It has been awhile since I last watched anything in the Xianxia genre (I was crazy about it back in my teenage years), but I decided to watch The Untamed during the lockdown in early 2020 (I'm in the process of moving my reviews to MDL). Though I wasn’t familiar with the original material, I quickly looked it up because to be honest, I got confused and overwhelmed by so many things going on and so many characters appearing all at once in the first couple of episodes. Once I got that sorted and we got into the long flashback, I was basically hooked on the series before I even got into episode 5. The Untamed is complicated, massive, hilarious, as well as sweet and tear jerking at times, not to mention I’m so in love with their costumes, swords, sets, the beautiful scenery, and the music.

I also have massive appreciation for this series for the clever way they adapted to stay true to the original materials, while still adhering to the strict Chinese censorship regulations.

I love this drama, however, there are some really glaring issues that stood out for me, some of them are pretty much what happens in c-dramas in general though, such as the audio, I understand that c-dramas are dubbed, but I do find it bothersome when a big scene sounds "empty", things like footsteps don't match (they have the same sound for footsteps on concrete and footsteps on wooden floor for example), etc. Slow mo shots are also jaggy, which indicates that they didn't shoot it on a higher frame rate and just slow it down in post. Then there is the jumping the 180 line back and forth, which is very jarring and doesn't make a lot of sense. The other thing that I didn't quite like also was the treatment of the female characters, I get that it's what happened in the novel, but still, most of the female characters were killed off. In saying that, this is one of the best historical c-dramas I've watched in a long time, so I'm still quite happy for having watched it.

This series definitely re-ignited my love for the Xianxia genre. If you’re looking for intense dramas, complex storylines, beautiful costumes, and strong bonds, I’d definitely recommend this series. Also, aside from the original novel, there is also the manhua, donghua (the artwork for this is insane!!), audio drama, the 20 episode special edition, as well as 2 spin off movies to date (I love them too btw).

I know a lot of people have re-watched this so many times, but I'm really not someone who like to re-watch stuff, I couldn't even finish watching the special edition, because it was basically re-watching the drama to me.