The casting has been completed for The City of Devastating Love, the drama adaptation of Tang Qi Gong Zi‘s period fantasy romance novel Hua Xu Yin (The Lure of the Hua Xu Tune), and I’ll use this as another reminder not to believe in early reports. Initially the word was Kevin Cheng, Jiang Xin, and Yuan Hong were the three leads and I was immensely pleased with that. But the final casting is all been jumbled up and I don’t even know where to begin. I’ve been preparing my write up on the novel, which I loved to pieces, but I’m going to have to discuss the drama and its casting first. I’ve read the leaked 30-episode synopsis for the drama and can confirm that its very VERY different than the novel. Set up, ages, relationships, so much has been changed it really should be called “loosely based on” or “inspired by” rather than an adaptation. And since the drama title is different than the novel, I think the producers knew what they were doing from the get go. The novel is lovely, so light and humorous, yet filled with epic romance galore. The drama as based on the synopsis actually is very compelling as well and could stand on its own. Hua Xu Yin is a novel where the main OTP of Mu Yen and Jun Fu traverse through the epic love stories of 4 other couples, and within those stories their love will develop into its own epic arc. The other four couples are Song Ning/Shen An, Rong Yuan/Ying Ge, Gongyi Fei/Qing Jiu Jiu, and finally Mu Yen’s parents Su Heng/ Murong An. The final casting indeed has Kevin playing male lead Mu Yen (Su Yu), but Jiang Xin and Yuan Hong are not playing who I thought they would be. They are playing Song Ning and Shen An! No, I am not kidding! OMFG whut is this?!? Playing the female lead Ye Zhen/Jun Fu is C-actress Lin Yuan, while Jun Wei is Luo Jin. Rounding out the main cast is Cui Po as Liu Qi Qi, Bao Jian Feng as Rong Heng, and Guo Zhen Ni (who acted with Yuan Hong in Bu Bu Jing Xin playing Lu Wu) as Ying Ge/13th Moon. My mind is spinning about this casting, I need to vent a little below. If you’ve read the novel, what do you think about this entire cast? Continue reading