Come on, come on! It's wuxia. Lots end like that, and everybody did not end up being sent to other plane of existence…
No one is forced to stay if that's not their cup of tea. I am not into "consoling" anybody. Life is hard sometimes : that drama was not meant to be soft, rather a homeopathic cure to stay aware that everything does not come for granted, and that promises can and often will be broken. It's a beautiful drama, well played, nonetheless. One of my favorites, now. Not as tough as "One and Only", but close. Colors, cinematography, martial arts, and supporting music : wow.
What I'm saying is that I was not looking for ROMANCE as my first need in wuxia (xianxia is different). If that's what you looked for, of course you were disappointed. Can you respect my opinion too, even if it is diametrically opposed to yours ? Yours reflect those who wanted to gun down the drama because it was not the wuxia to their taste, mine is reflecting those who liked it for theirs or reasons like mine. No wonder it is still polarizing.
As I mentioned elsewhere, I agree the title was misleading, although we know the conventions for translating titles to English. If they wanted to start with "A Journey" they should better have continued with "of heroes". And you should have been aware that the original title was "Yi nian Guanshan" (a thought about the Guan mountain". A threatening one, a cold one, in the north, with wild enemies in hordes there.)
You say you fell in love with LYN? Here's what a trueblue pengfei (not me, I just trawl through various fandom threads and Weibo to better understand what I am looking at), wrote, translated from her Weibo in Chinese :
Liu Yuning and Ning Yuanzhou have merged into one. Like a sinking ship, he tenderly bids farewell to the sea; This time, he was like a collapsed mountain. After the boulders and smoke cleared away, He still stands silent. @ Modern Brothers Liu Yuning
"The sea" refers to the currents of time, as an answer to the drama Weibo epigraph. 一舟之远在于宁，一念关山起，远舟归何处 / "Introduction: A boat is far away from Ning. A thought of Guanshan rising : where will the boat go?"
A Journey To Love Full BGM OST《一念关山》BGM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WXbfFFBVEX0&t=5s
Lovely. As befits a collaboration between gifted composers : Chen Xueran who was music director, Du Zhiwan who composed "Offer", "Standing Sword", "Why Spring Comes Back", "Don't Dream of Cold" ; Mingyao ("Yi nian Guanshan"), Special OST guest composer Guan Dazhou ("Afraid of Dreams", "Not Yet", ); Yang Qimen ("Long Drunk"), and Carlos Gonzalez, Shih-wei Wu, Jack Haigh, Ignacio Ramírez, Eric Marriot, Judy Kang, Julián Franji who also were on the music composition team. Names that LYN certainly is already familiar with (since he has sung several of their compositions already in other OSTs). We should be aware of them too.
Hmm well, I liked precisely what disappointed you: that it was not a fairy tale laden with tons of kisses and enrapture of weak females. It was like wuxia should be : battles, intrigues, swordfight, taking in stride that politics sometime have to override gushy sentimentality. And that the reluctantly accepted love stories were mature, befitting warriors who had gone through fire and death before, so would be careful about the terms to join formally. LYN and LSS were perfect, as were the rest of "our heroes". So yes, it was not an n-th story of hearts and roses. Fine by me, including the foreseen tragic end.
My poor heart, thou the ending was as most of us expected, ughhh. One of the best drama for sure. But still, the…
Come on, come on! It's wuxia. Lots end like that, and everybody did not end up being sent to other plane of existence (not like One and Only, magnificent tragic tale where just everybody end up dead, only hope being reincarnation). Li Tongguang and A Ying are still standing, together with a lot of LDT members, including Ding Hui who followed "our heroes" from the start, modestly but efficiently, and in Wu, emperor Xingjian, and empress Xiao Yan who is young enough to remarry, although not with someone we know, so that leaves openings for next generations, and an S2 which I think I saw rumors that it could be planned to film this year. In that case, we can look forward to a different journey perhaps, in 2025? A title should not be too revealing. I'm a bit tired of all those "to Love" titles. "Journey of heroes" might have been more to my taste. Heroes most often end up dead, even the "immortal" ones, so no problem. As for the love stories on the journey, they were nice, especially those who showed growth. Li Tongguang's obsession was different: it certainly looked like he always needed a mom. or a goddess. But even if "too late", he did let it go. So let's assume he grew up too. He was still very young to start with, 22 in the beginning. Many are not very mature then, so that's why Ruyi and Yuanzhou considered him to be still "a kid" until the final battle.
Most of your questions and those you did not think of are answered here (why the butterflies at wedding scene, etc) : https://kisskh.at/discussions/a-journey-to-love/121473-a-journey-to-love-notes-on-production-location-dates-cast-characters-and-more Including playlists of MVs, OSTs, and new mini profile of Liu Yuning created last month and updated Dec 31, 2023, including links to his latest stage performance of 3 songs. For the BGM, turn to Peachey Blossom's thread : she put it on YT now +someone gave a link to it on Spotify.
i wonder when this will be available in my country... i'm from germany, but iqiyi still doesn't have it for me…
Yesss. It is still difficult to access from some places. Kiss is the easiest non official platform, although not good quality. https://kisskh.co/Drama/A-Journey-to-Love?id=8251&q=true Some peer to peer share streams have it from what I heard: you have to know the right persons (competent and friendly IT nerds) to access them, although every drama is not available. I was also very disappointed that it couldn't be accessed abroad on iQiyi since I subscribe faithfully to the main platforms and was ready to fork out extra for the advance view of last episodes. It should be available to the world, imo.
Midway I spoiled myself reading a comment not to expect a HE with all of the squad members alive. I even saw in…
If I remember well, a part of the messenger pigeons had been "taken care of" so no news would travel easily that way. First by Ning Tou'er and Liu Dao Tang, when they were escaping from An, and then of course by Second Prince's henchmen, who had to cover up the treason. It has also been shown at the "hunting for the stolen ransom" episode that it was not that difficult to shoot down a pigeon and intercept messages. Sending Yuan Lu was clearly in the hope that he would be spared from the carnage. The distance between He xian and An du is mentioned by Yuan Lu as 300 miles. The nearest outpost with LDT secret outpost was days away from He xian anyway. If the going had been peaceful, yes QZ would have sent a message, that he did not showed there was a problem with communication, not only because QZ had hidden designs. Ning Yuanzhou and LDT were, as most there, believing that news needed cross checking and confirmation: usually a sound policy. So the smoke signal should have been investigated, but there were also cover up from some reasons not to do it.
I was prepared for the ending so the ending was bearable for me but can someone explain the last scene, who's…
Ah the mystery !!!! A vision? a dream? What many audience would like to see as a seed for hope that Ruyi faked her death and that of Ning Tou'er as well? Take your pick.
Clickable links to SOME of my comments for this drama, if anyone is interested they can read those as well.first…
Thank you for your detailed notes and hard work, and your love of this fine wuxia drama! I hope more people will come to like it, with or without the "heroic demise" ending (or did they manage to once more dodge the bullet, fake their death, and escape to the peace and quiet they yearned for, cutting ties with the past? There are clues both for this or that, and I can understand those audience who were sad that so many of the characters they had come to love ended killed off, and would like to dream up, like Chu Yue probably did, a different outcome; I read somewhere that indeed, a sequel is planned! But not with same cast/characters. So the final true demise of Ning Tou'er and Ruyi looks like it will stand in AJTL...).
Before moving onward to new drama excitement, I am listening to the excellent OST that featured such greats in Chinese pop music as Guangliang, Chen Xueran (most bgm and music director for the drama), Liu Yuning (the "prince" of ost could not have less than two songs in, here ; he always interprets beautifully), Tia Ray etc. And to the playlists of Liu Yuning songs, from and before his first non OST song "Imagination" - he covered also many beautiful songs in addition to the almost 90 songs he contributed to dramas!
I added some links to all that and some meat as well (literally!) in my mini profile of LYN (in the Discussion). It's from different angles than the article by Cho Na in 2021 that I finally found after her ongoing chronology of LYN's OST songs. Both are of course linked also, in the Discussion, which I will now leave standing, after a re-watch of the drama to check where characters appeared from the sprawling Baidu list. I added a good many to the list, with pictures from screenshots to know their face.
And some maps for the Journey. Plus some related interviews and show. Enough for the "starving concubines" (or princesses, as one might translate this fan name :D).
Happy New Year to you and those who read until this message!
Well its different. In mandarin, the drama, they call him Ning Tou'er (head), well his fans use "Lao Da"
Yes, but he's increasingly mentioned just like that in Chinese comments about published videos and even Weibo : 宁头儿 Ning Tou'er, so to me, it looks like it could fast become an alternative nickname to NingGe or LaoDa! Happy new year to the 棚妃们 :D
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Life is hard sometimes : that drama was not meant to be soft, rather a homeopathic cure to stay aware that everything does not come for granted, and that promises can and often will be broken.
It's a beautiful drama, well played, nonetheless. One of my favorites, now. Not as tough as "One and Only", but close. Colors, cinematography, martial arts, and supporting music : wow.
Can you respect my opinion too, even if it is diametrically opposed to yours ? Yours reflect those who wanted to gun down the drama because it was not the wuxia to their taste, mine is reflecting those who liked it for theirs or reasons like mine. No wonder it is still polarizing.
As I mentioned elsewhere, I agree the title was misleading, although we know the conventions for translating titles to English. If they wanted to start with "A Journey" they should better have continued with "of heroes". And you should have been aware that the original title was "Yi nian Guanshan" (a thought about the Guan mountain". A threatening one, a cold one, in the north, with wild enemies in hordes there.)
You say you fell in love with LYN? Here's what a trueblue pengfei (not me, I just trawl through various fandom threads and Weibo to better understand what I am looking at), wrote, translated from her Weibo in Chinese :
Liu Yuning and Ning Yuanzhou have merged into one.
Like a sinking ship, he tenderly bids farewell to the sea;
This time, he was like a collapsed mountain. After the boulders and smoke cleared away,
He still stands silent.
@ Modern Brothers Liu Yuning
"The sea" refers to the currents of time, as an answer to the drama Weibo epigraph. 一舟之远在于宁，一念关山起，远舟归何处 / "Introduction: A boat is far away from Ning. A thought of Guanshan rising : where will the boat go?"
Chen Xueran who was music director,
Du Zhiwan who composed "Offer", "Standing Sword", "Why Spring Comes Back", "Don't Dream of Cold" ;
Mingyao ("Yi nian Guanshan"),
Special OST guest composer Guan Dazhou ("Afraid of Dreams", "Not Yet", );
Yang Qimen ("Long Drunk"),
and Carlos Gonzalez, Shih-wei Wu, Jack Haigh, Ignacio Ramírez, Eric Marriot, Judy Kang, Julián Franji who also were on the music composition team.
Names that LYN certainly is already familiar with (since he has sung several of their compositions already in other OSTs). We should be aware of them too.
So yes, it was not an n-th story of hearts and roses. Fine by me, including the foreseen tragic end.
Li Tongguang and A Ying are still standing, together with a lot of LDT members, including Ding Hui who followed "our heroes" from the start, modestly but efficiently, and in Wu, emperor Xingjian, and empress Xiao Yan who is young enough to remarry, although not with someone we know, so that leaves openings for next generations, and an S2 which I think I saw rumors that it could be planned to film this year. In that case, we can look forward to a different journey perhaps, in 2025?
A title should not be too revealing. I'm a bit tired of all those "to Love" titles. "Journey of heroes" might have been more to my taste.
Heroes most often end up dead, even the "immortal" ones, so no problem.
As for the love stories on the journey, they were nice, especially those who showed growth. Li Tongguang's obsession was different: it certainly looked like he always needed a mom. or a goddess. But even if "too late", he did let it go. So let's assume he grew up too. He was still very young to start with, 22 in the beginning. Many are not very mature then, so that's why Ruyi and Yuanzhou considered him to be still "a kid" until the final battle.
FL Liu ShiShi does not die, of course.
Including playlists of MVs, OSTs, and new mini profile of Liu Yuning created last month and updated Dec 31, 2023, including links to his latest stage performance of 3 songs.
For the BGM, turn to Peachey Blossom's thread : she put it on YT now +someone gave a link to it on Spotify.
And more.
Kiss is the easiest non official platform, although not good quality.
https://kisskh.co/Drama/A-Journey-to-Love?id=8251&q=true
Some peer to peer share streams have it from what I heard: you have to know the right persons (competent and friendly IT nerds) to access them, although every drama is not available.
I was also very disappointed that it couldn't be accessed abroad on iQiyi since I subscribe faithfully to the main platforms and was ready to fork out extra for the advance view of last episodes. It should be available to the world, imo.
It's two pages: second one starts with the mini profile updated to Dec31, 2023. There are links on first page to hop from one subject to another if you are hunting for something in particular.
Sending Yuan Lu was clearly in the hope that he would be spared from the carnage.
The distance between He xian and An du is mentioned by Yuan Lu as 300 miles. The nearest outpost with LDT secret outpost was days away from He xian anyway. If the going had been peaceful, yes QZ would have sent a message, that he did not showed there was a problem with communication, not only because QZ had hidden designs.
Ning Yuanzhou and LDT were, as most there, believing that news needed cross checking and confirmation: usually a sound policy. So the smoke signal should have been investigated, but there were also cover up from some reasons not to do it.
Before moving onward to new drama excitement, I am listening to the excellent OST that featured such greats in Chinese pop music as Guangliang, Chen Xueran (most bgm and music director for the drama), Liu Yuning (the "prince" of ost could not have less than two songs in, here ; he always interprets beautifully), Tia Ray etc. And to the playlists of Liu Yuning songs, from and before his first non OST song "Imagination" - he covered also many beautiful songs in addition to the almost 90 songs he contributed to dramas!
I added some links to all that and some meat as well (literally!) in my mini profile of LYN (in the Discussion). It's from different angles than the article by Cho Na in 2021 that I finally found after her ongoing chronology of LYN's OST songs. Both are of course linked also, in the Discussion, which I will now leave standing, after a re-watch of the drama to check where characters appeared from the sprawling Baidu list. I added a good many to the list, with pictures from screenshots to know their face.
And some maps for the Journey. Plus some related interviews and show. Enough for the "starving concubines" (or princesses, as one might translate this fan name :D).
Happy New Year to you and those who read until this message!
Happy new year to the 棚妃们 :D