Betrayal and Romance Period C-drama Fated Hearts with Chen Zhe Yuan and Li Qin Off to Solid Start in Both Viewership and Audience Reception
It’s check in time now that period C-drama Fated Hearts has aired for nearly a week. The iQiyi politics, betrayal, romance, and action drama came in with lower than usual buzz and expectations as neither lead Li Qin or Chen Zhe Yuan commands strong and expansive fandoms to hype things up, both are more serviceable leading stars that go from drama to drama hoping for a strong drama to keep them at their level. Fated Hearts is getting good feedback and decent viewership, it hit 8000 heat index on iQiyi and the audience reviews are mostly positive. The leads have good chemistry, each play interesting characters, and the conflict and conspiracy between the two kingdoms is well plotted to date. The drama also manages to make second male lead Chen He Yi look bad boy hot lol, he normally looks like a wet towel even playing antagonists. We’re on a good streak with C-dramas in recent weeks let’s hope it stays that way as more on deck ones are released in the coming days.
Glad koala giving a review on Fated Hearts. I think all are perfectly cast, based on the book. Li Qin as the female archer Fu Yixiao, powerful, credible, and “badass”. Her fight scenes strong and believable. And contrary to my fears, she didn’t fall into hysterics or foolishness…
The dynamics between the main leads (Li Qin and Chen Zhe Yuan) is a highlight. True enemies, they were pretty brutal……which makes their eventual, slow-burning alliance and romance feel more earned and satisfying
High Production Value. Opulent interiors, gorgeous costumes, detailed hairstyles (I usually dislike long elaborate on males)….well-filmed battle sequences, strong tone for the story
….second male lead (Chen He Yi) is serviceable here…second female lead, naive Princess Xi Yang, comes across frustrating, though true to the original plot.
Interestingly, the drama aired with little fanfare and has been described as a “dark horse.” Initially, middling popularity, relying largely on word-of-mouth praise .
A major point of appeal for me is that the plot prioritizes the mystery and the characters’ survival over rushing the romance. The adapted storyline does differ from the book, much better in my opinion. More restraint, slower burn and more logical flow of storyline.
Agree with everything, pretty much, except for the book comments as haven’t read it.
The Leads are excellent,individually and, especially, together. My ONLY little nitpick is that he seems to have more makeup/lipstick than she does but that’s probably just my personal male/female makeup aesthetics, he still looks great.
Love the show…lots of good looking people.
It’s better than i expected. Like it too.
Agree, lots of good looking people. And they can act.
Lol yeah, another begging drama, asking to be promoted by other actors. Hard pass.
The action scenes are seriously so good! I just found out the director is the same one who did Blossoms in Adversity. No wonder the fights look that amazing. The male lead in BIA, honestly, can’t act to save his life, but every time there’s a fight scene, it suddenly turns so good.
Back to this drama, Li Qin, she looks totally natural when she’s fighting. Not awkward at all. I think it’s because she majored in Chinese traditional opera. her expressions, posture, and overall presence just hit perfectly.
And as for Chen Zhe Yuan, he actually did quite well. I just wish he’d build a bit more muscle and fix his posture to look a little firmer. Or maybe I really need to hold off on watching any C-dramas right now. I’ve been binge watching LOFG and Ambition Love, and both male leads have such solid physiques and don’t look too thin. So maybe it’s my fault for watching this right after those two dramas. 😅
The scriptwriter so far is pretty solid too. The pacing feels good. So far, it’s been surprisingly enjoyable to watch!
I don’t care about Fandoms or whatnot, I am interested in a show, i check it out and if it’s good then gr8 which this one definitely is. Li Qin and Zhe Yuan are doing a great job here, He Yi too and the action scenes are a pleasant surprise.
So much better than I expected. I’ve liked the lead actors before, but they really impressed me here. I find CZY expressions a little awkward here sometimes, but his line delivery and vocalization feel spot-on to me and it’s his own voice.
Li Qin wears her character like a second skin. She is delivering on the personality, the emotions, and the action scenes. Her acting matches the character’s background. The writing for the supporting characters, the distribution of screentime, and the pacing are also well done.
The drama doesn’t try to force the romance too hard. It’s not a sweet romance or a burning one, but one built on getting to know and trust each other.
I really hope this drama doesn’t crash and burn.
Whew! This one is good. I’m hooked to CZY’s character; he does not fear anybody. Li Qin’s character is also strong too.
CZY is visually and from his mannerisms on my unwatchable list. I tried to watch two of his dramas and dropped them in the first episodes. All the billing fights (rumors) don’t help either. He literally grosses me out.
That said I’m a sucker for enemies to lovers, revenge stories and strong female leads. I want to watch this … ottoke?
Give him a chance. The writer really did an excellent job crafting Prince Feng’s character. He’s written so well. There were moments when his acting felt exaggerated, but honestly, I still liked the character a lot. So, those little things don’t bother me at all.
Yes, give him a third chance. Wang Xingyue cast the same boring spell on me until the Double where I found him so hot. LOL.
This drama started interesting. Both leads did well to pique my interest in their characters and stories. It looks like on the way to Blossom, maybe.
Wang Xing Yue and/or his team don’t fight anybody for first billing after one hit. I think what put people off is Chen Zhe Yuan’s team think of him as the biggest star in town after years of struggling and just one hit. Last time there was some arguments about who was gonna be the first billed actor between he and Wu Jin Yan. Things were going out of proportion (bet you his side was annoying everyone) they decided to have no 1st billed actor
I honestly don’t care that much about anything off screen, be it who is billed first or who slept and then douched by whom. LOL. The only celeb whose private life has caught my attention so far is Yu Menglong who most likely were murdered by ppl with connection with Xi and his stooges.
I watched a few eps and it is going well so far. At least the production doesn’t look like crap used for money laundering. LOL
It worthy to give a try.I hooked after the first 4 episode. Nice storyline, fast and the action scene is excellent.
Wow
This is the kind of drama that I would rather wait and see if it gets a proper ending before engaging in it. Life’s too short to watch 40 episodes of a show only for it to crash and burn in the end!
hahahaha ur take on Heyi XDDD wet towel to hot bad boy! I agree %100. He is one of the best secondary casting actor! I hope he can get leads in smaller productions at least…
My interest in the plot is still high after watching 8 eps.
Chen Zhe Yuan did a great job portraying a calculated prince + general. His acting was nuanced and emotions transitioned smoothly like water. His lines were very good, and this is coming from a native Mandarin speaker like me. The character he portrayed was fascinating. IMO, this is his best performance by far, better than Hidden Love that was also the only drama of his I was able to finish. He also visually looked beautiful meeting the general expectation for a ML in a costume idol drama that is particularly important (critical) to me LOL.
Li Qin has been known for being hard working. I’ve never been the one for her acting style or visuals although I do think she did a decent job in The Youth Memories where I liked her chemistry with Xiao Zhan. Fated Hearts is changing my perception about LQ. She exuded right amounts of expression as a formidable and determined warrior. Her acting is well controlled exhibiting her solid training as a mature and experienced veteran in the industry. Her character as a tough and top-notch female general dwarfed those similar roles in other dramas portraying female generals. LQ looked pretty convincing in all her movements and manners while others appeared anemic and feeble, borderline damsels in distress LOL.
Fated Hearts is one unique drama that I watch for the OTP’s intriguing characters and leading actors’ impressive performances. Everything else is solid so far but the story is not that engaging as the Double, which was still the most fun drama among very few C dramas I’ve ever got to finish recently excluding my own fav’s works.
I read that Fated Hearts isn’t doing great commercially thanks to lack of proper promos. Nonetheless, the series got positive reviews by word of mouth. For fans still on the fence, I recommend checking it out, and you may like it by surprise.
Back to rave about Li Qin for her badass fighting scenes venting explosive emotions at the same time. She should be the actress of the year. LOL. LQ gave me a huge surprise. Salute!
I went in with low expectations because I haven’t enjoyed any Cdrama since Joy of life 2 but I was so pleasantly surprised! LQ brought her A game and I have never seen the ML before but I wasn’t sure if his baby face would be ruining the show for me but woah they surpassed my expectations with the acting, tight plot, solid pace, and noooo meaningless scenes, or insulting our intelligence. Refreshing to see a legit enemies to lovers troupe in a very mature slow burn way with this good chemistry too!