It’s rare to see an actor or actress have three lead role dramas airing in such short proximity and it’s happening for Zhang Wan Yi. He was male lead in Lost You Forever Part 2 which actually should have really accentuated his character based on the story line in the second half of the LYF novel but the drama editing hack job hurt him immensely. Then a month later in August came Are You the One which I really enjoyed (like but not total love) but despite him being top billed his female lead Wang Chu Ran got more boost from it. And now next week on October 10th his drama The Rise of Ning with Ren Min arrives and all eyes will be on how this fares. I have been liking the posters and trailer so far and despite his styling looking so similar to his look in Are You the One the two dramas based on the trailer feel very different in a good way.
Trailer for The Rise of Ning:
He is a very measured actor, but not in a natural way. I feel like he smiles, cries, gets angry, and looks at someone intensely because that’s what the director told him, not because he felt the character. It’s like those kids’ drawing books, where we connect the dots based on numbers to form an animal but without any soft edges or curves. I can’t say much about Ren Min, as I only saw her in white cat’s Legend and found her acting to be weak there.