Creation of the Gods Ⅰ: Kingdom of Storms
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I see.
This was ok?The Shang dynasty setting is cool to see - human sacrifice, lots of bronze armor and swords.
It's surprisingly horny for a big mainland Chinese movie, though the lusty sex-coded characters are all bad guys, obviously.
There's literally a scene of a dance number that's a metaphor for people fucking, with a woman shown "climaxing" with her dress and long hair.
That said, for such a big production it's surprisingly ugly at times - both the CGI and the colour grade.
I also wished all the hostages, princes and other young male characters were better visually distinguished.
I had trouble telling them apart at times, because they are all fit young men and wear the same hair and uniform all the time.
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boring CGI mess
What a letdown.The main problem is that the story is a) just kinda dumb and bad, and b) too condensed.
The protagonist is entirely bland (Good grief, is Raymond Lam ever a charisma black hole!) and none of the relationships get enough space, so any character development is impossible to believe.
All the twists, betrayals etc. are meaningless, because I feel nothing about any of the characters. (except for the princess, because she's hot)
And where the old KFCM worked - the crazy fun fights - just does not work here.
The fights are bland, fake looking and worst of all - boring.
It's just forgettable.
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Ultimately forgettable
I was looking forward to this, because it'd be cool if we finally got a complete adaptation, by the same director of my favourite version no less! Alas.There are glimpses of 90s Hong Kong here and there, sadly brought down by a very "current" mainland Chinese film look (= often indistinguishable from a TV cdrama), lack of humor and bland CGI.
The actor playing Mokei is not charismatic.
Sadly while very similar to Kung Fu Cult Master, it's nowhere nearly as fun.
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Satisfying Your DeDi needs
It's pretty nice.One thing I enjoyed is the structure - the characters usually travel to a new location and solve one or two cases there.
This keeps everything fresh and fun.
The characters take a while to grow on you, but when they do they are also enjoyable to watch.
Not quite as bonkers and colourful as Tsui Hark's Detective Dee movies, but overall in a similar vein.
I wasn't a fan of the Tang simping, but thankfully the nationalist meltdowns are not that frequent.
Ying Tao best girl.
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Delight of a show!
Not the greatest wuxia, not an amazing mystery show, BUT...This is a show that's much more than a sum of its parts.
Especially after I learnt it wasn't a big production, that it's a small budget web series, I can't but marvel at how good it is.
Beautiful to look at, the fights look excellent.
And the actors are wonderful, the story well written with lots of setup and payoff.
You absolutely can guess the big twist early (ep1 for me), but it doesn't make it not satisfying.
The romances also work very well.
It seems unlikely to get a season 2, but I am still hoping for it!
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This review may contain spoilers
One of the best Daomu series, for what that's worth.
Eeeh? It's good-ish?I generally care much less about the Daomu series than Candle in the Tomb, but I gotta admit this one's decent.
The story is a hot mess like always, and you don't really get any answers, as always. Gotta wait for that second season, you hope, and then it's the same thing and nothing gets answered in the next one either, probably.
This one is clearly a mystery show, and the mystery is even pretty intriguing. I do love the concept of listening to thunder for...some reason.
Not a fan of Xie constantly chasing his uncle, that's a bit old.
The plot, as usual, is broken up into randomly paced arcs. The tomb raiding is very well done for once, and we even get genuinely scary horror! Skinsuit zombies chasing the main trio through a flat cave while they're crawling was so freaky and nailbiting. Also skinsuit zombies animated by hand crabs? Very good, I approve.
There's a whole Shades arc which I couldn't give a shit about, because he's so cringey. But his gf is very cute and they have good chemistry. (so the conclusion to that is just...typical Daomu, always a disappointment)
Pacing in the first half is generally all over the place, cutting between boring south asian village militia crap and tomb raiding. It picks up in the second part and I enjoyed the whole "WuXie has adventures in Warehouse 11" bit a lot.
It's a cool concept, well done.
Onto season 2, I guess.
Random notes:
- Bai is a sweet cinnamon roll and I love her, but why is she a love interest? They even have solid chemistry with Wuxie, but he's very gay for his mute boyfriend, so we can't have none of this yucky girl-kissing. (why don't those two boys ever spend any time together though?)
- Liu Sang is also a grumpy cinnamon roll and I'd marry him. Wish he was in more of the show, as he just disappears in the second half.
- Wu Xie is kind of an asshole in this, right? Like I get it, his situation is not great, but he antagonizes absolutely everyone all the time. He's mean to Bai, he pisses off random people he meets. Including the villain.
He's usually cheeky, but also a nice guy? Even his older version in Tomb of the Sea was more brooding and pragmatic, rather than just a pissy bitch.
Mixed feelings about this version.
- Fatty is traditionally good, but I couldn't care less about his story arc, with his honestly pretty dumb girlfriend.
- I did like that Fatty and Xie had a genuine looking relationship, they had banter and seemed like real characters. (which reminded me, unsurprisingly of Hu Bayi and Fatty from the other shows, very similar) Their third boyband member is barely in the show tbh, not my fav version of him.
- A part of why I dislike Daomu over CitT is that the main characters are rich mobsters. Anything at any moment can be solved by throwing money at it. I appreciated that they wrote in conflict with uncle ErBai this time, so Wuxie was a bit less rich. But then he quickly reversed that by getting rich again.
(also - the whole PiaoPiao subplot could've been solved by a single phonecall to uncle. They're fucking rich as hell. Heck, they know miracle doctors who just a few episodes previously healed a mute friend of theirs. One of many examples of idiot-plotting in this series.)
It's ok. Cool even. I really enjoyed some bits. Two people in it are very hot and cute.
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Decent
It starts strong and finishes a bit muddled.Still, a very decent, almost good movie. Especially considering it's a friggin' MMORPG adaptation.
Pity about some characters' deaths, and the second half is pretty rushed.
The CGI is surprisingly good, with a very few exceptions. CG animals especially tend to be crappy in Chinese films, but here they worked well.
The overall art direction is very good and everything is quite pretty.
The acting is generally solid - Peter Ho is as menacing and intense as ever, and Jiang Lu Xia is hot AF with her short hair and a badass scar.
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Strange Tales of Tang Dynasty 3: To Changan
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Infuriating slop
I'm nearing the end, so I'll amend this if needed after I finish.But I have feelings and thoughts I want to write down.
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The second season had me a bit worried and annoyed, because its basic premise of taking place in the "western territories" dogwhistled towards Chinese "activities" in Xinjiang. "One Strong China, look how beautiful and varied this empire is!"
I despise courtly intrigue plots, so moving far away from the imperial family was good. But even in the far west there was a constant link to the politics.
This time it's nowhere near that subtle - we're in Chang'an and it's all courtly intrigue at all times.
Even if I were to excuse the constant trembling before The Law of Tang or obnoxious royals and their scheming (and I don't!), the overall quality of the show took a nosedive off a cliff - the cases are all absurd and boring, with unbelievable last minute twists and out-of-nowhere motivation reveals. There's no tension or a reason to care about anyone's safety or actions - Lu Linfeng and Yingtao are unbeatable and easily handle nearly any foe. Everyone's kinda just phoning it in, because the script and direction are infuriatingly bad.
Without much exaggeration - like a third of the runtime is purely consisting of people doing that stupid Tang dynasty finger bow, or standing in a group and loudly and collectively deepthroating the Tang dynasty while epic music swells. This happens ALL THE TIME. There used to be a few scenes like this here and there in the previous seasons, but here it's absurdly common.
And everything in between is just tedious melodrama - to the point of self-parody.
It's one thing to try and make something good while cutting off the pound of flesh for the censor. And entirely another thing to intentionally craft propaganda slop.
Shame, I used to like these characters, this used to be fun.
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Really boring and drawn out.
This was quite boring and I was amazed the thin premise couldn't support even the very short 14 episodes.That's it, really.
The actors were mostly solid, but they don't have much to do, since nothing happens.
This could've been a movie and I'd watch it, the basic idea is not entirely uninteresting.
But 14 episodes of THE SAME THINGS HAPPENING OVER AND OVER?
God no, this was dire.
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Interesting if unremarkable
A cop caught in the middle of a conspiracy fights to survive.A simple premise, starts off strong and finishes a bit melodramatic and unevenly.
I enjoyed the acting, it looked very pretty and the story was decently written, even if some moments had a bit too much unearned pathos.
There is one exceptional fight scene, while the others are just serviceable. There is at least one case of shockingly bad CG that seriously took me out of the moment.
Overall a solid way to spend a few hours.
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Not for me.
I'm dropping this.The convoluted premise is just not interesting and Song Yi is not utilized super well.
See, I find she's at her best as a strong confident character, sassiness being appreciated.
Here she just pines and cries all the time.
Like girl, you got arranged-married into a rich family, how awful for you! And your husband even wants to divorce you and give you a ton of money? The horror!
Main dude tries, he's trying so hard I'm surprised he didn't pull a funny muscle in his face. Also his ears are massive.
But yeah, it's just not what I hoped. Definitely not Dream of Splendor, nor Joy of Life/My Heroic Husband.
Pass.
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