Zhou Zishu (Zhang Zhehan) has decided he wants to leave the Window of Heaven, but to do this, he has to go through pain to keep all the secrets quiet until he eventually dies. But Zhou Zishu uses a second method to not lose his senses and martial art right away, and he disappears into the martial art world.
Wen Kexing (Simon Gong) and his maidservant Gu Xiang (Zhou Ye) sees a man and Gu Xiang is certain he’s a beggar, but he doesn’t even have a bowl. Wen Kexing says he’s only sunbathing. Xiang doesn’t believe this and goes to make sure. The man says he’s only sunbathing.
I got this recommended by Netflix and I had read the novel, and then saw someone liked it, so I decided to give it a go. It took a while, but I got to it when I got injured earlier this week. I was told to prepare to cry, but…
WHAT ON EARTH DID I WATCH?!
Adaptation? More like fan fiction. It started alright following the original work to a decent degree. You know, at least the storyline was similar. They it spiraled, and then it went out of control and then… the screenwriter “fixed” the ending, I guess?
And it spoiled stuff from later in the book really early on and honestly made no sense to have there???
I’m both incredibly amused because I sat through 36 episodes out of like 30 was a completely different story to Tian Ya Ke (ie faraway Wanderers), with small nods here and there just to remind you that, yeah, this is supposed to be based on priest’s novel.
The story had so much going on, it was just. No. It’s Dokidoki! Precure all over again. Trying too hard and making a mess out of it.
I just kinda sat through it first because it was pretty good, then because of the gay, and then I just pushed through to see Beiyuan, because I loved his character both in Qi Ye (Lord Seventh) and Tian Ya Ke.
Basically, it was like seeing fan fiction come to life and the fan decided to fix all the issues where there was none.
Not to mention the pacing was pretty horrible. They dragged what didn’t need to be dragged out and crammed everything complex into a too-small section. Yeah, it’s just Dokidoki! Precure all over again, just the fanfic version.
And the eff was up with that ending? It was horrible. I’m so unsatisfied with it. I could have quit early and got more satisfaction from whatever ending I got then, even if there were no resolutions to anything.
Speaking of resolutions… Did this even resolve all the plots stuff or did it leave loose threads? I don’t know because so much was going on! I genuinely regretted I didn’t have a notebook and write what heck was happening, to see if all ends got tied together.
Side note before my final thoughts: Wow, they gave Wen Kexing quite a wardrobe. I love the pink one with red accents. That one was gorgeous. The purple was also pretty.
FINAL THOUGHTS
The story tries too much and is too complex for its own good. The characters become more OOC the more the story strays from the original work, and even very inconsistent and difficult to understand why they do something.
If you read the novel, you should treat this as fan fiction, and not an adaptation. An adaptation is supposed to adapt a story from one medium to another, not rewrite the entire thing. Like wtf?
It might be enjoyable for those who haven’t read the novel. I know there are people who do like it. And the relationship between Wen Kexing and Zhou Zishu remains a romance without a doubt.
But me? I regret I spent 24 hours to watch that and with that ending! Thumbs down, thumbs down. I’ll have to re-read Qi Ye and Tian Ya Ke to wipe this show out of my mind. Not my thing. No, no. This one I’m yeeting outta my life.
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