This review may contain spoilers
Round and round to the end
Somewhere buried in the chaotic mess of these 40 episodes is a fairly straightforward message and commentary on the duality of human nature - its inescapable fallibility and simultaneous potential for achieving greats acts of goodness. These are perennial themes often seen in xianxia stories, and they are worthy of exploration. But 40 episodes to tell this tale was not needed. Every arc essentially said the same thing, and by the end, the devastation that was perhaps meant to wring the audience's tears only made me cringe in how poorly the story was executed.
I think the main failings of this drama stemmed from its confused story structure - it is a story told in reverse to bring out a big reveal, which ends up not being so impactful because there are 20-30 episodes leading up to it that dance around it while not saying much of anything in the meantime. The human emperor? Red herring - he doesn't really impact the story. Dream Shard Immortal? Even Zhao Liying looks bored in her scenes because the meat of her story isn't shown, it is merely said in a monologue by another character. But the most critical story is the one from 10,000 years ago - depicting the humans' struggle against much more powerful demons that builds up to Hong Ye, the human prince at the time, and his betrayal of the demons (Although, the way the story is written, those demons deserved some of the badness that came to them given their equally despicable behavior).
The story of Ning'an and Hong Ye 100 years prior to the present story is also redundant. Perhaps it would have been wise to cut out either this whole storyline or the one from 10,000 years ago and focus on developing the human-demon struggle and characters. By the end, only Bingzhu and Pianpian are somewhat developed supporting characters.
In any case, this was an unfortunately dull and derivative xianxia story that did not afford the otherwise capable cast any great opportunity to craft interesting characters. Instead of being moved, I was exasperated at the end. Hong Ye's sacrifice is hollow because the story is riddled with holes. This story affords only a superficial pass at what could have been a powerful story about two very different people putting aside their prejudices and grievances to heal the world of war and hate.
Fans of the cast may still want to check this out - I was myself really eager to see Tan Songyun again in a costume drama - but prepare for a very long 40 episodes.
I think the main failings of this drama stemmed from its confused story structure - it is a story told in reverse to bring out a big reveal, which ends up not being so impactful because there are 20-30 episodes leading up to it that dance around it while not saying much of anything in the meantime. The human emperor? Red herring - he doesn't really impact the story. Dream Shard Immortal? Even Zhao Liying looks bored in her scenes because the meat of her story isn't shown, it is merely said in a monologue by another character. But the most critical story is the one from 10,000 years ago - depicting the humans' struggle against much more powerful demons that builds up to Hong Ye, the human prince at the time, and his betrayal of the demons (Although, the way the story is written, those demons deserved some of the badness that came to them given their equally despicable behavior).
The story of Ning'an and Hong Ye 100 years prior to the present story is also redundant. Perhaps it would have been wise to cut out either this whole storyline or the one from 10,000 years ago and focus on developing the human-demon struggle and characters. By the end, only Bingzhu and Pianpian are somewhat developed supporting characters.
In any case, this was an unfortunately dull and derivative xianxia story that did not afford the otherwise capable cast any great opportunity to craft interesting characters. Instead of being moved, I was exasperated at the end. Hong Ye's sacrifice is hollow because the story is riddled with holes. This story affords only a superficial pass at what could have been a powerful story about two very different people putting aside their prejudices and grievances to heal the world of war and hate.
Fans of the cast may still want to check this out - I was myself really eager to see Tan Songyun again in a costume drama - but prepare for a very long 40 episodes.
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