cyau723

Great wuxia action let down by rushed ending

Let me just start by saying the action sequences in this show a top notch 10 out of 10. The action sequences are why I rated this show high for rewatch value. I have already rewatched two of the fight scenes multiple times before I finished the drama.

It is a pure old- school wuxia. No green screen or visual effects. Just people with skills and wire work and a whole lot of practice and devotion. They do not make many shows like this anymore. Kudos to cast and crew. But if your preference is pretty cg-enhanced action, you will probably find this plain.

The old-school vibe carries over to the characters too. This is a spin-off of the old Justice Bao and Seven Heroes and Five Gallants stories. The two MLs are exactly as they should be. I love that the show respected the characters and did not change them for the modern audience. Zhan Zhao is a government official. His job is to bring villain to justice by rule of law not to kill them. Bai Yu Tong is the jiang-wu hero who exerts justice unbound by rules. For me, the casting and acting and characterizations and constrast of these two are 10 out of 10. But if your preference is instant jiang-wu justice (i.e. encounter villain - kill villain), this show is probably not for you either.

Where the show lose points for me is the story and pacing. I prefer my mysteries to give clues so I can solve it along with the characters even if it's predictable. I do not like rushed expositions that serves as info-dump. I hate unresolved/unexplained plot points.

This show has one overarching plot that can be subdivided into about four cases each unmasking a major helper of main villain. The first two cases took 2/3 of the show. Some people find the early section slow, but for me, that was the right pace. They find clues, investigate, fight some bad guys, then find new clues till the case is solved.

The last two cases were cramped into less than 10 episodes. There was no time for clues, so they either make it super obvious or just told you the solution. The ending is the worst. They cram everything into one episode and don't explain key plot points. It literally made me go "huh? what happened?". If I had to rate episodes 1-28, it would be a 9.5-10. If I had to rate 1-36, it dropped to a 9. Rating 1-37 made it go down to a 8.5.

Still, the cast chemistry is amazing and I would happily watch another season of the same cast going on another adventure.

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The fast forward button is my friend

I will preface this review by saying I watched this series because I became a huge fan of the 3 MLs in Mysterious Lotus Casebook and wanted to check out their past work. I liked police procedures and decided to give this a try. This is a slice of life type drama revolving around members of a local police station and their family. It's not a hard watch in a sense that there’s no strong angst and nothing bad happens to anyone. With the help of the fast forward button, I managed to complete all 40 episodes pretty quickly, which is more than what I can say for some much better produced angsty xianxa dramas.

That said, I have pretty low expectations for this show to begin with, and it still manages to disappoint. A show like this is only as good as the characters, the chemistry between them and the situations they find themselves in. Unfortunately, much of the script is unbelievable and unrealistic in terms of situations and behavior. It's like the characters either have a negative EQ /IQ or are so understanding/good that's unreal; and the actors are given direction to overact as much as possible in a way that no normal person behaves.

Take Xiao Shun Yao who plays the 2nd ML as an example. He's my favorite from Mysterious Lotus Casebook and the reason I watched this show. This is the 4th show of his I tried to watch (and 2nd I finished), so I know he can act. But his character is so badly done in this show that it's like I'm watching a caricature of the typical arrogant rookie cop character whose purpose in the script is to show how good the plain (unattractive and old) first ML is in comparison. If it weren't for the scenes where his character is quiet and his thoughts/feelings were conveyed via expression alone, which were great and very believable, I couldn't have finished this show even with the fast forward button.

Then, there is the 2nd FL. No real person with an ounce of common sense, let alone a reporter who went to college to I presume study journalism, can behave like her character does. The actress did a good job at it, so much so that I need to fast forward her scenes, including her lines in scenes with the 2nd ML, lest I give into the urge to throw something at the TV.

The 1st ML is ok. At the risk of sounding shallow, he is the least attractive ML I've ever seen in a show. It's like the script overcompensated for it by making his character unbelievably nice and good at everything. The only times his character feels real is when he interacted with his daughter.

The one bright spot in the show is the 1st FL. Her character is mature, sympathetic and strong. It's great to see such a cool FL in a chinese drama, which tends to be favor the cute, sweet (naive) "princess" type FL that I really can't stand.

Overall, while I definitely will not recommend this to anyone, it wasn't a bad way to waste time till I get over my MLC obsession.

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