The Longest Promise with Xiao Zhan and Ren Min Concludes with an Ending Sure to be Polarizing
I feel like xianxia dramas almost always have the exact same ending, and I don’t mean sad or happy ending but that the sad endings are the exact same set up and same goes for happy endings. It’s like there is only one playbook for either extreme. The Longest Promise ended today with its quick 40-episode run over two weeks and Tencent did try a bit in promos but nothing close to what it could be doing having a drama anchored by Xiao Zhan and also getting high views and online buzz. I peaced out after the first 6 episodes but went back and watched the final episode and found all the same things that annoyed me still there but also that the drama production values seem to be good enough that it isn’t has cobbled together and half-finished looking as Legend of Anle so that’s good. For those of you who liked it, share your finale thoughts. My takeaway is that The Longest Promise will probably stand on par with Immortal Samara, a xianxia drama by the books made popular thanks to female lead Yang Zi, but not as solidly beloved as Ashes of Love and Three Lives Three Worlds, Ten Miles Peach Blossom.
I hate to say it but Ren Min shouldn’t act in xianxia. The aesthetic is just totally off.
Agree. She is disappointing…
I can’t unsee Wong Cho-lan in her face, esp during the latter parts of the drama where she had no fringe.
There’re too many strong antagonists. I hate the last one. The protagonists are the nicest people and give many chances to the antagonists to survive. The story is unusual for a drama. Stressed watching the antagonists resurrect again and again.
Wish they stick to the book ending and the story for the 2nd male lead as someone who just care for the female lead in a paternal way. Find the acting good for all and almost everyone looks like they fit into the story, esp the male lead and 2nd male lead the merman.
Wish they stick to the book ending and the story for the 2nd male lead as someone who just care for the female lead in a paternal way. Find the acting good for all and almost everyone looks like they fit into the story, esp the male lead and 2nd male lead the merman.
Koala, it seems your blogs are out of favor of Xiao Zhan’s fans. The Longest Promise is sizzling hot on various social media. Specifically in Douyin, topics about TLP with Xiao Zhan’s character have been taking #1 spot of daily hot index on the the streaming site since the drama premiered. The streaming volume has way beyond 1 billion with other celebrities trailing way behind. There are A LOT of positive reviews out there, either from ordinary viewers or main stream professional critics. Drama viewers flooded in Douyin etc. to create clips and blogs, watch, read, and discuss everything about TLP. If you haven’t watched the drama from the beginning to the end but jumped to somehow negative reviews along with other critical visitors here, how would you expect your site to appeal to ppl who really enjoy and appreciate the series? Ppl now have MANY sites to go to and feel more engaged in the sizzling discussions about the drama over there. They don’t need to visit your blogs full of biased opinions about XZ and his dramas. I’m prolly his only fan sticking to your blogs now. LOL
what are you? a 15 year old liuliang fan of his?
of course, all Mrs Koala does is cater to fans like you. No job, family or other responsibilities. Her only goal in life is making fans like you happy. LOL
Why did you get fussed so easily like a terrible two? LOL. I was simply stating a fact. If a popular celebrity has a huge fanbase, his/her fans will have many options of websites to visit. Then why would they choose websites full of bias against their faves? IT’S CALLED ENTERTAINMENT. Fans want to get entertained not annoyed. LOL
@somebody…
You’re still not getting the point! Her personal blog is not here to attract or entertain a specific fan base. Like you mentioned, there are orher sites who do that. Some who are dedicated to a specific fan group or sites with spaces for different fan bases. With professional staff behind it! This is not the place you ask for! By definition a personal blog is a space to talk about one’s personal opinion on topic of preferred choices. Never has she stated that she’ll provide a full picture of Chinese entertainment. She also covers topic of her interest in K-, TW- and J- entertainment.
I’m following her more than 12 year, specially for K dramas. However, she got me interested in watching C-, TW-, J- dramas, too.
There are always people complaining, but it got much worse over the years here. Blaming her for uncalled reasons.
Seriously, how can you not see this? You even said yourself others sites provide your preferred content. Go there. Get your defintion of “entertainment” and never look outside your box.
Nope! It’s you who did not get my point. I wasn’t blaming Koala for anything. As I said in the prior comment, I’ll emphasize one more time. I was simply stating a fact regardless of she or you or any of her visitors like it or not. I’ve also been visiting her site for how many years? I can’t recall. Surely I know this is her personal blog and she decides what she would like to say. Nonetheless, I just indicated that her consistent bias against particular actors, XZ included, has pushed away and will continue to drive his fans away from this site.
You don’t have to call me a 15 yrs old because of my honesty with a very simple and easy-to-get scenario. Her blogs have lower traffic than before. That’s the reason. Be rational! We reap what we sow. That’s simple as it is. She doesn’t have to change her bias to attract XZ’s fans. That’s her decision in the end. But I just pointed out an undeniable fact. A fact is a fact. What’s wrong to say it out loud? LOL
Love Ren Min, my favorite I feel in love with since 30 years ago when I stopped watching Asian dramas with my Greatgrandmother who died. I understand we all want to see beautiful people, but the work and the storyline here is very unique. I am with you that I want this to be the most popular. I don’t understand why the public needs to keep bashing her my goodness. She is supposed to be portray a young teen that matures into a women. She plays the role perfectly and well matched in acting skills with Xiao Zhan. Xiao Zhan even says she was light when he picked her up and supported Ren Min in her acting skills. She is detailed, delicate, cute. People were too focused on the looks and the CP. They weren’t supposed to have CP to begin with. It develops later! the lesson of defying fate is an important message. I see many can’t even see past that so you and I have to agree to support this and anyone else can just lose out on how wonderful it is.
It’s still too early to tell if TLP is not as popular as Ashes of Love and TLTWTMPB (dang! such an awkward long-ass title, lol). Per all the various ratings so far, TLP is definitely more popular than Immortal Samara. Yeah! I’m talking about statistics and hard numbers. If you only rely on Weibo (which is like Twitter with shrinking business compared with other thriving social media such as Instagram and Facebook) to get your idea of which C dramas or celebrities are popular, you may not be well informed. There’re several online platforms of C social media, e.g., Douyin, showing more footprints of C ent activities in general than Weibo, including actor/drama’s popularity.
TLP has been getting pretty good reviews from C professional critics and newspapers, saying the drama revolutionizes typical xianxia in many concepts. Immortal Samara (which I think pretty bad and is part of the reasons why I’m getting tired of Yang Zi’s acting) is absolutely not on par with TLP in terms of rating and review as well.
Also it’s a trend that C drama streaming sites are taking over western streaming platforms like Netflix outside China, specifically in those SE Asian countries. It was once in the news. Why would Tencent even bother to upload its most viewed drama to Youtube and share commercial profits with YT? No brainer. Viewership on YT doesn’t tell you if a C drama is popular or not. Revenues from international subscription and commercial values earned from YT are nothing compared with huge profits Tencent collected from its own streaming sites including WeTV.
Anytime there is XZ post someone needs to type a long ass easy, has if they have something to prove,it annoying at this point, XZ has massive fans n no one is denying that. Honestly TLP did well due to XZ n his fansbase helping to promote it, if it was another actor who is not has popular has him, no one will be talking about this show, it goes to show popularity matters more in c ent before acting n the others come in, well that is how I see it. I know every ENT popularity matters to some extent but I feel C netizen take it to the extreme.
Aw but you even bother to stalk me whenever possible ALL bcuz of Xiao Zhan. That somehow implies you’re perhaps obsessed with Xiao Zhan? LMAO
I don’t deny I’m a staunch fan of Xiao Zhan. He’s my fave among ALL celebrities around the world, and the only one. That’s how much I appreciate his talent and performance, be it singing or acting or interpreting his roles and dramas in interviews. There’re MANY fans like me who aren’t tired of writing long essays to praise Xiao Zhan to the galaxy for his due credits. Like it or not! Why not writing a long essay yourself also for your own fave instead of being jealous of XZ’s popularity and getting butthurt for every success of his dramas???? LOL
I stayed up to binge watch last few eps. Wow! My feelings at the end were fixed. I read the book. The drama version is so different from the book in many ways. I can’t say it’s adapted for better or worse, really depending on how you like it. I think the production values overall are good, specific the CGI. No wonder Tencent has been a gaming guru. They must have many talented and capable CGI teams in house. I particularly like how the scriptwriting/directing is creative in many ways, especially making audience “visualize” the mental states of Shi Ying (XZ’s character) who’s supposedly a taciturn and serious person in appearance. The drama is aesthetically enjoyable from the beginning through the end. I have no qualms about that.
I wasn’t disturbed by the FL’s looks as many ppl were. But I do think Ren Min didn’t look pretty in quite a few angles from camera. Since people always have high expectation over main leads’ appearance in idol dramas, she’d better work harder to manage her weight and looks if she wants to lead an idol drama again. Then it would minimize undesirable distraction from her acting although I think some criticism of her styles in TLP is too harsh.
The only part I think the book does a better job than the drama is the budding romance between the OTP after Shi Ying was resurrected from death. The book had quite a few chapters dedicating to the OTP’s love lines, some of which are full of Shi Ying’s teases on Zhu Yan and I laughed at his banter. However, the drama omitted those arcs and it seemed chemistry between the OTP just wasn’t there in last few eps. The novel is more romantic than the drama. That’s the only thing I think the drama could have done better.
TLP is a decent but not a perfect drama. As a fan of XZ, I hope he will costar in the future with FLs who have more chemistry with him. So far, I still think the chemistry between XZ and Yang Zi in Oath of Love is unparalleled even though I don’t like YZ’s heavy makeup and overacting cute in OoL.
I though you were a rational fan but right now you are acting like a bot. It’s you or your username is being hacked?
I haven’t had the time to watch dramas recently due to being on vacation, but from what I’ve watched so far, the quality of The Longest Promise far outshone the other xianxia dramas in the recent years. It’s definitely on par with Eternal Love. It’s such a pity that this drama is under Tencent, Tencent is notorious for cutting back on promos after it has earned enough profits from the drama in order to save costs.
I’m back here with more data evidence to support my claim that Immortal Samara is absolutely not on par with The Longest Promise. Two major rating sites, DataWin and Vlinkage have just published their June-July hot drama analyses today. On their charts, The Longest Promise is on top of the ACCUMULATED popularity index chart among ALL the dramas aired in June-July so far, trailed by Hidden Love in 2nd, The Youth Memories (also XZ’s drama) in 3rd, followed by Destined, then Firework in My Heart, and Legend of Anle the last. Both rating sites released the rating charts along with analysis reports to analyze the current C drama market trends among consumers of different demographics. In particular, both rating sites published articles analyzing why XZ’s dramas appeal to the market with such a great popularity.
You like it or not. Those are hard statistics published by two major rating sites, DataWin and Vlinkage. Yes, Koala is definitely biased against XZ and his dramas. That’s fine! That’s her personal preference. But to claim that The Lonest Promise is only as popular as boring and cliched Immortal Samara without objective statistics to support, is absolutely a personal bias!
Yet to observe if in the long run, The Longest Promise will be on par or surpass the popularity of Ashes of Love and Three Lives. Comparing a newly released drama with old dramas premiered so many years ago is like comparing orange to apple. How do you know how much viewership TLP will garner in the long run? That being said, it’s undeniable TLP is the most popular C drama in this summer so far. You don’t like the drama. But many more ppl are crazy about the drama. LOL
You keep on posting wall to wall comments, you really should make your own blog. This is a comment so that you can get the attention you need. Hope you can sleep well now, chile
You don’t need to pay attention to me unless my comments did make an impact on you. Why did you even bother? Lol. I believe Koala also prefers her site visitors to be more proactive in the comment threads.
You’d better post comments to support your own fave rather than wasting time writing futile and insinuating response to me. XZ is my favorite actor of all time. Therefore expect me to keep on raving about him to the moon. Lol
You are being ignored. Delulus never win. Lol. You are funny, keep writing. You need mental help.