It's good...(but not *that* good)
I feel like maybe I watched this with too high of expectations 😅 because everyone seems to be in love with it but I thought it was just okay. Maybe because I've seen 'Til The End of The Moon' and 'Alchemy of Souls' my fantasy expectations are too high? But this definitely isn't 'the best xianxia I've ever seen!'.
Here's what I thought was done well:
- The initial hook and concept are incredible and pull you in almost immediately
- They balance comedy and drama well (for the most part)
- They manage to juggle a large cast and make most of them endearing
- The costuming and makeup (omg you can tell the production had MONEY money, it's great)
- The CGI was also good (again MONEY money, you can tell)
- The actors that were good were insanely good
What I personally didn't like:
- The actors who were not as strong really stood out as awkward and a bit stilted (to me at least)
- Sound and music seemed oddly absent at times, like there were parts of scenes where I was like ??? Where is the dramatic music ??? hello ???
- They didn't follow through on things with consistency
- There was a bit too much time spent on comedy, one section in particular felt overly long to me
- This meant there was less time for plot, which then felt rushed. I get that it's hard to do plot and comedy at the same time, but like, this is why plot usually wins over comedy
- A lot of MAJOR plot points were resolved in mild and unsatisfying ways, like it almost felt like the writer was afraid to commit. Like, don't get me wrong, this would have been great as a comedy, it also would have been great as a tragedy! The fact that they didn't really commit in either direction means it ended up just being... good ¯\_ (ツ)_/¯ .
TL,DR: It was fun, but I wouldn't rewatch it and probably wouldn't recommend it to anyone with other things on their list.
(sidenote: I will definitely be following Chao Feng and Qing Kui's actors into their new projects because they were solidly in the 'insanely good acting' category.)
Here's what I thought was done well:
- The initial hook and concept are incredible and pull you in almost immediately
- They balance comedy and drama well (for the most part)
- They manage to juggle a large cast and make most of them endearing
- The costuming and makeup (omg you can tell the production had MONEY money, it's great)
- The CGI was also good (again MONEY money, you can tell)
- The actors that were good were insanely good
What I personally didn't like:
- The actors who were not as strong really stood out as awkward and a bit stilted (to me at least)
- Sound and music seemed oddly absent at times, like there were parts of scenes where I was like ??? Where is the dramatic music ??? hello ???
- They didn't follow through on things with consistency
- There was a bit too much time spent on comedy, one section in particular felt overly long to me
- This meant there was less time for plot, which then felt rushed. I get that it's hard to do plot and comedy at the same time, but like, this is why plot usually wins over comedy
- A lot of MAJOR plot points were resolved in mild and unsatisfying ways, like it almost felt like the writer was afraid to commit. Like, don't get me wrong, this would have been great as a comedy, it also would have been great as a tragedy! The fact that they didn't really commit in either direction means it ended up just being... good ¯\_ (ツ)_/¯ .
TL,DR: It was fun, but I wouldn't rewatch it and probably wouldn't recommend it to anyone with other things on their list.
(sidenote: I will definitely be following Chao Feng and Qing Kui's actors into their new projects because they were solidly in the 'insanely good acting' category.)
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