Y'all about to be real mad, but it must be said

This review will be long so grab some tea if you will because tea's about to be spilled here.

Heads up first: I did a mini post on this drama before it aired about what I was expecting so if you want to check that out just click on my profile then go to feed.

Disclaimer: Everything said here is my own PERSONAL OPINION. This review is not meant to hurt anyone. I have also not read the novel so I have no prior context to the drama.

P.S If you just want a summary of the drama just skip down to the Rewatch value section.

Plot/Story: 3.0
The plot of this drama could've been so much better if the scriptwriter actually focused on the plot and not so much on the talking/conversations that's so repetitive over and over again. Most of this drama is just people having conversations. In short, it's a speech driven drama, too much talking and not enough action. It would've been a bit more interesting if the solutions to the problems were a bit more complex. Also, everything was just really obvious. There's barely any mystery which makes the story so bland. The drama pace is slow and the tone throughout the whole drama is just shallow as in there's not enough dynamics. The characters developments could've been done so much better too. Also, too many unnecessary deaths, why introduce new characters when they going to die within 5 episodes?

Acting/Cast: 7.5
Y'all about to be real mad but it must be said: Yukee Chen does not give the presence of a main lead. That being said her acting was okay as CXZ. To be honest I wasn't really expecting much from Yukee Chen because a lot of her roles seem to be type casted to me. Not to be rude, but I hope she takes a break and take time to explore more roles. When I was watching the drama I felt that CXZ could've have a different facial expression or something during some scenes which just goes to show that Yukee could've explore more with her character. For example, a lot of the time when she's having conversation (not with the SGT personally) she either has a blank space out look or her eyebrows are crunch. She's supposed to go from naive to a strong female lead but how come I don't see that? Barely anything changed about her. Honestly, I was shocked when SGT died and she tried to revenge SGT by trying to kill Yuwen Muyuan. Like girl....what happened to the mature think before acting girl you were? Maybe I can't blame her acting too much because of the way the script is written but I would give her acting a 5.5/10.
Leo Luo is really good at this role too bad the other actors are good too so I can't say that he carried this drama (*inserts* crying face emoji). Honestly, everything I watch his drama he brings something new to the plate. I like his way of flirting, it's the scholar type of flirting and not the hooligan type (although it would've been interesting). I wished they would've add scenes of him flirting with other girls so that his role as a flirty playboy is more believable because it's really not believable seeing how barely any girl approaches him besides FZ. I know that he's supposed to have a bad reputation and whatever but his role is literally flirty playboy who makes women fall for him. Even if he has a (fake) history with FZ he should still be an attractive flirty playboy. The scriptwriters made SGT so weak which I really dislike. His brains are also meh. Can't deny Leo Luo has a pretty smile and can really act heartbroken. SGT has more chemistry with his father and Leo's acting proves it. He has more chemistry with SGX than CXZ. That is the tea. When he was conversing with his father before the execution and they cried and yelled at each other. That was my favorite scene. So much emotions there. His acting: 9/10.
I think the rest of the cast did really well in executing their roles.
Yuwen MuYuan, his acting is good, but not much facial expressions for his role. I'm disappointed because he has so many scenes but his character is not written off as an expressive person so he's basically almost the same in every scene. I expected more, but came to be disappointed. But I do see more of his acting when he's acting with other people in the scene or with himself or others when CXZ is not in the scene. His acting 7/10.
FZ wasn't that annoying to me and I understand her point of view. She was naive and loved too much, but she redeemed herself by knowing what's right and wrong later. She's not evil either. Y'all get mad at FZ for being naive but only annoyed when CXZ's naive doesn't seem right. At least she tries to fix her problems by acting instead of avoiding and not communicating. The actress that plays FZ graduated from Shanghai Theatre Academy no wonder her acting is good. I hope to see more from her. Her acting 7.5/10.
TBH I really liked QM's character because he's open. He knows what he wants and his rights and wrongs. I think he really did this role justice. His character is a bit of a coward tho. Overall not bad from the actor. 8.5/10.
All the dads acting are good, but CXZ's father maybe a bit overacted. SGT's father definitely delivered more to the plate tho. Acting: 8.3/10.
Lord Lu, he legit gave me Ning Yi's vibe sometimes from Rise of Phoenixes. His eyes looks cunning whenever he has a plan. He doesn't overact when his character is angry which I think it good, but I think him at the end was a bit dramatic in front of SGZ grave (but I guess it's because he's still angry at what happened to SGZ). His acting: 7.5/10
I can go through every character but I'll stop here.

Music/BGM: 6.0
The BGM for the first 24 episodes were so bad. The first 10 was the worst. Random music was just being played here and there. This rating would've been higher if it isn't because of the BGM at the beginning of the drama series. I LOVE the OSTs. I hate that in CDramas the music is released as the drama airs, so the reason why some of the songs weren't used in the beginning episodes is because the songs are not released yet and used in the drama. Ratings would've been higher if not for the bad BGM.

Rewatch Value:2/10
What I meant by rewatch is I'll just watch what's on the MV of the OSTs. I could watch the first 3 episodes and the last three episodes without the episodes in-between and still know what's going on. There's nothing that makes this drama stand out/unique/important messages enough for me to rewatch. The costumes and setting are good along with the hairstyles. The props does look a bit fake like some of the peach or whatever flower trees and the weapons. The fighting scenes are good but nothing too impressive. I wished the characters timing for a certain outfit was more thought-out. I like that they reused outfits, but please don't do that when the characters are at different stages of life because it confuses me. For example, you're telling me that CXZ still fits in the outfit that was made for her 17 year old self and she still wears it/fits her after 2 years? They shouldn't have changed her outfits so frequently then. Maybe it's only me that's bothered by it. Also the ending wasn't rushed but the last few minutes of the last episode was rushed. Their wedding was basically 5 minutes long, and to be honest they're not even officially married because they didn't do it the proper way and the drama just decides to end there. Um...okay then.

If I were to sum up the drama in long story short it would go like this:
He saves her.
They talk.
He saves her again.
She searches for him because he's a man that pops here and there and everywhere.
They flirt again.
He helps her with her problems.
They separate.
She almost died from an assassination attempt/ falls off a cliff.
Surprise, she's not dead.
He searches for her.
he saves her again.
They flirt.
She confesses.
He's insecure and conflicted about his life and feelings so he rejects her.
She heartbroken and they leave each other for a year.
Met again and starts flirting again.
This time he wants a relationship with her cuz he's finally over with his conflicted emotions/self.
They confess and starts their relationship.
Second FL comes in and drops a bomb that she and he slept together.
Main girl misunderstands even when main lead said it was not the truth.
She doesn't believe him when he believed everything to her. Oof.
They don't make up for a long time.
When they do, he dies the next second, but SIKE this is a CDrama and people never dies falling off a cliff (that is if they MLs tho).
He comes back with a different identity, but uh...he legit still looks the same and even carries the most obvious thing that identifies him. His fan, smh.
She founds out its him and got him to reveal himself after she tries to jump off the same cliff he fell off. Note: That's not healthy and never attempt suicide.
Now it's her time to die.
He tries to save her.
Blah Blah Blah
Surprise, she's not dying.
They join hands together.
They get marry, but not actually married because they didn't do the proper wedding tradition which is the bows at the proper time (which I always assume is noon sharp).
The end.

I went on for too long, but I hope this review helped you. If you read to this far, you must have a lot of patience. Thanks for reading my review.

Overall: 4.5/10

Leggi di Più

First off, just some disclaimer:
1. These statements are mostly my point of view and opinions, so if you have any issues with mine then go find your own because I'm just here to spill my tea.
2. This review is from someone who has been there from the beginning of the novel when it was translated, seen the donghua (currently watching the second season and my heart uwu), listened to the audia drama, and read some of manhua (but didn't really continue, but that's another story for another day), so yes I will have a lot of opinions and things to say.
3. This review may have too much comments on random things like the clothing and ect.
4. I have not read any of the other reviews so I' sorry if my review may or may not be similar to the other viewers or yours.
5. This will be a long review so if you plan on reading then grab some tea or popcorn. *Probably the longest one you will read if you do read*

Story/Plot: 6 stars
To be honest, the plot here may be the lowest rating I gave out of all the adaptations of the original novel that I've seen (listed above). I liked that the plot took a different route, but there are some things about the plot that bothered me and that's why I gave it and 6.5/10 rating. At the beginning, I didn't like that the writing made WWX seem like he misses(?) WLJ. Not that is was wrong, it was awkward because the novel was different. Also, couldn't they have done something like changing his hair style or adding makeup to WWX instead of making him wear a mask? Like he's going to take off the mask anyways and still have the same face as WWX so why can't they add a little detail for us to differentiate that he's WWX in MXY's body? Besides, XZ is really handsome and it frustrated me then I couldn't see his face because of the mask and I bet LWJ felt the same way too. I just have to say that I was one of those fans that didn't like how they made it so that the Stygian Tiger Metal was not created by WWX and that WRH wanted to use it because to me that was a big part of what made WWX the Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation. The drama also made it seem like the leads weren't even that good at fighting. Here's the tea, the original story/plot from the novel is way better. I don't care how much the scriptwriters had to change to make it into a drama and pass censorship, but they could've done better.

Acting/Cast: 6 stars
Not gonna lie I was going to drop this drama at episode 3 to 6 because of the bad acting and editing (but we'll talk about that later). Literally, all the acting from episode 1 to like 6 was basically the actors just ACTING or reacting! A lot of their acting seems force, unnatural, and awkward. The actors such as XZ and WYB were the reasons I almost didn't start this drama because they're not originally actors and I had already imagined other actors playing WWX and LWJ's roles (will get into that later). And I don't think I was the only one. When I first heard of the casting I was like, "Isn't WYB too skinny?" Like I don't know why but I've always imagined LWJ as someone who is bigger than WWX as in like having a wider chest and bigger build. But it was also because of them that I continued to watch this drama because I wanted to give this drama another chance because everyone was telling me that I have to have a different mindset or think of this drama as a fanfic so I did. The acting did improve after episode 6 and episode 13 was when I really felt that chemistry I was waiting a million light years for. I really think if I hadn't seen like the first 6 episodes I would've given XZ a 8/10 for his portrayal of WWX, and WYB a 6/10 for his portrayal of LWJ. They're honestly the reason why my acting/cast rating is at an 6 stars because without them it would've been at like a 3/10. I really like when actors can act with their eyes and that's what I love from both WWX and LWJ actors! I love shi jie's acting after episode 6 because she just kept improving in acting and also in portraying Ah Li's character. I love it when she stood up for WWX because it shows how strong of a character she is. She gives off this really lovely vibe. I'm just gonna put it out there that she is way more mature than JC. There's a saying a few times that was like, "The past is the past." and that they shouldn't dwell on it anymore. Ah Li, WWX, and JZX were the people I think embraced this the most wonderfully and LWJ later. Jiang Cheng's acting was pretty consistent throughout and that is overly expressing himself such as his actions and facial expression which I thought was disappointing because it shows that he clearly lacks acting experience on screen, might be better for plays/musicals since audience is far away and has to be able to determine your expressing skills. What bothered me the most was that a lot of the actors are inexperienced so a scene that could've been executed perfectly had flaws as in it couldn't give me the full emotion that it was trying to deliver for example that scene of XY and XXC when they found out the truth and when JC's mother taught that bad woman a lesson. I felt like it could've been more. There are a lot of scenes that I did felt was extremely well done such as WWX and LWJ's scenes of course, some of the fighting scenes such as the ones with WYB and I am thankful that he's a dancer because those scenes looked so graceful and beautiful but some of those fighting scenes were bleh. Like when Shi Jie was dying like??? What are all those people doing in the background (actually that's a lot of what happens now that I look at it closely when there are fighting scenes in this drama)? And btw that scene made me cried a river in the other adaptations but this one I raged instead and cried a little after. I also cried a river when JC's parents died and held hands. That scene was beautiful besides the fact that they died. I died a little seeing that scene just like how I died a little seeing WWX letting go of WLJ's hand. I have so much more characters/actors to talk about but that's too long so I'll end with someone interesting. I don't know about you guys but Xue Yang literally gave me GAY vibes whenever I saw him on screen.

Music: 7.5 stars
I love all the songs, especially the song dedicated to Xue Yang by Zhou Shen. I love that the beginning ost had no singing because obviously this story can't be explain in words and that's beautiful. I love the fact that shi jie was given a song. Love WYB and XZ for singing the Wuji ending theme song. The reason why this rating is not a 10/10 is because it's a song I wouldn't listen to on a daily basis like the WangXian song from the donghua. So I took a point off for personal preference. But I took 1.5 point off because some/a lot parts in the drama random songs/ instruments just played and it ruined the mood sometimes. One time I forgot which episode but the Wuji song was played for a scene for someone else other than WangXian couple and I was confused for the whole day and decided to forget about it so I could move on.

Rewatch Value: 6 stars
I could see myself rewatching quite a few times as I did so with dramas like Guardian and also because I have rewatched the donghua many times, reread the novel, and listend to the audio book. But would this be the first one I go to if I was to see an adaptation of the novel? No. Overall, this was an okay/good drama and did exceed my expectations.

Now you can stop here is you don't want to see me rant about other stuff about the drama, but if you do stay I can't promise it'll be short. Below are the things I want to get off my chest and are related to my overall rating of this drama.

1. Oh my goodness who did the EDITING??? It's so bad. I should also question who did the camera work because why all those weird angles and unnecessary movements? You could tell the editor didn't know whether which color of brightness/saturation/concentration looks good on screen so in one scene the editor would keep changing the color tone and it annoyed me so much. And the camera work. It's so frustrating because the camera work is the definition of bad camera work. Like why can't you just keep some angles straight? It is because the two main leads aren't? *and when I realized that I was SHOOK, but no. Still don't like that idea of weird angles camera work* It's really bothersome that on close-up scenes that the actors forehead or chin or hairstyle is cut of. Like???? Why? I understand scenes that focus on the eyes and face but why part of the head?

2. Clothing. The clothing was so...idk. Weirdly styled and colored? All I can say is that LWJ had the best outfits. WWX's outfits aren't even second to LWJ, I would say Wen Qing's outfits were better than his. WWX is third in terms of his clothing. The rest is a bit of a mess although some of the characters did pull of theirs or had pretty average looking outfits but nothing in this drama was too fancy. Someone that for sure pulled of his clothing JGY because he's really pretty that kind of makes him look good in any clothing. The sect's clothing is very questionable. Why does the Jin sect look so poor with that mild yellow color on? Like I thought they were the sect with the most money and wore yellow and gold clothing. The Lan sect got it easy by getting white, but their clothing looks heavy. I wasn't a big fan of some of the Lan outfits having too much ugly blue color. Maybe sheer light blue would've been nice. I know the Wen sect is evil but why are so many of them wearing black? Call me a WWX stan (cuz I am) but WWX was the only one who looked good in wearing black throughout the whole drama. I honestly feel bad because I feel like the Nie Sect and (especially) the Jiang Sect got the most ugly colors. They were wearing all shades of purple and brown/gray outfits. It looks to me that shi jie and Jiang Cheng were being experimented on with a bunch of random colored outfits. I will also add that the hairstyles were very simple and I liked that at first but later it seemed as if everyone just had the same hair styles besides the main leads. The only thing that was different in their hair was the head piece for most of the cast.


3. Day/Night/Lighting
This the one where I had the most issue with. Because of this issue the whole drama just screams LOW BUDGET to me. If there's one thing a production should invest in besides the cast is lighting. I was always displeased with the lighting in this drama. It was always inconsistent and strange or weird to look at. For example, when shi jie was dying, when JC came flying to her side the lighting was a bit red because they were at the Wen's base but when she started talking to WWX the lighting in the background was dark/night time and when she was murder it was going back and forth from black background to red lighting background with people fighting in the back. The reason why lighting is so important because it describes the mood of the scene or gives the audience/viewer an idea of what time of day it is or a sense of reality. I also didn't like the fact that they were night hunting in the day. Like what??? I watch so many wuxia dramas before and hunting any sort monsters or yao has always been in the night. How could the drama production make such a mistake? At least change it to day hunting or something less questionable.

4. CGI/Props
The CGI and Props were the last thing I worried about some dramas can do without it or people sometimes forget about it and I did forget a lot of it. But there was one I could not forget and that is when Wen Chao and his crew were floating/flying in the sky in a triangle formation. That scene was so funny because the cgi was so bad. I swear these actors were placed in front of a green screen with fans blowing at them and then when it was getting edited the editor just replaced the green screen with a sky full of clouds background. The props were okay but you can totally tell a lot of them were fake or cheap like the swords. Real swords don't wobble and aren't that skinny. How do I know this? (That's a different story for a different day.) One cgi I was really looking forward to was when that wrench sent a firework signal to Wen Chao. It was not as great as the donghua. There was literally one firework shown and two from far away in a very big background which literally looked like a dot and just colors flashing on that wrench. I actually quite like the cgi when WWX was tormenting WC with a red ghost woman, but the real question is: Who Is That Ghost?

That's all I have to say. If you have made it this far you are a great person with good patience. I hope you have a nice day and thank you for reading this long review. ^-^

Leggi di Più

Could've Been An Awesome Drama

This is a Critical Review, please do not read ahead if you're very attached to this drama, are easily offended, and/or do not like long reviews.

Disclaimers: This review has many criticisms and spoilers from the drama. proceed at your own cost. Everything in this review is MY OWN PERSONAL OPINION.

Review Outline (in case anyone wants to jump around):
Plot/Story
Acting/Actors
Production Value
Makeup/Costumes
Music
Rewatch Value

Now then, like always, grab your tea/drink because this review will be long.

Plot/Story:
The biggest problem with this drama is its plot and storyline. Everything is very out of place and its (characters') goals are constantly changing. I haven't read the whole original novel, but I read a few chapters from the links provided on here and a lot of spoilers before all the episodes aired.
This drama is very frustrating and complex. The things that needed to be explained in this drama are not explained (well), and the things that do not need to be explained are explained too much. There were so many times where I was watching and was asking, "Why? But why? How? But how?"
For example, the smut scene of SJ and MY, why? What was the reason?! Another example is when TTJ suddenly appeared on land after being in the River of Stynx after 500 hundred years. Like how? How did these mortals live for hundreds of years? How does one become an immortal? Isn't BuYu the first and old immortal? *Btw BuYu is PangYiZhi, the little kid god that got kicked down by JiZe.* Why did it take BuYu 10,000 years to become an immortal or become PYZ? How come he didn't ascend as a god after so long? If the immortals like the sect leaders had been alive for 500 years or more, how come they can't recognize GYJW as XL? Didn't XL train in the sect for years?
The drama was a bit draggy here and there with its limit of 40 episodes. The drama spent too much time on the first arc (TTJ and YXW) in my opinion. The script writers probably dragged it out because they want "romance" time for TTJ and YXW. For the SJ and MY arc, it was that draggy but so many things were unnecessary. The drama could've ended at CJM and LSS having a good time after she saves him from execution. I wouldn't mind. The ending was very rushed. Have no idea how their child was conceived, but it doesn't even matter anymore because a lot of things weren't explained.
A lot of the lines were cringey. The flirting was milking every single last chemistry the leads had for each other.
YeBingChang and XiaoLin's romance...where? LOL.
Also, the script does a lot of telling instead of showing. BUT! When they do show, they've already told us about it beforehand. LOL.
A lot of things are repetitive such as the evil bone talk. We don't learn any new information, but the characters talk about it as if its something new.
I do believe that this is a very hard novel to adapt into a drama. I wouldn't personally adapt this novel into a drama unless I get to change a whole bunch of things. I applaud the production team on their attempt to do justice to the novel and even making this into a drama.
One big thing this drama failed to do is make us care about why anything is even important. The characters are not memorable nor likable. Why does the world even need to be saved?
Even if we do get the 58 supposed episodes, I don't think the drama would've been any better. I heard the production team said that because they can only air 40 episodes they stuffed all the supposed episodes into the 40 episodes. A normal episode used to be only 40 minutes, but now each episode is 58 minutes long. I don't think we missed anything much. I did hear that XL and YBC had more filmed but it was cut out.


Acting/Actors:
Y'all please be patient and kind with me. I do not have anything against the actors/actresses. These are just things I notice about the acting and writing for the characters that I want to talk about.
First off, the script isn't that good and I think all the actors did the best they could based on what they had. If you look at the behind the scenes you can tell how confused some of the actors are or misinterpreted some scenes. *Reminds me of Marvel fans asking why Tom Holland looks like he's confused half of the time. It's because he didn't know what was going on half of the time due to the script.*
All of the main characters are so inconsistent; their actions, their love story, their thoughts, their feelings, and ect. This makes it more difficult to act because not everything is filmed in order and characters has growth. *Ex: I remember in the Starry Love drama interview, Li LanDi had to often help remind Chen XingXu which character he was supposed to be along with what part of the story it was as things were filmed out of order. He had like 4 roles.* *Scenes are/can often film out of order due to filming locations.* Everything is literally out of place for a majority of the characters.

Leo Luo: This script did injustice to Leo Luo's acting skills. I know the man can do better and I've seen better from him. But he still did exceptionally well. I can tell he really enjoys his role as TTJ. His best acting scene was the whole episode on the boat explaining his misery/asking his questions before his execution by his brother--just not to die in the end. *I cannot with C-citizens catching his blood bags and pipes for the blood scenes. I can never look at those scenes the same again.* I wished that his voice was deeper and more scary. When he laughed evilly, it sounded a bit funny to me, like I wasn't scared nor did I feel/react like any of how the characters did. I was just...confused. He still did the best as MY, maybe because he has more experience playing characters similar to MY. The director said that Leo asked about a lot of things about the script and how to execute some scenes. TTJ is a very complex character and with a script like this where many things are unexplained. It can be very hard to execute because the actors have to fill in the missing blank and act according to their knowledge of the script and character given to them. I also can not comprehend how nice CJM is, like one does not just change over sleeping for 500 years. We see before TTJ gets the name CJM, he acts a bit innocent in order to get to talk to PYZ and find a way to revive YXW, but the overall sudden change was too quick. This feels like plot armor from the script writer(s) to make people like TTJ more. It also came off as if Leo just wants to create an entirely different person/character for CJM instead of convincing the audience that TTJ is CJM. It doesn't entirely work because CJM isn't a reincarnation of TTJ. Just because LSS took away the evil bone doesn't mean she took away all of his despair/hate/evilness/ect. CJM seems to almost act like he wants to be MY/is (like) MY, and an entirely different person from TTJ.

Bai Lu: It's very hard to differentiate LSS from the Old YXW and SJ. All of their personalities are just too similar. Their actions and motivations too, even LSS as new YXW. I found LSS to be too similar to SJ after the SJ arc. Also if you watch Bai Lu on a lot of variety shows/BTS/facetime, you can kind of see that sometimes Bai Lu is just being herself on screen and not her character. For example when LSS ate in front of TTJ to confirm that the food is not poisonous. No noble lady eats like that nor does someone who grew up like a princess in a sect. Even if LSS wanted to prove a point, it was out of character. Bai Lu's best scene is when she was SJ and went against TianHuan. Just in general, Bai Lu’s characters here are not easy to portray because her characters constantly go through life changing events. A lot of the time though, it seemed like those life changing events did not really affect the characters at all. It may seem like the characters didn't change. Her acting leaves me wanting more. For example, when LSS goes back 500 years as YXW, she forgets her stages of grief and jumps into focusing her mission and is in the acceptance stage. Same thing happened when she went back to the future, 500 years to her present. LSS just quickly accepts that the future has changed and that she has left everything behind as YXW. She doesn't feel much about anything and is very subtle. Like we know she's traumatized! But there wasn't a lot of emotion or showing of it when LSS came back. She got over things quickly.

Chen DuLing: This drama seems to be like it's supposed to be her breakthrough drama that makes her the next industry go to big/consistent FL, but sadly she wasn't shown much nor did she have any likable characters. The drama promoted her as one of the four leads all for her to be barely on screen and for them to list her later on as a supporting cast. Same with Ding Wei who played XiaoLin. Chen's acting is a bit forced and some scenes came off as overacting and over dramatic. For example, when TH ordered for SJ's clan to be killed, the scene came off as too much as she is not grounded in her acting. When she does the evil laugh, it sounds really fake. Also, instead of playing as an innocent YBC, who is actually greedy and quite evil; we see a YBC, who is (already) greedy and evil pretending to be innocent. YBC showed all her cards already through CDL's acting to the point that we could predict what type of character YBC is already. There's no build up or mystery to YBC. It was easy to tell YBC was faking her innocence, and therefore; everything YBC did to be innocent or nice came off as "she's totally faking" or "she's a snake". Favorite scene from CDL is when MN asked GYJW to stay with her after he left the mountain to supposedly find an answer to who he is.

Ding Wei: Like CDL, I wished his character also had more scenes. DW was also promoted to be one of the four main leads and it's disappointing that due to his short airing minutes/time, he and CDL are now listed as supporting cast. DW as an actor really plays and embodies XiaoLin as a main character. It was easy to tell that XL had his own vibe that is different from all the other characters. That vibe though was lost when he played SY and GYJW. Can't even evaluate SY much as he's barely shown in SJ and MY arc. GYJW was a questionable character. I was very confused by a lot of GYJW thoughts and actions. The script wrote GYJW as a resurrected XL but made him an entirely new personality/character. We didn't need that. GYJW just became annoying and despicable. Sometimes the camera would just cut to GYJW looking spaced out or looking like he's deep in thought. Yeah, if the script is like this and with GYJW's character being all over the place, I would be lost and confused too in what to do.

You know it's bad when the OG actors are just having fun filming. They're not even taking this drama seriously LOL. The BTS are so funny! The OG actors are just enjoying themselves as their characters and delivering their lines. Their roles is basically just to narrate a whole situation to pass time in the drama. I love their energy so much though. It makes the drama less serious in a way and reminds us not to take this drama too seriously. I've seen these OG actors do great acting before. Supporting roles did okay. Nothing too impressive. I do have to say though that Sun Zhenni is very pretty and it carried a majority of her scenes.

Production Value:
Money was questionably spent. I heard a lot of people say that the CGI in this drama is phenomenal but I dare to disagree. This level of CGI is normal nowadays for a decent to high budget fantasy drama. Underwater scenes are all too fake and change many times just for plot armor. Sets are very questionable. One scene we're in the palace meeting hall, then we're in a poor cottage, and then a rich cottage? No proper carriage or nice carriage for rich people or the Kings? Why does everyone own a horse, LOL.
Going back to sets, some of the places look very modernized, like it was just cleaned up for the shoot. For example, the rock and set/landscape that CJM and LSS was making out on after confessing their love.
Awful camera angles and close up on actors. Color lighting is constantly changing. Would've been better to stick to a certain tone per arc. Night never truly being dark...even when going to bed.
Majority boring/basic fighting scenes.There's more but they're not as bad as the above.
I do think money was well spent on the Gods CGI. I love seeing them. The best fighting scene is MingYe against the Devil God. It looked expensive, had good duel choreography, was well executed, and had great CGI.

Makeup/Costumes:
The makeup is just...all over the place. Whoever chose the foundation and put it on the actors...Why? Everyone looks as pale as a ghost. Pale means beauty but not this pale. This is legit white. No natural make-up. Everything was put on a bit too much. Maybe this next era of costume dramas is bringing back heavy makeup.
Eyeliners..OMG Leo Luo..What did they do to you?! Sometimes one eyeliner is shorter than the other. Sometimes one is thicker. Sometimes one is sharper than the other. Leo's eyebrows too. This is why they shouldn't have done so many close-ups of his face and the other actors!
Talking about close-ups. We can see pores. We can see those colored contacts, and how red some of the actors' eyes are from it. Lipstick and blushes, lots of shades, and very inconsistent colors on the actors. Close-ups were bad as the imperfections of the lipsticks can be seen. Like some colors just do not look flattering on the actors.
Now onto the clothing.
What is up with fantasy dramas nowadays just designing random outfits for mortals? You can't even tell if anyone is from the same Kingdom because they all wore different clothing styles. For the demons, can’t even tell that 10K years have passed due to their clothing and looks.
Also, why does the main cast (and some of the supporting casts) get better costumes than everyone else even when they're supposed to wear similar clothing/status to the others? CJM wears nice high fashion clothes as a disciple and has a different uniform. Same goes to LSS and GYJW. Their Shifus don't even have such nice clothes. No dress code, I guess.
YXW as a maid having an expensive looking maid outfit that is also a bit different from the rest of the maids... TTJ wears fur when he's a hostage prince.... SJ's evil purple outfit being a modern dress with overlay fabrics. Yes, we can see the straps that hold the dress. Paper Towel wrapped around CJM's shifu's headpiece. LOL!
I do really like the color palette for the Heavenly Gods and Goddesses outfits. Ming Ye probably has my favorite with his general outfit with the red and blue fabrics. I think the drama put a lot of money into the costumes because some of these costumes look EXPENSIVE AND BEAUTIFUL! But some of them are also just straight up filler outfits.
The mismatched earrings are giving...Korean Asymmetrical Earrings. It's pretty though. The hair dangles are so long and maybe a bit much. Pretty yes, but is it needed and practical? No. In the BTS their hair is constantly stuck due to the hair accessories.

Music:
I love a majority of the songs, but I do like all of the songs, so a 10/10.
I didn't like a lot of the songs when they appeared in the drama.TBH I didn't know that I liked all the songs because like 8/13 of them didn't even connect to me that it was from TTEOTM. The songs would just appear on my random chinese ost playlist. I had to look up the playlist and that's when I got a light bulb.
There's just something about the songs that don't feel cohesive altogether nor connect closely to the drama for me. I like to listen to a lot of the songs separately. When I listen to a majority of the song I don't even think about the drama.
A song I felt was used exceptionally well in the drama is 'My Body' - Huang Xiaoyun. It was perfectly used during the fighting scenes of MY and the Devil God. When the music came on before the last fighting moments...I felt the build up to that epic battle scene.

Rewatch Value:
Let's just say...there are hours of my life that I will never get back....
Funny thing is, I kept dropping this drama while it was airing. I watched around 10 episodes and then dropped, but I kept coming back due to the TT by Youku. Like I invested too much time into this drama already to not write a review. This review took me three weeks to write LMAO. I kept writing and got overwhelmed by how much I had to write about and kept stopping. I also overwrote my review that I had to delete over 1k words. I contemplated not writing or publishing my review, but I wanted to let out my rant about this drama so I can forget about it. And if I do ever need to rewatch a drama I can come back here to see exactly why I will not be rewatching this drama.
I actually rewatched some of the episodes because either I kept dropping it/slept through it/or just skimmed. On the episodes I did not rewatch, I was quite bored and I did find a lot of the romantic scenes cringey. Chemistry was too much for me LOL.
Overall, I think I'll just stick to the music and fan made videos of this drama.

Note : I do not hate this drama. Feel free to comment down below any questions or comments you have about my review. As a reminder, please be kind to each other.

Thank you so much if you've read and made it this far. I hope you enjoyed this review and were not too offended by my opinion. Have a wonderful day! Now then, peace out!

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