So My Journey to You has been my most 180-degrees about turn in opinion for both leads Yu Shu Xin and Zhang Ling He as well as for director Guo Jingming. That it mostly releases 1 episode a day has made the slow burn even more painfully delightful, it gives me chance to savor each episode and really take in the details. It’s not just the narrative with the twists and turns but also the visual sumptuousness and Guo Jingming once again picking pretty faces that can act and deliver onscreen charisma in spades. Second leads Cheng Lei and Lu Yu Xiao have gotten plenty of buzz but also supporting actors Zuo Ye, Ai Mi, and Omid, not to mention scene-stealers with off on their own planet Jolin Jin and Sun Chen Jun as Gong Zi Shang and Jin Fan. Even better is the hilarious subtext that the showdown between assassin org Wufeng and noble stalwart Gong family is really the former training gorgeously emotionally messed up lady assassins as a dating service for the multitude of hot Gong men each with different personalities and quirks. The drama has turned the corner with 1/3 left of its run so please join the party and watch as it goes to rocks fall down with a sliver of hope, I’m thoroughly enjoying this drama sooooo much!
I joined the party this week and is at Ep. 4 and will surely catch up more this weekend.
I had to agree with all your compliments. Love the gorgeous visuals, from color tones, settings, clothes to faces. It’s my first time watching all the casts here, so far I’m pretty impressed with the overall casting, everyone delivered convincingly. I sense a strong directing at hand here, and if the plot and suspense can sustain to the end, this will be one of the best dramas this year for me.
On the fun side, don’t you think this drama could actually be one of Gong Zi Shang’s dreams on hot Gong men ? 🙂
I haven’t so much in a long time as much as I laughed over the dating service viewpoint. Its true. The Gong men are hot and distinctive as heck. The Wufeng women are all messed up in their heads.
Sliver of hope sounds about right. I am mentally prepared for no one being happy and at least half the cast being killed off.
Gong men from back to front hill are simmering hot but starved for woman touches. Damsel in distressed is their Achilles’ Heel. This kind of honey trap trope is as old as the world but still enjoyable as heck for me.
Love how the actors not only pleasing to the eyes but delivered the acting part as well despite mostly are unknown. This drama is one of the best for this year.
I have to admit, I got on this drama because of the men visuals. Hahahaha. But fighting choreography is nice too, Esther did it well in the fighting scenes. Her younger sister is very pretty too but is she dead? I hope there is a twist so our handsome Elder Yue can also have his bride.
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Koala, now please please go and watch ‘Love between fairy and devil’. And then tell us how you felt about it.
It is such a good drama, funny and interesting throughout because they keep doing new things (in fairy world, then in mortal world, then in devil’s world).
I know what put you off, but it’s really worth it.
Body swap part is very short and Esther changes her acting towards the end when her character changes towards more serious and dark side.
Btw, I’m a person who dropped Meteor garden because I couldn’t stand Dylan’s acting there, but here he did ok and is simply beautiful to look at 🙂
What I like about it:
– Each episode felt like I was searching for easter eggs; getting a little crumb or a little piece of the puzzle with every drop.
– The cast’s acting was adequate and good.
– The setting and theme felt different, more somber but tightly plotted. It felt purposefully done.
What I dislike about it:
– Each episode felt like I was searching for Easter eggs; it never stops. There are more questions than answers. At some point I felt like I was being strung along for the suspense.
– While I like SGQ and she wowed me the first few episodes, she started being this weepy princess and we know she’s cunning and coldhearted, but all she displayed with the men were her watery eyes. I stopped at episode 18, knowing that the remaining episodes were apparently very bad
– The comedic relief GZS who loves JF. I think she’s fine but she overacts. It’s kinda cringey.
– The younger brother/cousin of shangque who is the prodigy of poison. He just has a really annoying bratty face lol. Want to punch it.
I turned this drama off after about 5 minutes because I could tell it was all style, no substance – like an overlong video game cutscene. Very unfortunate.
I gave this drama a shot of 7 eps meanwhile I fell asleep or fast forwarded quite a bit. Lol. I agreed the cast visuals, mainly men’s looks, are above the average. But I’m on the same page as you about all style without substance. It’s pretty boring plot-wise. There are more new dramas coming. I decide to push MJTY to the back burner and may not pick up again.
I’m still waiting for something like Nirvana in Fire in a similar genre. So far pretty disappointing. I surmise increasing censorship over the recent years has had a negative impact on script writing.
I summarise increasing censorship over the recent years has had a
negative impact on script writing, this sentence has some truth in them, it unfortunately it could 😔 get worse going forward, hopefully u find something entertaining enough to grape ur attention. That is what most of us r looking for in a tv show or series,we can’t have it all I guess.
@Mercy, now I mostly watched the dramas of my fave since I love his visuals and acting style enough to overlook some flaws in his dramas even though some of his dramas were also tinted with state propaganda that I laugh at. C dramas are getting boring with recycled tropes. Pretty settings and costumes do not offset the weakness in scriptwriting/directing. Such a waste for a huge pool of acting talents. In the past, some C dramas had distinctive characteristics apart from K dramas. But now it’s getting repetitive and predictable.
Are you guys C-ent noobs who don’t know who directs or produced which dramas? This is an Edward Guo self-written directed production (I am not using his Chinese name since he’s using a pseudonym to direct MJTY lol due to plagiarism or something) so no matter how much raves it got here or elsewhere, everyone including myself knew with a wry smile to wait for the whole thing to drop since it was likely to be messy and he’s never done historical dramas before. Edward Guo used to appear on acting varities as a coach and he was known to be a pretentious dude who fancies himself as a 大导 or big director. His next drama is 伪宋杀手 based on the Song dynasty and Zhang Jingyi backed out of it to take over the FL role of Song Zuer’s modern drama 焕羽, that’s how unfavored Edward Guo’s productions are. He’s known as a MV director or music videos lol. Even Yuzheng is more accomplished as a producer/scriptwriter even if he’s the bitchier gay of the two, Yuzheng’s scripts are of a higher standard such that a lot of women eat up everything Yuzheng does. Edward Guo has a good eye for pretty camerawork but his plots are too simplistic and dragged out like a 6 hour story extended into 24 episodes.
As for Nirvana in Fire, that’s a Daylight Entertainment/Shandong Film production led by top director Kong Sheng who is the basically the creme de la creme of Chinese TV (the others are Zheng Xiaolong, Lin Yufen, Guo Jingyu) and gets nominated for Best Directing awards on a regular basis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_Eagle_Award_for_Best_Television_Series_Director_(China) Kong Sheng hasn’t been in great health iirc after Battle of Changsha he was rumoured to soft retire and his & Hou Hongliang’s company Daylight Entertainment (which basically emptied out Shandong Film Entertainment’s state TV enterprise of everyone talented) has a lot of directors who work alongside him to get trained then splinter off into their own productions. Daylight’s quality is still higher and better anything Edward Guo produces: Reset, Minglan, Ode to Joy, Nirvana in Fire 2, Like a Flowing River, The Bond, Minning Town, Romance of My Parents. Edward Guo has issues with storytelling and pacing that will impede his dramas from ever getting a high score on Douban, much less get an airing license for TV or nominations for awards. The fact that people can watch a Yuzheng or Zheng Xiaolong drama with 70 episodes and not quit midway is proof they are not former MV directors lol
I disliked this at first too. Completely hooked now, although it makes a few jumps I don’t see the connections to adequately. All the actors deserve praise.
What are they going to use as a metric to gauge whether there will be a season 2?
In the U.S., most stations usually give at least a green light to two seasons before making the call to stop or not. But that’s based on ratings. And purely financially-driven.
What is iqiyi basing theirs on? And what is China basing it on?
all style no substance is my succinct review. The slow-mo movements are abit too much for me. I get by by watching cuts on weibo, think that helps me summarise the plot pretty sufficiently which just goes to tell you for a drama that is supposed to be all about delicious spy/undercover tension and intrigue, doesn’t have much of a plot to go on….