Skibbies

I think the Qin Empire 2 is on netflix, but not 1 for some mysterious reason. You can technically watch one without watching the other I think.

MDL ratings was 6.8 before which is lmao. It has been holding 7.6 on douban for few days, which is fair, since it's having hard time grabbing people.

They were recorded on set and limited dialogues were dubbed by themselves in a studio I think. (dialogue change or whatever) which is incredibly rare for historical because even when dramas have actors' own voice, it's usually largely dubbed in post production for noise pollution reason (? I think).

8.9 is an incredibly high score though, I'm not sure how much higher you think this deserves?

RAW trailer, it's preview of first twelve episodes, the first two episodes are more horror-esque with jumpscare, while latter ones lean towards suspense: https://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XMzc2OTM5MDkyMA==.html?spm=a2h0k.11417342.soresults.dtitle

Fun tidbits: the director, Passsee Mu is a newbie director but he's also the writer and editor of this drama, he also made posters for each episodes: https://movie.douban.com/review/9580417/

A fair few supporting characters are from or have worked with Daylight Entertainment, as well as the director of photography & post-production have also previously worked on their dramas, which is how I found out about it.

The most similar drama I can think of is probably jdrama Galileo with sesmingly supernatural incidents having a scientific explanation, and the creepy tone, with dash of Mr.Brain where a genius doctor treats his patients using unconventional methods.

Watched it raw on iqiyi. I love the set designs so much holy crap. This is also the first recent historical I've seen that doesn't use dubbing, damn, real indicator in everyone's acting ability (and accents :P)! The pacing is pretty good, first two episodes are ofc set up but there's a ton of stuff happening already, I think it might be slightly confusing at first tbh, but that's okay, I'm sure everyone was mildly confused and overwhelmed by sheer number of characters for NiF too.

The OTP's first meeting was different but it's a fun first meeting! so I quite like it. I expected the change since the drama focus is different, but I was quite dazzled by the book's opening )and first meeting) so I did want to see it. There are fair amount of difference as been indicated before but I think it kept core aspects pretty well? We'll see how it goes!

Good to hear about the pacing not being draggy!

Good god, why is this 60 episodes?? Isn't the novel pretty short? Can't we have nice and cute dramas at 20 or 30 ep? :c

Sorry I just saw this. I read it in Chinese unfortunately. I loved the book enough to buy it and briefly contemplated translating it, but I don't really trust my own translating skills and the level of commitment that'll require (with all of the epilogues, it's double the length of With You). Maybe a future project.

@Map_Linh: I know they changed supporting characters and the drama is actually male lead focused and haven't really looked into anything else. I think you can change a lot and still keep the soul of the story but it's very difficult and doubly so for historical. To be fair, a lot of the characters in the book were super OP so toning it done would be better.

@etcetera: I think the sequel is on Netflix for some mysterious reason and you can technically start with it. I always feel like I need to bring a history book or three to watch Qin Empire though so I don't know how it would go for you.

Nirvana in Fire is pretty darn hard to match, especially in the current cdrama world, what with strict restrictions of what can be filmed, a distinct lack of competent screenwriters (GOOD GOD so many good materials and actors and production ruined by plot), and the lack of patience to craft a good drama sjdfhsdjf bluh. The same production company has a historical coming out this year though? It's about the life of a girl but it's not epic. The novel is well regarded but I haven't read it. Also it's not the same director as NiF, but it's a different kind of story so eh. https://kisskh.at/23911-the-story-of-ming-lan

Have you tried The Qin Empire? or the Advisor's Alliance? Both are super serious historical though. They tend to be better quality but are usually incredibly hard to find subs for and have limited appeal to a lot of drama watchers. Lighter ones are lot more tricky since they'll fuck up the casting or the story usually, and broadcasting restriction can also make things terrible. I can only think of https://kisskh.at/23514-hua-jian-ti-hu-fang-da-chu but it's slice of lifey.

anyways. there's enough content in the book to fill all 70 episodes, so I hope they pace it well.

Watched this when I went on a 90s/early 00s school series binge. It was super cute! although I wished they cut down on the tropes a bit? The initial premise were already trope filled, then they added more, and more, I think the story and strong nostalgia would have stood out by itself.

I like the meta homages too! Both Joe Chen & Jerry Yan would have been huge part of the audience of this movie. The former being the female lead of top rated twdrama TWICE, Prince turn into Frog (2004) & Fated to Love You (2009) and later, Meteor Garden (2001) of course. The director is also the director of over half a dozen immensely popular twdrama. I think the theme song is sung by Hebe. who's part of SHE, also immensely in early 00s.

Above spoilers are pretty much correct except Wuji knew the sister wasn't her fiance. He outright called it off, but there were some excuse about how sister is sickly so they didn't want to announce it to the public (but everyone in the family knows), so sister just walks around claiming she's the fiance. If they see each other, Wuji kind of ignores her or show her courtesy but just some princess he knows.

I think he also finds out it's Fuyao because there were hints so he had suspicion. The backstory reveal comes not long after though.

YM got very lucky in her early cameos and first major roles, and she had a pretty good manager (and her own company now). Married with kids is a different image but is not harder to sell, especially as you get older. Sun Li (Zhen Huan Zhuan) and Liu Tao (Nirvana in Fire) are both married with kids. In fact, Liu Tao got explosive popularity twice (before she married in few dramas, most notably Tian Long Ba Bu 2003, and after she married with Nirvana in Fire).

It's a pretty humiliating implication though, it left an incredibly bad aftertaste for me. I rather they didn't use rape for drama and for you to care and cry for the character. (you can humiliate and powerplay without rape)

Common practice in cdrama. Historical are always dubbed, sometimes by the actors themselves. Contemporary varies, web dramas usually isn't dubbed. It has to do with wide range of accents that can take people out of a drama (especially historical. taiwanese and hk actors are almost always dubbed even in contemporary ones), not good enough acting from actors to say the lines with proper emotion, voice not fitting a particular character and noise pollution. The place where they film a lot of dramas are actually also a tourist spot and used by multiple teams, you can't air the drama just like that.

Looks like she was in Feng Qiu Huang dubbing Huo Xuan and Ze Tian Ji. I don't recognise the other works. I think they are all minor roles. She's part of a very popular/high profile dubbing group that dubs dramas (some roles) and anime (majority of the roles are from their gorup?).

happy ending. the novel had more of a chance for "tragic end" than the drama would tbh, because it had transmigration elements and the entire book was her trying to go home.

I think it's still 8 episodes for vip. it'll just be up to ep 20 instead of 16 like on TV.

Looks like it's 结爱·异客逢欢, I kind of doubt it has a translation though since it's not the a super popular book.