now. It did nothing to reflect general audience sentiment nor the success and appreciation for the dramas and the casts.
Douban is always like that. Many popular dramas have less rating over there. Douban rating doesnāt really matter…
Is it though? Pursuit of Jade was a massive blockbuster hit which peaked at an astonishing 55.1% daily Yunhe market share. It was the top 3 highest-performing dramas of the entire decade alongside The Knockout and Joy of Life 2 and yet got only 6.8 on Douban, not even close to the other two.
Same goes for The First Frost. Despite being a massive commercial success, it got review bombed by Hidden Love fandoms and dropped to a 5.4 on Douban making it another "completely unwatchable garbage" according to you and other Douban truthers even though it was anything but.
So no, I don't think getting low on Douban means anything major or significant. At the very least it's clearly not stopping anyone from watching. Douban seem to either prefer safe, low risk dramas which don't require using much brain and thus can't be nitpicked OR, the social, political and historically realistic dramas usually containing veterans. Most importantly, dramas featuring casts nd crews who are mostly free from dedicated antis or serious fandom rivalries.
I know many people may attack me for commenting this way, but I just want to give my honest review of this drama.Firstly,…
Hi :)) Firstly, thank you for honest review.
Now let's go over some of your concerns. I'd like to ask you, have you watched the movie Yin Yang Master: Dream of Eternity? It's a GJM movie. If you didn't, kindly watch it and say how many things are similar or highly familiar to Fangs of Fortune :)) Off the top of my head, I can think of a few:
Like the gesture of ml holding 2 fingers in front of his mouth to cast a spell, him giving the other lead black wings, the winged lead fighting fire spells and the last villain, the transparent barrier concept etc. Now you could say it wasn't EXACTLY the same, but that applies to VOS too, some similar concepts but not really the same.
Also, I think you aren't aware of just how many boycott FOF complaints were there initially when many of the early episodes scenes matched frame by frame to a completely unrelated donghua called Tianbao Fuyao Lu. It was all over twitter. But because the plot turned out different despite similar setting, it eventually died down as the ones with issues over plagiarism simply didn't watch and moved on. The costumes in FOF were also similar enough to MJTY for people to recognise they were by the same director. The white foundation criticism was more common in FOF too. Particularly for YingLei and Baijiu, who sometimes looked completely caked in makeup.
His rude behaviour with casts is also known. I heard one of the actors on his short drama series Wuliang and Painted Skin was driven to tears because of how hard GJM pushed them. As for the weight loss, TJR's buckwheet noodle diet and 18 hour overnight shoots that made his face swell while his ribs could be counted is also a common complaint from his fans who followed VOS filming. Besides, did Yu Shuxin get that weight back? She still looks very skinny and so did Chen Du Ling in a program I recently saw. What about Song Zu Er? Even their backbones and chest bones were visible, and there is no GJM pushing them now. So why only say it's him when it's a recurrent issue disregarding the casts health for a toxic standard of beauty?
As for one of the scriptwriters post, to me it sounds like she's saying stop comparing and looking for similarities because they are different stories and the great dream is already over, and not some heartbroken message that she's being plagiarised.
Now, good timing since someone posted a small segment on Tian Jia Rui's page recently. He actually had experience playing a character with dissociative identity disorder having 7+ personalities. It was one of his more talked about and well known theatre performances before he debuted in the industry. As a theatre actor he didn't have cool camera works and lighting to make him compelling, he had to rely on live and raw skill that's difficult to imitate or cover up. So although you can say that GJM gives him too much screentime, and that's very valid, but him giving a role like that to TJR likely comes from prior faith that he can handle it.
I share your point about some scenes, including a few of Joseph's but I will blame it on weak editing rather than the casts lacking, since some shots look better in the reuters now that I see them. Were you by chance talking about the bloody tears scene? It was one of the most anticipated for many fans but it didn't land as hard as episode 8 puppet jiling did. I saw fans of most of the lead casts complaining about quiet a few scenes saying they were better unedited even though it should have been the opposite.
But yes, you could also argue that one or more casts didn't live upto the hype, since it's a purely personal opinion. Even I don't like some of the highly praised actor's performances in cdrama. For every person who didn't like something, there are many more who do like it. At the end of the day, people are free to have their own tastes and opinions. Not everything will resonate with everyone and that's completely fine. :))
Me neither. So I'm trying to keep anticipation low. But it's 45 minutes per episode, not 10. So the abrupt transitions shouldn't be needed. Let's hope she did her research and knows what she is doing :))
This is already way more for the director. She's used to winning awards and being famous for shortform and micro dramas only. This is her first step into the longform genre with big scale production. So best to keep expectations limited. (hard, I know)
Kwak Dong Yeon is an actor's actor. He's not only a natural talent but also has something very rare; he brilliantly elevates the performances of anyone in his vicinity, which is a very difficult thing to do. They really weren't utilizing him properly for all these years. Whatever role he takes, he never fails to leave an unforgettable impact. Its been so long and yet his potential is endless.
May I be able to see more of your scene stealing versatility in the future, may your path be rich with success, may more diverse, compelling and challenging roles find you, may your journey ahead be long and rewarding, may you not change if not for the better, and may you find joy doing what you love every single day.š
You can still check Douban, it's always nice to see a good score. As it means everything went right - plot, acting, lack of toxicity and no controversies. While a bad one means something went wrong.
Besides, it's usually not the first place people find dramas on. That happens initially through word of mouth and public platforms. Douban is just one of the metrics, not only. In fact when there's a big disparity between Douban score vs scores on all other platforms, it makes viewers more curious to see why. So the viewership don't suffer that badly either way.
Same goes for The First Frost. Despite being a massive commercial success, it got review bombed by Hidden Love fandoms and dropped to a 5.4 on Douban making it another "completely unwatchable garbage" according to you and other Douban truthers even though it was anything but.
So no, I don't think getting low on Douban means anything major or significant. At the very least it's clearly not stopping anyone from watching. Douban seem to either prefer safe, low risk dramas which don't require using much brain and thus can't be nitpicked OR, the social, political and historically realistic dramas usually containing veterans. Most importantly, dramas featuring casts nd crews who are mostly free from dedicated antis or serious fandom rivalries.
Now let's go over some of your concerns. I'd like to ask you, have you watched the movie Yin Yang Master: Dream of Eternity? It's a GJM movie. If you didn't, kindly watch it and say how many things are similar or highly familiar to Fangs of Fortune :)) Off the top of my head, I can think of a few:
Like the gesture of ml holding 2 fingers in front of his mouth to cast a spell, him giving the other lead black wings, the winged lead fighting fire spells and the last villain, the transparent barrier concept etc. Now you could say it wasn't EXACTLY the same, but that applies to VOS too, some similar concepts but not really the same.
Also, I think you aren't aware of just how many boycott FOF complaints were there initially when many of the early episodes scenes matched frame by frame to a completely unrelated donghua called Tianbao Fuyao Lu. It was all over twitter. But because the plot turned out different despite similar setting, it eventually died down as the ones with issues over plagiarism simply didn't watch and moved on. The costumes in FOF were also similar enough to MJTY for people to recognise they were by the same director. The white foundation criticism was more common in FOF too. Particularly for YingLei and Baijiu, who sometimes looked completely caked in makeup.
His rude behaviour with casts is also known. I heard one of the actors on his short drama series Wuliang and Painted Skin was driven to tears because of how hard GJM pushed them. As for the weight loss, TJR's buckwheet noodle diet and 18 hour overnight shoots that made his face swell while his ribs could be counted is also a common complaint from his fans who followed VOS filming. Besides, did Yu Shuxin get that weight back? She still looks very skinny and so did Chen Du Ling in a program I recently saw. What about Song Zu Er? Even their backbones and chest bones were visible, and there is no GJM pushing them now. So why only say it's him when it's a recurrent issue disregarding the casts health for a toxic standard of beauty?
As for one of the scriptwriters post, to me it sounds like she's saying stop comparing and looking for similarities because they are different stories and the great dream is already over, and not some heartbroken message that she's being plagiarised.
Now, good timing since someone posted a small segment on Tian Jia Rui's page recently. He actually had experience playing a character with dissociative identity disorder having 7+ personalities. It was one of his more talked about and well known theatre performances before he debuted in the industry. As a theatre actor he didn't have cool camera works and lighting to make him compelling, he had to rely on live and raw skill that's difficult to imitate or cover up. So although you can say that GJM gives him too much screentime, and that's very valid, but him giving a role like that to TJR likely comes from prior faith that he can handle it.
I share your point about some scenes, including a few of Joseph's but I will blame it on weak editing rather than the casts lacking, since some shots look better in the reuters now that I see them. Were you by chance talking about the bloody tears scene? It was one of the most anticipated for many fans but it didn't land as hard as episode 8 puppet jiling did. I saw fans of most of the lead casts complaining about quiet a few scenes saying they were better unedited even though it should have been the opposite.
But yes, you could also argue that one or more casts didn't live upto the hype, since it's a purely personal opinion. Even I don't like some of the highly praised actor's performances in cdrama. For every person who didn't like something, there are many more who do like it. At the end of the day, people are free to have their own tastes and opinions. Not everything will resonate with everyone and that's completely fine. :))
(hard, I know)