FanofMinMin
This review may contain spoilers
Draggy story-line and fake looking studio set. Otherwise a good series.
Despite having 2 of the biggest names in the c-drama industry in Zhao Liying (ZLY) and Wang Yibo (WYB), the “Legend of Fei” will be regarded as a disappointment of 2020. The series will gather a lot of internet traffic, talked about by various fans for its plusses and minuses, dissected over its story lines and its adherence to the novel, discussed on Zhao Liying’s apparent discontent upon completion of filming, etc. To the fans of the 2 main characters, there is nothing wrong with the series. But to me as a hardcore fan of Chinese costume drama, and who just wants to watch quality series, there is plenty that is wrong with “Legend of Fei”. And it is reflected in the Douban’s pedestrian rating of 5.6 score with over 200K reviews.
Before I dwell on why this drama disappoints me, let me highlights the good points about this web-series. The casting is obviously the drama’s strong point. Zhao Liying and Wang Yibo – the 2 main protagonists in these 51-episode costume drama – are highly accomplished, successful, marketable and very sought after actor/actress. Zhao Liying is the queen of c-drama. Most of her drama was a sensation, and this one is special because it marks her return after giving birth to her first child. Wang Yibo is currently the hottest male actor in China due to his success in “The Untamed”. The strength of these 2 main characters alone should give this c-drama considerable mileage and headstart from internet buzz, traffic and interest particularly from both hardcore fans. Even the supporting cast were established actor/actress like Zhang Huiwen (Yimou’s girl), Chen Rou Xuan, Sun Jian, etc.
As of late, there has been many instances in c-drama of pairing older FL with a much younger ML, and this is also the case in Legend of Fei. There is a 10 year gap between ML and FL, but you don’t feel the gap as ZLY looks much younger than her actual age. I don’t think even Yang Mi or Tang Yan could carry the 17-year old persona better than ZLY. Tang Yan was heavily criticized for her portrayal of a young Yanyan in “Legend of Xiao Chuo”. Similarly, Yang Mi did not fare much better in “Legend of Fu Yao” playing a young Mary Sue character devoid of any imperfections, while being protected by the all-mighty Crown Prince of the Five Kingdom. What sets Zhao Liying apart from Tang Yan/Yang Mi is her petite and slim figures which belie her actual age, and that makes playing a 17 year-old Zhou Fei – believable. Did you watch how Zhang Ziyi got blasted for her betrayal of a 15 year-old teenager in the first 8 episodes of “The Rebel Princess”? There were even critics who stated that the producers of “The Rebel Princess” should have gotten a younger actress to play a young Zhang Ziyi. Zhao Liying does not have any issue playing a young Zhou Fei because she looks young. Not sure whether in 5 years time that would still be the case. On an unrelated note, her skin looks flawless on a close-up. You could see skin imperfection on Zhang Huiwen who is an unrivalled beauty in her own right, so it can’t be down to post production magic.
Another plus point to me was the wardrobe. Love them. The costumes on Zhao Liying are simple but beautiful and it outlines her slim figure. Zhang Huiwen is gorgeous in anything she wears. There is not anything particularly hideous that stands out like Zhang Yaqin’s (Fei Kou’er) thief character that made her look short and stubby. The costumes were pleasing to the eye and not too striking in tone and color.
The fight choreography is average at best, and mediocre at worst. Even-though this is a jianghu/wuxia type of drama, there are not very many fight scenes in it. There is not an excessive amount of slow-motion fight sequence either, and that makes it bearable. In fact the whole fight sequences looked slow and choregraphed, and gave the fight scenes rather “unnatural” feeling to them. But at least they are bearable to me – it does not give me that cringeworthy feeling every time Zhou Fei wields the sword and engages or kills the enemies. I like it when Xie Yun uses his qinggong and flies/glides effortlessly from one end to the other. It was beautifully choreographed.
The sound track was nice and I really enjoy the opening track. The CGI was average, and was only limited to very few scenes especially involving animals. There are plenty of CGI involving snakes and the snake charmer, Ying HeCong – a Great Medicine Valley’s disciple played by Leng Jiyuan.
Now why was this c-drama disappointing given all the plusses above? There are 2 main reasons why I believe this is an average series; and disappointing because it has limitless potential from the casting of 2 very famous artistes. Firstly, there is a fake studio setting that keeps popping up in this drama. It is so fake, that it makes me very uncomfortable. The fake studio scenes feature secondary forest, and were used extensively. It was certainly very disturbing to me because everything looked so fake. It reminds me of 80s Hong Kong films and I have not seen this type of mediocre studio-set production in any of 2020 historical costume drama, even from those low-budget ones. Even “Novoland – The Castle in the Sky 2” had a much better studio setting than “Legend of Fei”, and I was very critical of “Castle in the Sky 2” for its rather cheap-looking set. I could understand if they have to use studio setting for a place like the cave inside the mountain where the treasures were hidden, but they could find a nice forest and film the scenes easily rather than building a cheap looking set.
My second grouse was the overall pace of this c-drama. The pace is awfully slow – I mean really slow. I could go and cook myself a dinner, and come back and watch the end of an episode and not miss anything. Fillers are being added to make the drama longer than necessary, and at times, watching it feels like a drag. Too many unnecessary scenes where the 2 main leads just talk endlessly and pointlessly. The scenes before the Demon’s Convention, Episode 29, illustrates my dislikes with the series’ pace -- too draggy. This drama could have been shortened to 35 episodes and we won’t be missing much of the storylines. The whole storylines are not worth 51 episodes especially when the first few episodes were speeded up to quickly introduce the ML (Wang Yibo) into Episode 1. In the novel, the ML and the FL did not meet one another right away. The producers of this c-drama were too eager to get the ML into the action, when there are 50 more episodes to go.
Now the ending – typical. Some will like them, some won’t. I am in the negative camp. My overall verdict of this series is 6/10. Give it a miss unless you are a die-hard fan of Zhao Liying and Wang Yibo.
Story - 6.0/10
Acting - 7.5/10
Music - 9.0/10
Rewatch value - 5.0/10
Overall - 6.0/10
Before I dwell on why this drama disappoints me, let me highlights the good points about this web-series. The casting is obviously the drama’s strong point. Zhao Liying and Wang Yibo – the 2 main protagonists in these 51-episode costume drama – are highly accomplished, successful, marketable and very sought after actor/actress. Zhao Liying is the queen of c-drama. Most of her drama was a sensation, and this one is special because it marks her return after giving birth to her first child. Wang Yibo is currently the hottest male actor in China due to his success in “The Untamed”. The strength of these 2 main characters alone should give this c-drama considerable mileage and headstart from internet buzz, traffic and interest particularly from both hardcore fans. Even the supporting cast were established actor/actress like Zhang Huiwen (Yimou’s girl), Chen Rou Xuan, Sun Jian, etc.
As of late, there has been many instances in c-drama of pairing older FL with a much younger ML, and this is also the case in Legend of Fei. There is a 10 year gap between ML and FL, but you don’t feel the gap as ZLY looks much younger than her actual age. I don’t think even Yang Mi or Tang Yan could carry the 17-year old persona better than ZLY. Tang Yan was heavily criticized for her portrayal of a young Yanyan in “Legend of Xiao Chuo”. Similarly, Yang Mi did not fare much better in “Legend of Fu Yao” playing a young Mary Sue character devoid of any imperfections, while being protected by the all-mighty Crown Prince of the Five Kingdom. What sets Zhao Liying apart from Tang Yan/Yang Mi is her petite and slim figures which belie her actual age, and that makes playing a 17 year-old Zhou Fei – believable. Did you watch how Zhang Ziyi got blasted for her betrayal of a 15 year-old teenager in the first 8 episodes of “The Rebel Princess”? There were even critics who stated that the producers of “The Rebel Princess” should have gotten a younger actress to play a young Zhang Ziyi. Zhao Liying does not have any issue playing a young Zhou Fei because she looks young. Not sure whether in 5 years time that would still be the case. On an unrelated note, her skin looks flawless on a close-up. You could see skin imperfection on Zhang Huiwen who is an unrivalled beauty in her own right, so it can’t be down to post production magic.
Another plus point to me was the wardrobe. Love them. The costumes on Zhao Liying are simple but beautiful and it outlines her slim figure. Zhang Huiwen is gorgeous in anything she wears. There is not anything particularly hideous that stands out like Zhang Yaqin’s (Fei Kou’er) thief character that made her look short and stubby. The costumes were pleasing to the eye and not too striking in tone and color.
The fight choreography is average at best, and mediocre at worst. Even-though this is a jianghu/wuxia type of drama, there are not very many fight scenes in it. There is not an excessive amount of slow-motion fight sequence either, and that makes it bearable. In fact the whole fight sequences looked slow and choregraphed, and gave the fight scenes rather “unnatural” feeling to them. But at least they are bearable to me – it does not give me that cringeworthy feeling every time Zhou Fei wields the sword and engages or kills the enemies. I like it when Xie Yun uses his qinggong and flies/glides effortlessly from one end to the other. It was beautifully choreographed.
The sound track was nice and I really enjoy the opening track. The CGI was average, and was only limited to very few scenes especially involving animals. There are plenty of CGI involving snakes and the snake charmer, Ying HeCong – a Great Medicine Valley’s disciple played by Leng Jiyuan.
Now why was this c-drama disappointing given all the plusses above? There are 2 main reasons why I believe this is an average series; and disappointing because it has limitless potential from the casting of 2 very famous artistes. Firstly, there is a fake studio setting that keeps popping up in this drama. It is so fake, that it makes me very uncomfortable. The fake studio scenes feature secondary forest, and were used extensively. It was certainly very disturbing to me because everything looked so fake. It reminds me of 80s Hong Kong films and I have not seen this type of mediocre studio-set production in any of 2020 historical costume drama, even from those low-budget ones. Even “Novoland – The Castle in the Sky 2” had a much better studio setting than “Legend of Fei”, and I was very critical of “Castle in the Sky 2” for its rather cheap-looking set. I could understand if they have to use studio setting for a place like the cave inside the mountain where the treasures were hidden, but they could find a nice forest and film the scenes easily rather than building a cheap looking set.
My second grouse was the overall pace of this c-drama. The pace is awfully slow – I mean really slow. I could go and cook myself a dinner, and come back and watch the end of an episode and not miss anything. Fillers are being added to make the drama longer than necessary, and at times, watching it feels like a drag. Too many unnecessary scenes where the 2 main leads just talk endlessly and pointlessly. The scenes before the Demon’s Convention, Episode 29, illustrates my dislikes with the series’ pace -- too draggy. This drama could have been shortened to 35 episodes and we won’t be missing much of the storylines. The whole storylines are not worth 51 episodes especially when the first few episodes were speeded up to quickly introduce the ML (Wang Yibo) into Episode 1. In the novel, the ML and the FL did not meet one another right away. The producers of this c-drama were too eager to get the ML into the action, when there are 50 more episodes to go.
Now the ending – typical. Some will like them, some won’t. I am in the negative camp. My overall verdict of this series is 6/10. Give it a miss unless you are a die-hard fan of Zhao Liying and Wang Yibo.
Story - 6.0/10
Acting - 7.5/10
Music - 9.0/10
Rewatch value - 5.0/10
Overall - 6.0/10
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