The spring C-drama drought is over and of course its now the extreme with a full on flood. Today on July 2nd iQIYI released xianxia C-drama Divine Destiny with zero announcement and promotion. Starring Angelababy and Ma Tian Yu, the drama was filming in late 2020 so its another one of those long shelved likely meh efforts that seems to … Continue reading →
Consider me pleasantly surprised and not at all unhappy that the initial gloom and doom prognostications for upcoming otherwordly C-drama Ice Fantasy may not have been warranted. The first teaser trailer is out and does not look bad at all, and in fact look much better than I could have imagined possible. Still iffy on the story and acting but … Continue reading →
Despite looking like a hot mess in the making, upcoming C-drama Ice Fantasy got the first decent looking aspect of the visuals in the guest staring presence of K-actress Kim Hee Sun. She’s done a C-movie before way back when in her early career days, and doesn’t seem to be jumping fully on the bandwagon train of Korean acting talent … Continue reading →
China may be mostly miss when it comes to producing quality C-dramas, but it has the budget and scope to tackle a wider range of projects, especially when it comes to fantasy stories that require a lot of post-production. Case in point the upcoming special effects laden C-drama Ice Fantasy (Chinese title translates as Fantasy Kingdom), with a big name … Continue reading →
Sometimes I wonder if SARFT releases decrees and suggestions and the Chinese networks give a collective shrug and go back to their regularly scheduled programming. A little over a month ago SARFT issued a suggestive letter that it wished all networks aired dramas during the Summer months of July through October that promoted “the Chinese dream” (whatever that means), leading … Continue reading →
I’ve been trying to retrain my brain to tolerate fantasy wuxia dramas, which to me is like the untalented sibling of the overachieving star of the family. It substitutes special effects for story, dumbing down characters because magic and make believe elements can be thrown in to solve any problem. But once my darling rising young C-actor Li Yi Feng … Continue reading →
I usually embrace change readily but one thing I remain adamantly old school about are wuxia dramas. I don’t do fantasy wuxia or RPG wuxia because it’s like some weird hybrid of silliness without the epic depth. I’ve watched a few of Tangren’s takes such as Chinese Paladin, Chinese Paladin 3, and Xuan Yuan Sword and none of them were … Continue reading →
