Into the Mortal Reallm

ALright, here we go:
Short Recap:
1.The Lotus Concubine is taken away by Fire King and the King and Queen are left imprisoned, after finally sharing that they do not know anything about the location of the leaf which the Fire King Wants
2.Remaining Ice Tribe Members are told that aiding Ka Suo or Shi will be considered treason.  They are also told that the King and Queen are dead.
3.Ka Suo and Shi barely escape with their lives but the general dies in the process.
4.In the mortal realm Ka Suo and Shi disguise themselves as mortals, and Ka Suo looks for a healer for Shi.  He manages to raise money selling ice shelters to pay for healing services from the Healing Tribe, but this turns out to be a scam.  He uses his magic to suppress this people.
5.Ka Suo loses his magic because we learn harming humans and even using magic in the human realm causes you to lose magic.  He and Shi are cornered by the Fire Princess in the woods, but are rescued by Li Luo. Shi is captured.
6.Ka Suo seems to be smitten when he learns Li Luo's identity. It seems like love at first site for him.  But this may not be the case as once a red-dreaming spell is used to provoke his rage, he imprisons Li Luo and fires her in order to rescue Shi.
7.Meanwhile, Shi seems to have a weird heart attack, is engulfed by flame and bursts out of his prison...

So we open up to the imprisoned Lotus, Ice King, and Queen.  The Fire King appears with what appear to be Ka Suo and and Shi and demands to know the location of the special leaf, and then he will spare them.  Both the Lotus and the Queen beg the emperor to tell him but he refuses as he has to put the ice tribe first.

The Ice Queen insists she will take the blame and the fire king temporarily releases her.  she shares that in truth no one knows where the pieces are, beyond the fact that they are in the mortal realm.  she is sent back in and li jian (lotus) is taken away. the emepror doesn't seem to be angry with the queen.

ka Suo and shi and the general make it to the bridge, which is unlocked by the general (apparently it was sealed) and as one commentor said, it is like a video game as they run across the bridge .  fire princes yon Da almost dies because of her brothers actions but he seems to not care.  

Ka suo and shi survive; the general is discovered by li luo (never really explains how she got there) and he dies.  meanwhile, the fire king has his children tell the handful of surviving ice nationer's (like all 20 of them) that the king and queen are dead and shows fake remains.  he then issues an edict: that since he is the ruler of the three realms and wants peace, it is his duty to protect the realms and that Ka Suo and shi are looking for the special leaf and will try to ruin the peace. anyone who aids them will be committing treason and killed at once.

the crowd is not happy and protests. the fire prince and princess start knocking people off one by one (this is like genocide!)

---we still don't know what happened to mermaid princess and ice queen grandma--
I THINK that the fire king hopes to gent inside the panties of Lotus. Who knows what Lotus really thinks, she is a cunning lady.

MEANWHILE, Ka Suo changes his hair and Shi's hair to black to blend in with the humans (so pretty!!).  In spite of his disguise, they are immediately found out because of the type of language they use--they talk like immortals.  In order to save Shi, he will have to go to the Healer Tribe (alright this feels like Final Fantasy).

Because they are so suspicious, someone starts to follow them.   This stranger says he can help them, and Ka Suo is stupid enough to trust this stranger.  Is he a dope?  The stranger asks for money, something that does not exist in his realm.  He recalls from his talks with Li Luo what money is--the man asks for a fortune, and Ka Suo promises to have it in a day (what will he do? steal? prostitute himself?)

Ka Suo tries to sell ice sculptures (yup) and explains they won't melt.  But the humans just laugh.  (These guys are adorable)   Taels are like little rocks in this world??

It feels like a giant scam, this guy.  He finds healers but can detect the scam because they don't smell like medicine.  These fools try to kill him and here he learns a lesson: that not every mortal is good.  Some are bad.  Somehow these mortals don't realize who they are dealing with.  He uses magic on them and puts the fear of god into them (I think he turned them into ice by freezing the blood in their veins).  

But his magic and strength suffers.  It is because he is in the mortal realm, JUST BECAUSE, if you use your magic to harm and if you use it to harm humans you become weak.  It also makes you easy to find.  WHY?  BECAUSE.

Fire princess tracks them down (she's my fave, such a badass) and uses her whip on them.  Her personality is kind of meh--she right now is just evil mean lady.  Guardian Li Luo shows up and saves them, and she cuts through the fire nation army--they escape but Shi is captured (in an incredibly poorly executed separation scene).

Li Luo and Ka Suo are now on the run.  Ka Suo has lost his magic and wants to save his little bro, but Li Luo is far more practical and rational.  She tells him that they cannot do this.  He actually tries to bite her to get her to release him, she screams and knocks him out.

MEANWHILE, Shi is brought back to the fire nation.  It's a pretty desolate place no wonder everyone is unhappy.  But fire princess is (rightly) confident that as long as she has Shi Ka Suo will show up.

Ka Suo awakens and can only think of his brother--is it not odd that he is not upset about his royal family or his people??  Anyways he does some magic which shows he has his magic back.  Li Luo arrives and introduces herself as the guardian he has communicating with.  

So now he has a face to the person whom he has been talking to, and it seems like he is sort of like struck by love.  And somehow I don't think she is in love.  The music they pick for this scene is bad, but the back and forth I like.  She gives him flowers because he once said that the scent gives gods energy (yes, really).  He gives her money for food.  She expresses respect that he has been doing okay in the mortal realm.  She shows him how he eats--they hunt animals and eat them--I have this feeling that if she were a man he would still be in love with her--

Li Luo tells him that they need to plan, that their forces are weak, and they need to find the six leaf crystal.  She helps him out i.e. repairs his clothes so he does not use magic, and so he learns more about how humans live.  I think she is like his savior.  Or something.  While for her this is just a normal duty, so it's kind of cute how he is clearly in love but she is like whatever.  He asks her to cal him by his first name to protect their identities--it's interesting he behaves I think sort of sensually but she seems oblivious to it.

So someone casts the re-dream spell to record events---essentially a movie in the sky--so mortals can watch what happened in the ice kingdom and get a live update.  It's like CNN.  This infuriates Ka Sao, and he wants to liberate his brother, which angers Li Luo who points out that he is being manipulated and interfering with her duty to guard him.  He orders her to withdraw, she basically says you are a moron walking into a losing fight.  But he locks her up so she can't stop him.  He fires her for disobeying him (so much for love) and goes to the fire nation fort where Shi is in a cage, dirty, looking at his flute.  

BAM! Red light comes out of him and it seems like he is having a Kali-Mal (see Temple of Doom) moment.  Ka Suo meanwhile is blowing on the leaf, and Shi grabs the flute --he loses his clothes and emits flame (is he a fire tribe guy?) and blows away the bars to his cage.

Review

I gave it an 8 for more plot.  I am curious to see what will happen next.  Fire princess interests me alot.

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Eye bulge acting.

Wow, the dramatic eye bulge acting is painful to watch. Especially with the Fire King. What is with this horrid acting . . . and the dialog. Did know one tell the director that just because certain scenes look pretty doesn't mean the acting and writing should suffer.

Not to mention the weird bubble affect when they're trying to "span" a big landscape/scene. It really makes me dizzy and I'm happy I'm only watching it on a small screen.

At this point I thought the campiness of Ice Fantasy would grow on me and I'd want to continue out of sheer curiosity. However, everything is just so awkwardly done it's become painful to watch! I recently watched The Mermaid. The over the top acting and what not balanced off. This is just really bad acting. Not to mention how disjointed some flashbacks and many of the fights were.

Heck, last episode I thought many of the fight scenes felt disjointed. What a waste! This really could have been a great show. At this point I may or may not try a few more episodes. If I can ever get over my disappointment of how bad Ice Fantasy is turning out.

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