Fireworks of My Heart Becomes Lowest Douban Rated High Profile Drama of 2023 Dropping to 3.2 as Pundits Believe Criticism of Leads Yang Yang and Wang Chu Ran will Impact Their Reputation

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• I love the novel and the drama adaptation failed the source material soo hard. They left out stuff that they shouldn't have and added filler to bloat it to 40 episodes. I gave up after episode 30 (can't believe I stuck around for so long). Everything about this drama is disappointing - acting (YY's eyebrow acting: please never again), directing and script, everything feels off.

• A bit puzzled by this rating. For the Chinese public, was it a case of high expectations? I have read the novel and indeed there were parts that the drama fell short, like in the reconciliation scene. The tension build up was well written and the delivery in the drama was doused (pardon the pun) by the open tap. Was it PPL? anyway, it is bad when the second lead gets more sympathy than the main leads. It think they stretched the tension quite a bit to people's liking and left the redemption arcs too late or contrived. It was not this bad in the novel. I learned something about how to operate the fire extinguisher at least! It is one item you buy and remain skeptical whether you can operate it when the time comes. They showed us how. I understand they are highlighting their fire and rescue agency departments, but maybe it stretched too long. You are my Glory was just 32 episodes. Writers and PDs, please note, stretching the tension with shallow characters to have more time for PPLs and fillers do not make good drama. Actors, please note the number of episodes, in your decisions. You may be paid more but reputational risks can be high. Best to have it short and sweet

  • Lol, I heard that this drama was so bad that the Fire and Rescue Force were using it for showcasing bad examples on social media.

• Anyone else get Jeon Ji Hyun vibes from Wang Chu Ran? She is so beautiful!

  • Yes! She reminds me of both Jun Ji Hyun and the gorgeous second female lead in The King Eternal Monarch (sorry, forgot her name)!

• See my comment below or this commentary https://youtu.be/id0UNrssPIM it wasn't the acting or length and Koala doesn't really delve into the issues like plagiarism or removal of Wei Daxun's scenes

• The whole problem with this drama started from the book, to the adaptation, the production team, and lastly to the actors. It wasn't one person's fault. I have read the book translation and the characters in the book itself were already problematic. The drama adaptation made the characters even more unlikeable, and the pacing/ editing of the drama made it worse by trying to promote the firemen as an occupation without making ppl like the main cp characters first.. giving too little attention to the romance build-up until it's too late. I guess they were probably thinking viewers will be automatically enthralled with beauty of the leads and everything else can be forgiven.. but viewers seems to have gotten smarter and rejecting just a pretty face. Overall, there are just too many problems with this drama but it definitely is not just because of the actors. Probably some anti-fans trying to also flame the hate. One thing for sure, this drama did burst like the fireworks, fitting to it's name. Lol.

• to be honest, after watched the drama, I won't give zero star but minus if there is. Just like other viewers, if not Wei Da Xun acting, I have given up the drama since the first episode because it just that bad. I did read somewhere about the director of this drama, he said, 'I couldn't imagine other actor to play the character except Yang Yang.' I feel so speechless LOLS
  Everything about the drama is problematic, from FL and ML acting, the script, etc.

• The whole drama was a trainwreck and the fallout is still ongoing due to Wang Churan's attitude controversy. Please don't come after me I'm just relaying what happened.

  1) Wei Daxun's unexpected popularity: his tortured stepbrother role went viral over the uncouth firefighter played by Yangyang, compounded with WDX's variety fame and clean easygoing nature with 0 controversies despite acting for many years, netizens started to fangirl him and his character.

  2) The drama's producer Jia Shikai who happens to also be Yangyang's agency boss and novelist JiuYueXi all wrote long posts to defend Yangyang's role and acting, and the novelist JiuYueXi even said fans who prefer the stepbrother played by WDX are "superficially attracted to wealth and power". Netizens counterargued that the FL herself is attracted to wealth and power because she refused to leave her stepfamily for love and demands her firefighter boyfriend buy a big house 四合院 which is impossible on a firefighter's salary.

  3) Cutting of WDX's scenes by the producer Jia Shikai who happens to be Yangyang's agency Yuekai's CEO. Yangyang also has a 30% stake in Yuekai so it's clear netizens will perceive it to be Yuekai, Jia Shikai, Yangyang (all the investors in this drama) bullying Wei Daxun. I didn't watch the drama at all thankfully but apparently his scenes got reduced which made netizens hopping mad and support Wei Daxun the actor even harder, and hate the show even more. Worse Yangyang complained that his cool skateboards scenes got cut so netizens found behind the scenes skateboarding footage that looked "greasy" so Yangyang got another round of acting criticism

  4) Plagiarism: JiuYueXi got exposed by another novelist for plagiarism of her book where the FL is an adopted girl who falls for the ML her stepbrother. In other words she accused JiuYueXi of copying her plot, setting, characterization of the adopted family and adding a new uncouth firefighter ML so the original ML got shifted to 2nd ML. JiuYueXi had previous plagiarism scandals at JJWXC or China's main webnovel site where another author who accused her quit JJWXC in protest of the site's inaction so netizens sided against JiuYueXi and hated the show even more.

  5) Yangyang's greasy acting aside, both his & Wang Churan's characters got deemed problematic because of how they characterise firefighters and their personalities got picked apart too. I really don't want to comment too much as I've not watched to show but Yangyang also got criticised for being a himbo like his role because he often gives shallow substanceless answers and is overly affected by how he looks. There is even a viral clip of Wang Churan calling Yangyang "empty brained" to his face at a drama fanmeet because he called her role a nurse 白衣天使 when she's a doctor, now that clip has a new connotation in light of Wang Churan's apparent attitude issues

  6) Wang Churan's issues: Last weekend a Weibo user posted online that she ran into WCR who was filming an advert at a mall and got called a witch because she wore black clothes. Subsequently WCR's agency started harassing this user to delete her post so the user posted the chatlogs. Then various industry insiders with proof shots who worked with WCR starting posting on Weibo, Douyin, Xiaohongshu that they witnessing WCR being rude to assistants or losing her temper easily. Suddenly all hell broke loose and previous compilations of WCR rolling her eyes (this used to be seen as her being cool) at costars or interviewers were now interpretated as proof of WCR being rude. Netizens even found an old vlog where Churan showed fans 3 books that her mother bought for her ("How to not lose your temper" "How to not let emotions get the better of you" "How to control your state of mind" LOL) which further confirmed their suspicions that she is ill-tempered. Also the previous clip of her calling Yangyang "empty-brained" was now seen as less funny and more mean-spirited.

  The biggest winner is Wei Daxun by far, he is a newly minted liuliang and has new endorsements and magazine shoots. It remains to be seen if his new fans will stick with him past 3 months though. The issues are still "fermenting" and the show will have a negative effect on the leads especially Yangyang that they would be better off if they didn't film this drama. Like Zhang Han's Gentlemen of East 8th, Yangyang probably regrets investing to produce this drama and needs to rescue his reputation from the drain. The director Li Muge was deemed promising before this (he did Goodbye Princess and Rattan) is also a longtime collaborator with Yuekai and Jia Shikai, his rep will be affected too. Chinese netizens hate Big Capital and their cronies shilling untalented actors and posting holier than thou comments on viewers' perception and taste, hence the low Douban score is a middle finger at Jia Shikai, Yuekai, Yangyang who is Yuekai's shareholder and top dog. I'm glad this has happened because many top stars like Yangyang do think too highly of their poor skills and don't see the need to improve since Big Capital will cast them to act as leads, plus theyre rich enough to invest in productions which they can helm once they reach 30+ like Yangyang and Zhanghan. Unsurprisingly these productions that are meant to be a vehicle to push the lead actor who also happens to be a key investor in the drama turn out to be dogshit.

  • This is the best and most thorough explanation I've seen from an English-speaking person about this whole ordeal. If you have Twitter, please share it there. Most international viewers have made up their minds that this is all an organized attack from "haters" or "antis" who are simply jealous or threatened by the leads' "visuals" or "popularity" without considering the layers of reasons as to why this drama has spiraled into one of the biggest real-life dramas in recent years. People just need to take off their rose-colored glasses and see the situation for what it is. All the video and screenshot evidence have been circulating on every Chinese social media platform for weeks.

    I would argue that WCR's image and possibly her career may be affected more than YY's from this controversy. She's already lost endorsements and netizens are boycotting her upcoming dramas. Every day something new comes up and it's to the point where even credible people who've worked with bigger celebrities are publicly testifying against WCR with their own experiences. From disrespecting seniors and colleagues to mistreating staff members to making nasty comments about random strangers, there's no shortage of allegations against her. She may not have done anything illegal, but it's understandable that the public's impression of her no longer remains favorable with everything that's being revealed. There's a reason why someone like Liu Yifei has lasted for decades in the industry. Physical beauty only gets you so far, but a pleasant personality makes your followers stay.

    • Wang Churan won't be affected, I wanted to add in the original comment that netizens dug deep into her background because they didn't understand how a newbie actress has the guts to offend so many people within the industry at age 23 (today an actor from one of her previous dramas reposted a clip that said WCR doesn't look like Liu Yifei and netizens find it very weird an actor would take a swipe at a coworker like that, people who worked with her clearly don't like her and it's a bit shocking) because even Irene the kpop idol who they use as a comparison was around age 30 when she was called out for being rude to stylists. Well turns out she's from 复星 and Fosun International's first signed artist. They are one of China's largest MNCs, their main business is healthcare, and they're very well connected to the CCP so she's a Fosun princess. Fosun signed a deal with Yuekai to let them handle her drama promotions so that's why she's close to Yangyang and apparently dating him because months ago she was supposed to do an event to promote her drama with Peng Guanying but didn't show up despite people calling her. Fans noticed she was in Maldives at the time and noticed that Yangyang was also in Maldives on holiday around the same time, and that was prior to Fireworks airing. She's definitely not an ordinary newbie because she has Big Capital behind her back, namely Fosun and Yuekai, so she won't lack new dramas to be cast in and hasn't apologised to anyone who called her out. In any case she believes that her visuals or backers will get her roles and she doesn't need to play up a nice image to build a fanbase. Fair enough

  • I can't reply to your comment underneath mine, so I'll reply to this one again. I was aware of WCR's agency, but didn't know the extent of their power and connections. Although she won't lack any resources going forward, I still believe this controversy will follow her around forever. She'll continue to get good opportunities, but she's already fallen out of netizens' good graces and won't be worshipped like before. She'll be one of those actresses who’s known more for their black material than their actual work. Both WCR and her team have tried to maintain her image by silencing people for years, but perhaps they'll drop the act now since she's been exposed.

    The good thing about this saga is that a serious and unproblematic actor like Wei Daxun is being appreciated.

    • damn now I know the reason why China hates WCR so much

• To be honest, I haven't watched the drama, and to me Yang Yang is not an actor, but I feel all this backlash is in part people that enjoy bitching.

• My only joy from this drama is the people of China finally, I hope, realizing that Yang Yang has no talent. none. From the day i heard people raving about loveO2O and I watched it and realized both the female and male actor were terrible at their job, I habe been wondering if Chinese definition of good acting was different from the rest of the world. Then I saw Yang Yang in that movie with Liu Yifei and i knew people in China had lost their damn mind if the thought this man could act. lol

  Now the world knows what I know. Yang Yang is a terrible actor. I feel vindicated. lol

  • dude i totally feel you - when i was watching love o2o i was like how is this remotely good? I did like Yang Yang in who rules the world but i was also confused with the movie version of ten miles and I’m like what the hell am i watching? I also don’t think Liu Yi Fei is that great of an actress either though.

  • Yang Yang has always been criticised for his bad acting. The reason you don't see much criticism in Chinese social media and forums previously was because:
    1) His team has control over certain Douban groups previously, any criticism of him there were quickly removed.
    2) He's not much of a threat to other actors with his bad acting skills. Hence other actors' fandoms usually won't bother putting much effort into criticising him online unless he had seriously pissed people off like now.

    He's lucky that both he and LoveO2O debuted at a time where the C-ent was very lacking in modern-looking handsome young actors and idol dramas, plus Yang Yang was still young, so the audience were way more lenient back then.

• Wow. I didn't have time for this yet, but I might watch it next lol

  I always felt that Yang Yang uses botox, he could easily win a staring contest. I look forward to his eyebrows!