Sword Dynasty (2019)

In my opinion Sword Dynasty is a very good series. Unfortunately it falls a little short of excellence. The casting, acting, production, and music were all very good to excellent. The choreography and cgi were decent but nothing spectacular. The story was good enough that I binged the series in a handful of days. I was always interested to continue to the next episode until it ended. However, some of the story really needed more detail and more episodes to be great. I think the ending was good for the most part even without an epic fight.

Overall this is an entertaining series. I think the story and main characters are actually better than a higher rated series I also liked named The Untamed. I will definitely rewatch Sword Dynasty someday and recommend it.

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Sword Dynasty began promising but is ultimately bogged down by a myriad of problems.

The basic premise is centered a young man and his adoptive aunt seeking revenge against a king who had annihilated their entire sect over a decade earlier. The story is set in a world with multiple magic/cultivation systems with the main kingdom's cultivation being centered on sword technique. The setting seems to be inspired by pre-Qin China with multiple warring kingdoms seeking to conquer each other.

Sounds cool?

The show doesn't execute on most of it.

First off, the story and writing are both mediocre. The story unfolds pretty much as one would expect from the premise but the pacing is extremely irregular. The first half of the series is reasonable but the last 10+ episodes especially fly by in a blur. They characters zip from plot point to plot point and important events just kind of happen. Along with the weak pacing is weak characterization. Most of the characters begin and end as stock characters. Everybody has simple, singular motivations and very few develop complexity. Even the main character isn't significantly development other then slowly revealing his backstory. This world is also full of macguffins that just kind of appear and chaperone the plot along without anticipation or buildup. I think the story really needed more episodes for proper character and world-building.

The acting isn't bad but it is unexceptional. Li Yi Tong is fine but her character is written as reserved and cold which doesn't give her much to work with. Li Xian is a bit weaker but again, does not get many emotional or powerful scenes so it's hard to say. The supporting class pretty much all play archetypal characters and none really stand out.

The production is also fairly weak. The sword fights are fine and a bit flashy but they weren't anything spectacular. Since 90% of people fight with swords there is also limited creativity and variety in the fights. The sets, costumes, and props generally look good but there is a severe lack of extras, to the point where scenes seem to include exactly the characters that are plot relevant without any minor characters or random soldiers/functionaries around to give the scene a sense of realism. There's a dearth of scenes set among common people and scenes seem to happen in the same locations over and over and over. Battles are shot in close-up with a couple people running around tents. Basically, everything looks decent but it all feels like sets and scenes--not real places and real events.

And more then anything, there are just so many missed opportunities and things left unexplored. The MC supposedly has a super-move involving spider-threads but it's used exactly twice and left unexplored. The main character reaches the final realm of cultivation in the final episode but... he fights exactly like anybody else and it's super unclear what's so special about that realm. The other kingdoms all supposedly have their own fields of cultivation they are experts in, including one kingdom that specializes in some sort of dark/black magic but we see exactly two people from outside the main kingdom fight and we never see any techniques that are different from sword techniques. There is supposedly a climactic war in the final episodes but it pretty much all happens off screen.

Basically, this drama writes a lot of checks that it was then unwilling or unable to fulfill. The premise is ripe for an indulgent power spiral drama like Fight Breaks Spheres or Ever Night, exploring multiple cultivation fighting techniques and with the MC growing steadily more OP. It promises emotional drama between MC and the man who murdered his master, culminating in a final battle. It promises scenes of battle between nations. And what it ultimately delivers is... disappointing.

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Action: Great Fighting Scene and storyline

Summary: I love a good love story but this barely has it. It made up with such moving plot and great action scenes. Computer graphics is very good. , better than Eternal love (miles of peach blossom)
Pro:
-moving story. I have watched more than 50 Chinese dramas and I was surprised this was also good.
- great fighting scene. The choreography was very good. I was surprised with such detail, even the best most watched shows like Eternal Love or Ashes of Love cannot compare to such good action scenes with some twist in type of swords etc. Princess agents has some goods action scenes but even that doesn’t compare with unpredictability of this one

Cons
Hoping for a comedy. Got an interestingly dark action show. Still good to watch , considering I’m NOT into action drama.

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I had initially planned to read the book which was being translated but given over 900 chapters of the story. I would have to wait over 2 years so see the end. The drama was very much welcome as a result.
I beg to differ on the negative reviews. Even though the end was rushed. It seemed like 10 years was crapped into 1 episode. It was true to the original story from episode 1 to the end.
The story was potent. Ye Zhen was a surprise and stole the show. Yao Di, the actress who played Ye Zhen is such a good actress that I am considering trying to watch Fighter of Destiny which I dropped so that I could watch her scenes.
The story is dry but that is by design and the charm.
The main points are the conservations. Ye Zhen's final line was unforgettable: " I have repaid with my life, give me back your love".
The impotency of the King who was supposedly the strongest forced to tears at his powerless when his son died was pleasantly surprising.
I would not watch Joy of Life which another reviewer rated so highly but that is another proof that said reviewer is not the target audience for this story.
If you are the target audience then you would find this to be a lovely gem. A story with pleasant surprises.
It certainly needed more episodes but that is not necessarily bad since it prevented the story from dragging.
I saw a review using terms like "Overpowered". Proof that the reviewer did not understand the story. This is the closest thing to a true wuxia story that isnt a Jin Yong remake(God bless his soul) that I have seen in years.
The story is about morality not powerful characters
I haven't watched such an enjoyable story since Xuan Yuan Sword 3

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If you are familiar with the Chinese Xianxia/Wuxia genre (dudes with long hair and swords, females with elegant gowns and beautiful headpieces, magic, sects, demons etc), then this is one to skip. As someone who has watched more than my fair share and read so many books in this genre, I can say it's very, very disappointing.

I had high hopes before this aired. And when it did, I was ecstatic and manage to binge the first 8 initial release episodes as I usually do. The beginning is like any other beginning of this show type. Nothing extravagant, but it was good. But starting from the 20th episode or so, things started to roll downhill. Characters seem to come and go, plot points seem to vanish into the void and appear out of some other dimension, and our leads seem to have more mood and allegiance changes than a 13 year old girl. I ended up dropping it and only recently picked it back up and finished it.

Story: ^^^ I think that was a decent explanation of what I thought

Acting and cast: The leads didn't have much material to work with, so nothing impressive, but the acting definitely wasn't bad. One thing though, the leads have basically no chemistry, or the script didn't manage to let the actors convey their emotions properly. Other than the leads, everyone is basically forgettable, except for the old master of the ML. I quite like that dude.

Music: Forgettable.

Rewatch Value: Probably not unless I'm desperate.

Overall it's just... weird and weak. Weird and weak pacing. Weird and weak motivations. Weird and weak chemistry. Weird and weak characters. Weird and weak plot. It had potential, but the show simply couldn't use it.
If you haven't seen much if this genre though, try it. You might have a better opinion of the show. If you are frequent viewer of this genre though, move on and watch something better.

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Not terrible

I went in with low expectations and mainly watched for the cast. If you're watching for the same reason and generally like this genre, then you will probably find it decent. I'm not saying it's amazing, but for the most part it was enjoyable. Seeing the main character level up is pretty satisfying. After completing this drama, I see why people were disappointed. It didn't help that they had high expectations to begin with either. This drama had a pretty decent cast, ost, and production (considering it was filmed many years before it actually aired). The story is pretty good, but the writing is kind of weak. The beginning was really confusing. The writing assumes you've read the novel or synopsis and know most of the backstory. After a while, you finally begin to understand and enjoy the story though. Many people also found the pacing to be off, but it was not a problem for me.

The problem mainly occurs with the ending. When it comes down to it, this is essentially a revenge story. However, when it comes to the highly anticipated revenge, it was just not satisfying. The moral or point of the story seemed to be lost. Also, apparently the drama ending is different from the novel ending, so novel fans must've been extremely disappointed. Clearly, there was a lot of stuff that got cut out. Was it budget cuts? Censorship? Who knows? There were also a lot of missed opportunities. I could see they tried to touch on some things (such as parallels between crown prince and "that person"), but unfortunately they did not have the time to explore further and failed to hit the point home. If you're considering giving this drama a try, maybe watch while skipping the last two episodes? That way you can enjoy the drama without being disappointed.

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I was looking for a drama series with Wuxia genre that has many fighting scenes. I thought since this drama series has a "Sword" in its name, i figured it would include sword fighting scenes. I was right. There are many sword fighting scenes throughout this drama. I am happy with the plethora of action scenes in this drama. Just what I'm looking for. And it's good fighting scenes too. The reason for the lower rating is because the storyline is confusing, I can't keep track of the many supporting characters. The first 1-2 episodes were really good, but when they start introducing one supporting characters after another, I got confused. I understand that period costume drama usually has a ton of characters, not just the main leads. But I failed to understand the connection of these supporting characters and their importance in the story. Oh and did I mention the ending? It is by far one of the worst ending that I've watched! The ending took so many stars of my rating in my opinion. It felt so rush and confusing that by the end of the series, I go "WHAT WAS THAT?" "IS THAT ALL?" and then the ending credit song would play. Weird ending indeed. If you're someone who doesn't really care of pay particular attention to the loopholes in the story, you would enjoy this drama for the fighting scenes alone. There's not that many drama that has these scenes nowadays. I might even rewatch this just for the fighting scenes whenever I feel like watching a Wuxia drama.

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There is the outline of a good, possibly great TV show in here. The primary problem in my view is that the writers were not ruthless enough. It has one character too many. In my opinion, Li Yi Tong's role could easily have been filled by a kindly old Oba-chan with limited screen-time, and nothing would have been lost.

The focus should have been on the duelling visions of 'just' between the Heng Emperor and Jingmen, with the romance focus on how torn the Empress is between the two men, and with a reflection on the age-old question of the merits of the logic of the 'greater good'. That would have made the ending sensible.

You'll probably skip parts, I did, but it isn't unwatchable. A little cheesy, but not TERRIBLE. I enjoyed the music in the opening segment, as well as Liu Yu Jun's Heng Emperor. Quite heavy shoulders he has from all the heavy lifting he had to do.

As I wrote, the character of Qian Xue was absolutely unnecessary. Also unnecessary was at least three companions the hero acquires along the way. The writers should have trimmed the fat!

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Watchable but won't make you want more

Well, actually the story is good, can be a better series if screenwriter write better and cast better actors/actress with better acting. This series watchable but no essence to make you so eager to keep watching. Some scenes are totally absurd, missing momentum and jumping here and there especially on the final episode. The editing not realistic at all, ocean very fake and the soldiers line up in one episode totally an obvious picture and not real person. Acting wise not much can be said, lack of expressions, emotions, character engagements, so overall poor acting

Ep 19: When Fan Zhuo let himself stabbed to save Bai Shan Shui, if he can make Liang Lian can't move, then why not let Bai Shan Shui kill Liang Lian instead of asking her to run away?? Liang Lian hitting him multiple times and still unable to free himself, is a very good opportunity to kill Liang Lian instead of asking her to run, right? and then when she tried to run away, why so slow motion, just too over dramatic, but totally without logic.

Ep 20: so easy to figure out a spy, and then suddenly have another treasure pills to offer for faster cultivation... LOL then everyone should use pills!

Ep 22: the fighting competition sooooo fast, like all the opponents are very weak. And then when the Xie sister and Nan Gong unconscious due to Sun Xing scheme, Xie sister only got poisoned, while Nan Gong was badly injured, but surprisingly the two conscious at the same time!

Ep 26: Ye Zhe Leng offering life sword, thought it should be something extraordinary, but eventually it's just a flying swords, which can be dodge easily.

Ep 29: Prince Han drunk, but once see his father suddenly the alcohol effect subside? The enemy from Feng Wu very easy go in the Wu Zhou town without being noticed?

Ep 30: Strangely the priestesses was abducted long ago, but Ding Ning Group able to catch up pretty fast..

And finally the ending final episode like rushing to end the show...

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It was very good to watch. The visuals were there! I love that there was a lot of martial arts without so much blood, a lot of killing but blood was absent... Not like I wanted to see any. The costumes and hair I did love. The white hair was so beautiful in Cave master of White Ram and the Sword Master of Min Shan. I loved the hair on Ding Ning at the end of the episodes. Li Xian who played Ding Ning, I so love this actor. He does so well in Historical movies but loved him Go Go Squid too, just an excellent actor. Li Yi Tong who played Zhang Sun Qian Xue was also great. I loved her Go-Go Squid part 2. She is very short next to the actress who played AiQing in the first one. The music and visuals were excellent and finally, a KDrama that was not so misty, the clarity was very real. Thanking all of the cast, and I guess there is no other that can play an evil king/emperor/prime minister/sworn brother like Liu Yi Jun (Lost Love in Times, Legend of Fuyao, Age of Legends).

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I watched the series because of Li Xian. I first got to know this actor when I watched Tientsin Mystic in Netflix. I also watched his other C-drama "Go Go Squid" (available in WeTV).

Sword Dynasty belongs to the wuxia genre and it is about a group of people wanting to overthrow the tyrannical king of Wu. There are love elements in the drama but it is not the main theme of the series. It started out slow in the first few episodes. The focus was on the backstories of the characters. After the backstories, the story moved fast. I like the principles and morals presented in the series. One thing I hate though is (SPOILER ALERT) that a lot of good characters died in the series.
I give it an 8/10.

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Favorite Actors

Omg it is weird to see the male main lead from go go squid and the female main lead from go go squid 2 as main roles in this hahahaha
These two are some of my favorite actors
I haven’t watched this yet but it seems like a very good drama series
Since there are my favorite actors in this drama series I’d definitely watch it
Can’t wait to see more new drama series of my favorite actors
This is amazing omgggggg
Yayyyyyy
I hope this is a good drama series
oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

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