I am ALWAYS going to be in the own voice dub camp, even with some stars whose voice I don’t like because it’s too high pitched or squeaky I still think it adds authenticity and uniqueness. Dylan Wang is reportedly a C-star who not only does his own voice but actively wants to do it and makes time for going back to the studio to record the dialogue. He thinks it’s a lot more real to the character he’s playing and I love this boy more for how hard he’s trying. Sadly C-netizens think at times he needs to be dubbed with his most recent Only for Love where he comes across like a little boy playing dress up as a top company executive and his voice adds to the disconnect of the performance. I think Only for Love is dumb as bricks as nearly all modern C-drama romances are, most recently Xiao Zhan couldn’t save Sunshine by My Side and Wu Lei barely came out of Nothing But You and Gong Jun is paddling through Rising with the Wind. But Dylan is so adorable and yummy onscreen I don’t care that he’s playing pretend and vow to finish this sucker when I have time so keep doing your own voice m’boy!
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He can't act and no, he can't deliver his voice lines properly.
Just because you have zero standards when you get your eye candy, don't expect others to lower theirs.
Personally I don't find anything cute about him, or many others, who grab main roles in cent with supremely inferior skills just because they look decent and have the right backing.
lol you seem fun to hang out with
Is he/she wrong tho? Too many people on this site are okay with bad acting as long as it's a handsome oppa. And when people criticize these actors, the people rightly criticizing should be the one to lighten up? LOL That's why fangirls have a bad reputation, it's like looks is all that matters to you all
For comparison, can you give examples of C actors who have superior acting skills? Thanks.
Zhang Ruo Yun for example. Superior actor in every aspect with great lines.
He is not the hottest guy around but still very popular. So what is driving that popularity? The acting.
Oh well it's debatable. The bottom line is all about personal preference of acting styles. ZRY did an impressive job on Joy of Life 1. But he was kinda bland in all the dramas after JoL. He reminded me of his role as Fan Xian in all other dramas. From that perspective, I don't consider him a great actor with good acting range. His lines are good from domestic audience's points of view. But taking that away, he's nothing particularly impressive. Sorry to disagree with you.
Talking about C actors who have impressed me until now, Hu Ge and Xiao Zhan are the ones. There may be some other actors I haven't watched yet. So I can't say those two are the only ones with talent.
As much as I wanted to enjoy this drama the writing is just awful. I love both of the leads so I’m just watching for some background noise but I don’t know how long I’ll keep watching.
For modern dramas my favorite are Meet Yourself, Fake it till you make it and the ideal city.
I’m currently enjoying rising with the wind.
Don't worry, I don't think your opinion is worth anything, having read the kind of bs you usually write.
LOL @Lmao ! You are running out of reasoning to support your own points. So you resorted to cussing! What a character! LMAO!
Two words: Mark Chao
@somebody
No, you're just an idiot and arguing with idiots is a lost cause.
I actually remember you. You are that imbecile that came to Reddit, made a huge stink and so many problems pretending to be a xz fan. It just took me a while to understand why your style of posting seemed familiar. There is absolutely no reason to argue with the likes of you.
LMAO @Lmao! You're one of those Chinese fans that don't know online etiquette in the Western world, always passively aggressively attacking people with views not in your favor! Get some basic civil education yourself before engaging in any public communication rather than getting butthurt bcos people are bluntly telling you they don't appreciate your faves. We're not on Weibo or WeChat! LOL
See @Lmao, you're exposing yourself by such rudeness of name calling that whoever got proper education in the West would always disapprove of! Calling people idiots not knowing yourself a laughingstock in the free world that respects and tolerates various opinions is a foolish act itself. You're just self-validating you're a halfwit not me! LMAO.
BTW, Reddit per survey statistics, is a biased forum full of either underage school girls or Chinese speaking fans who share a lot of similar online social behavior patterns that I disapprove of. I don't have a Reddit account. But accidentally coming across some threads about Cdrama on that site and reading some threads immediately turned me off. Reddit is totally irrelevant to my online activities. Stop exercising your wild mental gymnastics to wrongly identify me as someone else as many obnoxious Chinese fans have a fetish doing so on Chinese SM.
It took some time for this blogging site to resume communication sanity after I fought the kind of intolerant toxicity that obnoxious Chinese fans like you spread from Chinese social media to western forums. Now here comes a banana with communist-style of name calling and labeling again !!!! You'd better stick with your toxic Chinese social media if you can't stop your filthy mouth!
I though he would improve but He is awful here. His voice/delivery is not professional enough for the role. BL here too picked such a awful character. For a story to depend on the fact that a company only have one person to relied on as the cover story and no other back up is lazy writing. There offscreen chemistry is more realistic and appealing & genuine.
Clearly, koalas bypass good looking. I remember her macking the actress ‘longest promise’ for her nose plus among other things.
And people on this site wonder why there are so many sh*tty actors and actresses acting in dramas today and why the quality of dramas have gone downhill. In articles about this guy, Gong Jun, Cha Eun Woo, etc, the comments are like, "Yeah, he's not a good actor but I'm just here for the visuals! HiS sIdE gLanCeS aNd PuRsEd LiPs ArE sO hOt! 🤤 YoU aLl ShOuLd LiGhTeN uP aNd StOp CrItIcIzInG mY oPpa! 😤"
LMAO People are really straight up okay with bad acting as long as it's a good-looking person, it's embarrassing really. And this is coming from someone who enjoys good-looking actors too, but it's a turn-off if there's no talent to back up the good looks
but that only applies to actors is something i've noticed. when it's an actress who's bad at acting, these people suddenly care about good acting and they will rake the actresses over the coals. it's the double standards for me. that's also why i can't bear being around fangirls of male celebs
@yanna I notice this too, when a actor gets critized for bad acting, a flood of excuses come pouring in. It's the script, directing, editing is bad. He needs a different, better, female lead. It's a bad role, he would suit this, that role much better. The character is supposed to be expressionless and cold etc etc
I remember those comments. lol
You're right. Just two words (bad acting) will get them writing an essay to defend these male celebs who don't know of their existence LOL. Pathetic, really.
Oh yeah! Side glances and hot pursed lips! Yummmmeh! Imma ALL ABOUT 'em! Take my money, TenCent, Iqiyi, Mango! #tossingCreditCard
If you watched LBFAD and still feel this way, something is wrong with you. He is awesome. The entire cast is great!
But he(WHD) was over dubbed for that. So basically he was just a model that moves around with expression.It might as well have been an animated series. Granted I am a westerner who likes cdramas but the whole process confuses me. In the west if you study acting you also study diction. It is a big deal to be able to deliver your lines. That's what actors are supposed to do. In the US they teach what is called standard American and in England it is BBC English. If you are on stage you have to be able to speak! I guess this is not a consideration in China as so many actors are overdubbed by a voice actor. The pretty ones are really just models preening around for the young ladies eye candy. Mr Wang is obviously trying to be something more then a model. Good for him. Let him keep trying. But if I were him I would try to find better vehicles to display my talent.
I skipped through episode one expecting to hear Mickey Mouse but was disappointed, he sounds completely normal, what a nothing burger. Probably black PR from the competing show. Gong Jun's awkward and unnatural acting and lack of chemistry is the bigger problem.
Bad comparison as Xiao Zhan and Wu Lei's own voice dubs are great. For me, I think that actors using their own voices is a great plus point, but if you aren't good at it in the first then it's wiser to stick to hiring voice actor. BUT you still have to work on improving your voice/pronunciation in the meantime because if you don't, you won't be able to act in 正剧 serious dramas once you are too old for idol dramas.
She did not say their voice were awful she said their modern dramas were not that good either. Read the message she wrote carefully.
Still a bad comparison as Sunshine By My Side and Nothing But You were way better than Only For Love.
She's pretty wrong about Sunshine By My Side. Idk how she got this idea Xiao Zhan's last drama is a failure as her wording implies that. But IT'S Nahhh! To the opposite, all the data has proven SBMS was the hottest drama with the highest viewership (online streaming & TV ratings combined) among all during its 1st round of airing. This is validated by announcement from several data measures including Weibo popularity, Mouyan rating, Ky.live (the only rating measure for web streaming & TV rating combined), and VLinkage.
On what basis other than Koloa's personal unfavorable opinion of Xiao Zhan did she choose to use the wording "couldn't save?" She had to validate her negative wording by hard data support, not her emo. LOL
Like it or not, SBMS has been commercially successful. Otherwise, the drama wouldn't have been purchased by many TV channels to be broadcast until now. Until last week, SBMS was still on the top 10 most watched TV dramas per VLinkage. Just think about how many new dramas have been premiered since SBMS officially wrapped up its first run and SMBS is still on the top 10 most watched currently? That's an incredible success. Koala is ignorant to say "couldn't save" SBMS cos the drama doesn't need to be rescued in any way. LOL
@Somebody...but OFL is ALSO charting as #1 on iqiyi so hit ratings also don't mean that much
Are you talking about Oath of Love? What is OFL? How is that to do with my opinion about SBMS? Data show that both dramas of XZ were commercially successful. OoL was perhaps more popular. But SBMS is a better drama than OoL. Any problem with my statement?
Well, ppl can dismiss popularity when they dislike those actors. But data present hard facts of trends that nobody an ignorantly deny. It's important for actors' career in terms of both future projects and endorsements. Money matters! Don't you agree? Don't tell me you only appreciate starving artists. LMAO
only for love - forget which channel it was trending from, but it's #1 hit on that channel. I'm saying that people might like something which drives ratings, but it doesn't necessarily mean the ratings equals actual good storyline or good whatever. For example I still can't finish Untamed and I've tried watching it 5x over, and its ratings are unmatched across the world for an Asian drama. But I still don't find the storyline engaging enough or even all that wonderful. Some of the directing, storyline and color balancing in that drama was really weird IMO. A lot of dramas can get high ratings and are skewed due to popularity of the stars, eg Immortal Samsara. Ratings mean popular, doesn't equate to greatness
Since you referred to The Untamed, then I'm by far pretty sure you're only talking about your personal preference, just as Koala did in the blog. LOL. I found it amusing that ppl oftentimes mix personal preference with statistics or critiques from pro critics. Not only is The Untamed a huge commercial success domestically and outside China, the drama also received critical acclaims from many pro critics and people working in the filming industry both in and outside China. Therefore, your personal preference has no bearing to deny The Untamed is a great drama even there are flaws that no dramas can be perfect without any flaws. Sorry for getting straight with plain truth. I like to be honest regardless of the possibility that it may not please people.
I don't know if you're into anime or novels, but I suggest reading the novel/ watching the anime The Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation. The anime is free on YouTube. They did a far better job in my opinion with fleshing out and building up the story, and The Untamed is based on them with extra censorship from C-Ent. It is truly an epic, and the eloquence of the original novel and its translation is what got me into studying Mandarin Chinese in 2018.
I remember I was one of the rabid fans that signed petitions etc. for the author and whatnot when it came to getting the drama off the ground and even spreading info for more viewership of the audio novel.
The Untamed was cringeworthy and strange from the onset, ironically I skipped to episode 30 or 32 and from there finished the story, to better reception. Don't feel bad if you couldn't get into the beginning. I'll say if you stick with it, it all makes sense, and the characters are fleshed out as well as the worldbuilding.
Ironically there are CERTAIN PEOPLE on this site that are pompous and announce everywhere how they drop a drama right away after the 2 - 3 episodes, but when it came to some *COUGH* BL or bromance dramas (The Untamed, Word of Honor) who also had arguably average beginner episodes they were willing to stick through it. And I'm SURE we all know why LOL.
@omonaijaJ thank you! yes, i thought the drama was really awkward (I got up to episode 16, and still didn't see progress, so I didn't think it was for me), even if folks kept telling me it was the best thing since slice bread. I also heard the anime is MUCH better than the actual drama, but i haven't had the interest to watch, seeing as I wasn't into the actual live-adaptation. maybe i'll take a look now.
@Somebody Dude, folks were all over Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon back when it first came out. Like all over it. Me being a veteran of a ton of martial arts dramas, thought it was mediocre at best. But hollywood? They went nuts. You'd be hard pressed to find anyone that said anything negative about it. Nowadays, it barely holds any water when set next to the competition. Similarly, yea Untamed is trendy (exploration of a taboo theme due to censors), and it has fans and support rooted in the OG anime, but nothing about it (up to episode 16) felt anything new to me. You need to give it a rest and accept that folks have different opinions than yours. Even publicized folks writing a review could be biased or just don't know any better.
@omonaijaJ, FYI. I've never been a BL fan. I have no interest in reading the original novel of The Untamed or watching any anime. Youtube AI recommended The Untamed since 2019 perhaps bocs I watched Our Songs very often back then. LOL. But I did not click to watch TU until 2022 per recommendations from quite a few western youtubers' reactions to the drama. I checked it out of curiosity without knowing the plot was adapted from a BL novel. I dropped it twice after failing to follow spooky ep 1. LOL. It piqued my interest to pick up The Untamed again after watching some fan-made clips and many people raved about it with great reviews on IMDB for example. I usually have to check myself if a drama has really great reviews. That's how I picked up The Untamed again after failing to even get past ep1 twice. LOL.
The Untamed has a confusing start using retro narratives. It's not without flaws in production and acting. But overall, the script delivers a sound and fascinating plot that was smartly executed to keep viewers glued before screen and want more from the story. This one C drama did an outstanding job in storytelling that can rival Kdrama counterpart. Although there's a lot of rookie acting in The Untamed, but the right amounts of emotions are there for fans to grow empathized with the characters. The cast did their best and they were successful to convince audience. I don't have to elaborate how mesmerizing and charismatic Xiao Zhan was as Wei Wuxian. Actors don't have act like "old acting bones" to be convincing (and those "old acting bones" oftentimes are too boring to bring characters alive LOL). They need to have on screen charisma to let their characters stand out. That's what Xiao Zhan did in The Untamed. Like it or not, he's the only C actor that can rival K actors' popularity outside homeland, just bcos of this irreplaceable role of Wei Wuxian in The Untamed.
In all aspects, this drama of BL and Dylan is not on par with The Untamed, let alone they are in different genres to compare with. The Untamed has been popular outside China for years for reasons. Only for Love, however, will cater to a limited group of viewers at best.
@Coralie…as someone who doesn’t give much credence to film critics’ opinions because not only can critics be bought (cause capitalism, it be everywhere!) but also critics can be so deeply biased and oftentimes can only bring their own experience to judge a piece of media, I’m delighted that you brought up “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” because that’s such a good example to what am talking re: critics and their inherent biases. I remember when this film came out and how perplexed I was by all the praises because as someone who have grown up watching wuxia, everything about it was something I’ve seen before and with others being done better (the cinematography was gorgeous tho!) So my opinion was basically , “these white ppl have never watched other non Western media before so they don’t know better.” Haha
@R thank you! i was super baffled when it became the biggest rage that came out of China. artsy-fartsy pretentious productions that spawned the likes of House of Flying Daggers and Curse of the Golden Flower. *shudder* those were the dark days of C-ent for me. but, beautiful cinematography, agreed, gotta hand them that much.
critics mean nothing to me, especially as you mentioned, they can be bought, or simply afraid of stating their real thoughts (esp when they see the mountain of criticism they'll endure from the drama's fandom.) or they really don't know any better. these folks are the ones who probably worked backstage or did some production work, akin to the likes of avenueX, but have barely, just BARELY touched the surface of what good drama is.
@Coralie…I actually like Curse of Golden Flowers tho 😬 . In general, I find debates about the merit of movies and dramas mostly pointless and usually borderline on the obnoxious. Ppl will like what they like. One man’s trash will be another man’s treasure. And sometimes, you will just love something despite its trash quality cause it came at a right time in your life. Someone will find a show to be the most boring thing while another will find emotional resonance with it. And sometimes like Koala here, you just want to watch an actor being pretty on screen cause your brain needs that kind of shallowness. It’s all good and fine and doesn’t need to be defended against imo.
@Coralie, you'd better give me some examples of your personal preference so that I'll get where you came from. Sorry to say I totally disagree with you about Ang Lee's martial art movie. Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon was the one film drawing me to martial art genre. Before watching that movie, I did not give a shit to a bunch of HK MA that were just dazzling audience with kong fu gimmick without any artistry in the presentation. LOL.
You'd better not get butthurt cos your own faves can't deliver popular and critically acclaimed works.
@Somebody, if you liked CTHD, then you must be young. Either young or really inexperienced with c-dramas in general. Or you have some background in theatre.
My favorites include Joy Of life, Journey to the West ('96 HK version), LBFAD, Love Like the Galaxy, The Empresses in the Palace, Oh No Here Comes Trouble, Story of Yanxi Palace, My Girlfriend Is An Alien, New Life Begins, OG Meteor Garden and so many more OG HK dramas, example: A Step Into the Past.
Respect and like, not love (simply not interested in the genre): Nirvana in Fire, Mysterious Lotus Casebook
Like but low budget: Go Princess Go, Oh My Emperor, Please Don't Spoil Me, Reset. An Ancient Love Song
Now your turn. All I hear you say is The Untamed or anything with Xiao Zhan in it. What are your tastes?
@Coralie, I greatly appreciate how fans like you can rationally discuss dramas with sanity even we don't totally agree with each other. Respect! Thanks! Also my apologies for being bluntly sharp that may sound offensive sometimes.
I have to confess I'm more a fan of Xiao Zhan than a Cdrama fan in general. I couldn't finish most of the Cdramas you like without skipping or fast forwarding here and there. Yeah here's my turn LOL:
Best: Nirvana in Fire, The Untamed (This is the only tier that I did not skip one scene till the end.)
Better than average: Love Like the Galaxy, Ashes of love, Story of Yanxi Palace. (I enjoyed the dramas in this tier although not paying attention to some scenes.)
Good: Joy of Life, Lighter & Princess (I think the drama is better than average but I hate some tropes in the plots.)
That's all I can come up with so far. I'm a staunch fan of Xiao Zhan and that means I'm biased regarding him. LOL. I'll always watch his dramas regardless of quality. I just want to see his progress as an actor. Nonetheless, I think only The Untamed and The Youth Memory were well delivered without big flaws. All his other dramas have something to be critical of. I'm actually watching Xu Kai and Jing Tian's new drama now that I found entertaining. Not sure how long I can stick with it though cos I do think C dramas is a bit lackluster compared with K dramas in general. Therefore, I dropped C drama a lot even the beginning looked interesting. I've been watching Kdramas most of the time recently.
Thanks Koala…. I will skip the modern dramas for now although I like all the actors.
Modern dramas is not c ent Fort, their Fort is the historical dramas. They do excellent in that.
The problem is your laziness and lack of will to find good dramas
Go search on Douban using machine translator for the most well scored and well commented dramas without popular idols
Find actors who are known for good acting along years of work instead of actors who have fandoms
Fandoms are made by mentally ill people
His voice comes across as dragging/lazy to me. Like he didn’t want to put any effort in his own voice.
If he voiced himself in dramas I’ve seen with him, then he must be doing it on purpose in this drama but it’s a little off putting. His character is already not showing any sort of emotion or movement, and not the stoic trope of CEO’s but like he was just put on set, and the voice makes it harder to watch him. The other male characters are much better in expressions that I wonder why he is the male lead cuz him and/or his character is just there picking up the check, IMO.
I can't agree more. I always find the C-drama voice dub trend strange, like why are they called actors if they can't voice themselves? I don't mind if newbies or the minor supporting cast dub, but bigger names headlining dramas should be embarrassed at not using their own voice. Thank goodness I already see improvements with recent dramas having the more established leads using own voices.
Yeah, it's very wierd and inauthentic. How is one considered an actor when acting includes not just expressions but vocal delivery/diction/pronunciation? Many actors in other countries have gotten dragged for poor vocalisation, but I guess you can bypass that in China. Fortunately, more and more actors are using their own voices.
Right? Fully half of acting is in the voice. I don't really care for modern office dramas, but I did watch the beginning of this one (may go back later), and definitely enjoyed the more natural sounding voice of the actual actor. I'm 100% for all real voices, all the time. I think the dubbing in Cdramas sounds flat and unrealistic, and have a really hard time listening to it. Bring on the real voices!
He really should be dubbed. His voice does not suit the character at all and neither does his acting. The comparison with Wu Lei makes no sense because he's a brilliant young actor. Xiao Zhan also delivered his role well, but neither of these two can save a bad script. Agree that maajority of modern romance C-dramas are trash, but their period pieces are great.
How do these actors graduate without being able to deliver lines. Did they graduate from a silent film academy or a school that teaches mime.
And who are these voice actors, are they relegated to voice acting because they don't fit the aesthetics.
There's plenty of voice actors out there, you see them dubbing animes, audiobooks and game characters. It's wrong to simply assume that they became voice actors because they don't fit the aesthetics, you can be good at voice acting but bad at facial expressions. In fact, voice actors in China get more jobs due to dramas requiring dubbing.
Lol. There are plenty of actors in Chinese entertainment who can't make facial expressions or deliver lines and coast on their looks. It's not a stretch to think a voice actor (very likely also trained in acting) given the opportunity would rather be a on screen actor (likely alot better paid than voice acting) if given the opportunity.
On the contrary, most voice actors weren't trained in acting. Ji Guanlin, who is famous for dubbing Zhen Huan in Empresses in the Palace, wanted to become an radio dj, tv announcer or tv host but wasn't able to become one so she turned to becoming a voice actor. Bian Jiang, who has dubbed many male leads such as Ye Hua in Eternal Love and Yuwen Yue in Princess Agents, studied voice acting in school and became a voice actor.
I don't deny that many young Chinese actors nowadays are bad at acting, but it's wrong to assume that voice actors only became voice actors because of their looks. Many young actors and actresses also don't have the looks either but became drama leads due to connections.
Of course I am not talking about all voice actors. But I bet there are many actors who don't make it on screen become voice actors. It's all good bad actors create more jobs for people with actual talent.
This reminds me of the Chinese Olympics opening ceremony, where the little girl who could sing was rejected for her appearance and was replaced by a pretty little girl who couldn't sing and had to mime.
I'm not interested in Olympics so no idea about that, but I'm not surprised as plenty of celebrities also lip-synced on the New Year Countdowns and Spring Galas.
I appreciate his hard work nature and see that there are some improvement in his heavy Sichuan accent but he’s not suitable/believable in this role. Like, when he’s reprimanding his on screen niece like a supposedly more mature but young uncle, I can’t buy it.
With a different pairing with sizzling chemistry, this old school 霸道總裁 novel adaptation can work, but not here. Dylan and Bai Lu are straining trying to convince us they are falling hard.
I think using his own voice for boyish characters, like in Meteor Garden, is fine. When playing a mature CEO, it’s not working for me. LBFAD was smart enough to use a voice actor for him. I cannot imagine a formidable DFQC with Dylan’s own voice.
I don't know where this stereotype for how a CEO is supposed to sound comes from? I watched some videos of Zuckerberg and Elon Musk neither have deep voices both sound a bit dweeby.
That’s because Zach and Elon are in a field of tech guys and they typically NERDs who built their own company from the bottom up. They are not in filed of business/investment. If u work in big corporate before, the higher ups present themself mature/professional and great speaker & they hired people like that as well. You think u can get far?
I don't expect a deep rich voice or anything, but he sounds like a little kid pretending to be a CEO with his pronunciation and line delivery. He doesn't come off believable for the role. I watch Dylan in varieties and know what his natural voice sounds like. It's fine.
If there's an actor with a weird tone, I would say I needed time to get used to Chen Xingxu's real voice in The Starry Love. But he has a much stronger line delivery and acting. I eventually turned around and quite enjoyed the drama.
The complaint is that he sounds young. If CEO's from the finance industry work their way up and are on average a lot older than the actor, then they should have cast accordingly.