mukkanna

I'm actually still primarily watching a different drama, so am not caught up. The popularity in China seems good. Will have to wait and see since it hasn't finished airing, and there's plenty of time for the drama to mess up something :)

Only if you're watching or reading works by fans :)

Not much romance. The original novel writer and screenwriter is a man (Zhou Munan), and the original target audience for this series was men, too, so romance was not a focus. So far this drama has been fairly faithful to the source novel.

There is bromance, which is also faithful to the source novel.

Ironically, GJ got a lot of criticism for his “wooden” acting since people don’t always know that SMY is a “wooden fish.” I really wish people would look at any source material before criticizing actors and actresses. I wonder if the writer and production crew were all laughing at the irony!

Regarding Su Muyu: this is a character described by other characters as “expressionless.” So the actor’s portrayal is spot-on. I’ve noticed he’s very deliberate in his movements in his Kui persona, which seems fitting since that means “puppet.” Since most chinese dramas aren’t filmed chronologically, this means it's very likely to be a deliberate acting choice as well.

novel spoiler:

When he was a kid SCH was tricked by the other nameless and fell into a pit and couldn’t escape. He was just thinking he’d die down there when SMY threw down a rope. SCH promised to repay him then, though SMY said it wasn’t necessary.

I also like Neo Huo, though I don’t really consider myself a fan. I’ll watch pretty much anyone’s drama if the story is good or if they have good costumes or at least one interesting character.

I think I know whose fans don’t like GJ the most, and they definitely frequent MDL often based on the popularity ranking of a person who hasn’t released any dramas in years. It’s a pity that MDL’s ratings and rankings are all just popularity contests.

They mentioned some days back that Neo Huo should have gotten this role instead of GJ. His drama has just finished airing, but I see they’re still here watching the competition’s drama instead, so who knows? Maybe they really do like GJ but don’t want to admit it.

Why is it strange that people have different opinions? Your opinion is only that: an opinion. There’s a difference between fact and opinion. You are not an acting expert, and therefore your opinion is not more valid than anyone else’s.

Honestly speaking though, I think many people would question the validity of your analysis of acting ability since you state that you base it on the zodiac sign of the actor in question. I don’t know if you know, but most people in the Western world see astrology as being about as valid as magic and vapours.

Actually, I consider TBOY to be an alternate universe. Zhou Munan retconned Dashing Youth and Blood River already.

SMY and SCH were powered up in Blood River compared to TBOY, which doesn’t make any sense. Furthermore, the dialogue between them doesn’t make sense if Blood River occurred before TBOY unless SCH suffered some kind of memory loss plus personality change. Zhou Munan also said that if he had written Blood River first, he wouldn’t have written TBOY the way he did.

Zhou Munan is known to get his timelines messed up. I’m just saying what the drama itself said in…episode 1, I think. 3 years after the demon sect events.

I wouldn’t recommend it personally, but clearly there are people who do like it.

The medical things in there are pure fiction (like they don’t make any sense whatsoever from a medical standpoint), and some of the characters are not cohesive within themselves, and the plot has holes. But if you really like the actors or like murder mysteries in general this may be okay for you.

The drama said it’s 3 years after. But Zhou Munan is known to write time/age discrepancies into his works, so who knows.

Coroner’s Diary. Not trying to criticize this drama or the actor. He’s just less experienced!

TBOY and BR novels/scripts are written by the same person (Zhou Munan) and he doesn’t really focus on romantic love much. The main love story he wrote was covered in Dashing Youth.

BHH and SMY’s relationship is how the author originally wrote it. Like his intended audience (men), he’s more interested in the action.

But Blood of Youth comes after this one chronologically, so I don’t think you would need to know the future to watch this. Dashing Youth can be watched but I don’t think is necessary, either. There’s enough context to figure out who these other people are (and honestly I wasn’t a fan of either character anyway).

There isn’t much romance in the first arc, but the bromance is definitely there. I enjoy intrigue and the way character motivations are slowly revealed in this drama is also nice. Actions speak louder than words; I dislike “lazy” storytelling where other characters just completely explain someone’s motivation (or worse, when the character monologues it themselves).

Brotherhood is one of the overarching themes of the wuxia genre. If you look at the classic wuxias from the 80s, they were full of men who would risk their lives or die for a friend, most often also male (because usually they’d be roaming the jianghu having adventures together for months or years at a time, trusting their “brothers” to watch their backs, so these are the closest relationships in their lives). This happens throughout Chinese literature, going back centuries. Even famous classic novels like Romance of the Three Kingdoms from the 14th century has the oath in the peach orchard, where the friends become sworn brothers, saying they weren’t born on the same day but hope to die the same day. Nowadays people seem to think that if you’re willing to risk your life, it must be romantic love.

I think she must have specially selected this role. But anyway there aren’t any major female roles in the novel, so pickings were slim.

I would have said before this that he’s better at martial arts moves than Gong Jun, but my opinion on that has changed with Blood River. Gong Jun does emotions significantly better than Xu Kai. Having watched Moonlit Reunion not long ago, my opinion is that Xu Kai can do the martial arts parts well enough but wouldn’t be able to perform the rest of Su Muyu (his personality and emotions) adequately.

Please stop watching, this is really unhealthy behavior for you. You didn't like this drama from the beginning since you feel someone else should have been casted as ML. Yet you continue to watch and then talk about how much everything sucks. You'll enjoy life more if you're doing things you like instead of dwelling on things and people you don't like. Is Blood River the only drama airing? I think we all know it isn't! Some of the actors you mentioned you like have dramas currently airing--wouldn't it be nicer to go watch those?