Singularity

Show was firing on all cylinders for a few episodes, but I must say it is very disappointing that they covered the whole four protectors of Tian Qi thing in a 30s animated cutscene, no buildup, no fights, just a random yada yada yada, the succession crisis is over.

Just a bizarre decision. Is this how it was in the books or did they have to cut it for time? They made a big deal of the four protectors of Tian Qi in the original season and I assumed we would see what they were protecting the city from in the prequel season but it seems entirely extraneous.

Show had risen to a 8 out of 10 for me, but gotta shove it back down to a 6 again after this disappointment. Hopefully will end strong with the last few episodes.

They really went overboard with the CGI this time. A lot of the fight scenes the characters just stand there and pose while the CGI happens.

The first season was well balanced with martial arts augmented by CGI to make it feel more impressive. This season is just CGI overload. The story and characters are interesting but the fight scenes feel like cartoons, not as good as Blood of Youth IMO.

Still watchable, solid 6 to 7 out of 10 show.

This drama feels like a cliffs notes version of the story. The first 15 minutes covered what would usually take several episodes in another adaptation. Not sure I enjoy it...

The actor does not have to be around for the post-production.... they can film season 3 in 2025 and release it in 2027 or something.

Anybody else find the sound mixing a bit off? Just started watching, the BGM seems way too loud and drowns out the dialogue?

There's a whole story arc where XFN solo infiltrates Beimang. It doesn't really come to much though so IDK if they might cut the whole thing. It happens right after the arc covered by the show so it might be most of season 2.

It’s a separate country, possibly similar to Mongolia or Manchuria historically. They are meant to be culturally distinct from the main culture (the Han stand-in) whereas all the places Xu Xiao conquered are supposed to be of the same culture/ethnicity.

North Liang is a territory of the Li Yan Empire. It’s similar to how the Holy Roman Empire worked, there were kingdoms, duchies, and counties inside the empire, each of which was ruled by a feudal lord. Xu Xiao is the “King” of North Liang but is a vassal of the Li Yan Emperor. He was appointed to this position due to how many battles he won for the Empire. North Liang is one of the larger fiefs in the Empire and includes 3 provinces. The guy whose wife XFN stole is another feudal lord, ruling a smaller fief.

One difference between this system and western feudalism is that most of the subject Kings (Wan) are members of the imperial family, with the surname Zhao. Xu Xiao is the only non-Zhao King because he was appointed to the position due to merit, not birth.

The title Wan also doesn’t necessarily imply holding land. A lot of Wan are just the emperor’s relatives and hold no actual land.

West Chu was a separate country, similar to how China was before the Qin unification, where there were many small kingdoms. Xu Xiao and the Li Yan emperor unified the kingdoms into the current empire.

Practically I would say North Liang is similar to a March, a feudal territory, usually on the border, created for the purposes of defense. So it has special status and may be exempt from certain taxes, for the price of having to defend the empire from invasion on that border.

He's afraid that if he seems too competent the emperor will want to prevent him from taking over his dad's position, so he's purposefully acting like a lazy playboy so they aren't threatened.

I find her very endearing too. Her and Lao Huan were the best.

More so xianxia or xuanhuan. It's hard to characterize the level of OPness as wuxia.

Interesting, I had the same reaction to XZ's voice in Douluo Continent when he dubbed himself, speech just weirdly blurry. I think maybe because Chinese actors have a habit of being dubbed by voice actors their speaking ability can be a bit lacking.

She’s characterized as acting very childish in the book and screenplay so I don’t think that’s the actresses fault. I find her acting fine, my main annoyance with her is the voice, idk if that’s her or a separate voice actor but the pronunciation is very blurry for some reason, needs better diction.

As somebody who read about half the book, pretty good so far. Best part of the book imo was always the relationships between the characters, specifically between XFN and his dad, Jian Ni, and old Huan, and those are on full display as the focus of the drama.

The rest of the book IMO was much weaker, just a weird tangle of fight scenes and tangents so I honestly think the conversion into a screenplay will make it a much stronger, tighter story overall.

Don't know, stopped halfway through. The book moves extremely slowly, lots of tangents and fight scenes.

Yep, it's a cultivation novel, not a wuxia novel. Mixed with some political intrigue.

Not sure about the book (I read it in middle school but don't remember much) but he's equally annoying in the 2003 version. Man gets through life soley by undeserved luck.

Same! I think a lot of characters become less interesting transitioning from novels to dramas but Wang QiNian, DuoDuo, and IMO the Second Prince are both way more interesting in the drama compared to the novel.

Every time I watch an adaptation of this book it's annoying how much Duan Yu is really lacking 社会的毒打

At first thought it was the actor but seem to recall having the exact same reaction to Duan Yu in the 2003 version too. Think he's easily Jin Yong's most annoying protagonist.

Maybe the censors don't want vilification of Han historical figures but do they really care about vilification of historical figures from other cultures?