Details

  • Last Online: 9 minutes ago
  • Gender: Female
  • Location:
  • Contribution Points: 49 LV1
  • Roles:
  • Join Date: January 8, 2022
  • Awards Received: Finger Heart Award1 Flower Award2

Frost_edelweiss

Frost_edelweiss

To Fly With You chinese drama review
Ongoing 35/35
To Fly With You
3 people found this review helpful
by Frost_edelweiss
Mar 5, 2022
35 of 35 episodes seen
Ongoing
Overall 9.5
Story 9.0
Acting/Cast 10.0
Music 8.0
Rewatch Value 8.0

Lovely winter sports and romance drama

This was a lovely winter sports and romance story even with the expected elements, beautiful pictures, nice showcase of the ice sports. The actors are very good looking and act well, so despite the 33 episode length, the drama goes by smoothly. Both leads : Wang Anyu (as Shao Beisheng, the "Prince" of pair and figure skating) and Song Zuer (as Shen Zhengyi the budding speed skater who joins a team belatedly at age 18), and supporting characters were pleasingly portrayed. The shy college romance, ebullience and naiveté of some might make them look younger than their age group, but this makes for a "forever young" atmosphere. The older adults, teachers, coaches, parents, doctors are present too.
The brief appearance of real life speed skating legend Wang Meng 王濛 in episode 31 was a nice surprise.

The optimistic mindset, breaking down of mental barriers to overcome challenges and past or present traumas, emphasis on trust, friendship and team spirit in practical demonstration, importance of food and family, and learning something about the figure skating, speed skating and some more in present day college life in China, are some of what can be remembered.

This was a nice drama to watch before Winter Olympics and even after.

Winter sports have come to be popular in China, with ski domes and skating rinks in many cities (even tropical weather ones), bringing them to new and young players who may or may not also have enjoyed skating on natural ice in the north where winter freezes lakes and rivers. Those who want to embrace these sports professionally look further than inter college contests, having ambitions to be better and win honors even abroad with the teams they'd join. But it is clear that this is a physically and mentally demanding short career, where retirement comes very early, sometimes as early as graduation from the university where they joined teams (Wang Meng in real life retired in 2014 after an injury and converted to business after earning a diploma in Business administration from Renmin Daxue). The drama shows realistically the hurdles, jealousies and joys of training in sports beyond the amateur level, and what such players may expect for their future.

When hopes are dashed, converting the energy to look away from the closed and locked door, and find the open window to move forward again, is pleasingly shown in this drama. I may go to rewatch some parts or episodes that I liked, not only for the sweet romance or comedic moments.
Was this review helpful to you?