Hello, you're watching Avenue X and today let's talk about the drama feng Chui Ban Xia, Wild Bloom.
This is a 36 episode, 25 years ago, contemporary time setting drama that's being aired on the web platform iqiyi, also
on two different satellite televisions in China right now.
It is also produced by it, directed by Fu Dongyu, Mao Wei, written by Fu Dongyu, Zhang Ting , Zhang Ting, this name, yes, that's the same guy who
also wrote and directed Tian Xia Chang He, The Long River that has just finished airing on Mango television, and I have recently made a review about.
This drama is led by Zhao Liying, Ou Hao, Li Guangjie as the three most important roles of this drama, but it also includes
many other very essential roles played by very well known actors.
The story is based on a novel written by the very famous novelist A Nai, who has also written the original work of Dou
Ting Hao, All is Well, and Like A Flowing River, Da Jiang Da He.
She was one of those early adventurers back then to start a private business and had many years of experiences dealing with all types of things business related.
So many of her novels are based on her real experiences and they have this heavy grounded, practical realism in it, and based on the previous performances of her
work that's been adapted to dramas, which are all very successful, Wild Bloom as a new adaptation, has this really solid text based foundation to rely on.
If you've watched the drama Like A Flowing River, Da Jiang Da He, you'll know the male lead, the most important role, Wang Kai plays is somebody
who goes down the route of going into a state-owned big factory, chemical factory and then becoming one of the instrumental person at the turning
point of many state owned business turning into private sector stuff.
And this drama comes from a different angle.
It actually starts with somebody who never was a part of the state owned business.
They're always individual fighters in this world.
They're always small business owners and all the difficulties they have to go through, starting their business from scratch.
As I'm making this video, I've watched 16 episodes and because this is a daily updating two episode drama, by the time this video goes
out, It should have just gone into the twenties numbers of episodes.
I will give this drama right now a two goldmine rating, and overall, I'm very pleased by it.
It is a little bit different than what I expected it to be, and mostly that happens on the positive end of things.
So as usual, let me first tell you what the story roughly is about and then let's go into the usual part.
The story starts in the mid 1990s and it features our main female lead role Xu Banxia, played by Zhao Liying, and she's one of
those super adventurous and ambitious young people back then.
So we're basically seeing a female entrepreneur starting from scratch without knowing much.
Ended up in the recycling of steel business over the decades to come, will become one of the major players in this industry in China.
Along the way, she'll come across many, many men in all kinds of capacities and from all walks of life who would become her friend,enemy
frienemy, business partners, challengers, trouble makers, you name it.
This is a grounded in Chinese recent history.
Very realistic depiction drama of a female person's journey.
The real big female lead role drama.
Now let's get into the divide and conquer part of what is good and not so good about the drama.
On positive end Number one, this is overall a very solid production quality, contemporary, or let's say slightly earlier setting time,
within three decades of time setting to now contemporary drama.
It has very little that you can pick at on the basic requirement of being a 2022 drama production.
Camera work, editing, prop, costume, the right amount of contrast and color, and thankfully no skin smoothing at all.
With realistic lighting, it's very easy to see all the flaws on all the actors, and I'm just so thankful for that.
Number two, adding onto that, not only is the basic things of production quality of drama are done pretty well.
I also really appreciate a couple of things they've added into this drama.
For example, reusing a lot of the songs that were super popular back in 1990s in China, the pop songs, every time those songs show up, I'm like, ah.
They picked it for that reason, for that time.
Perfect choice.
They did invite new singers who are working today and well known today to kind of redo the version, and it definitely costs money, right?
To do all the copyrights and stuff, but it adds so much immediately takes you back into the mental space, into your memory of that era.
If you were alive then and in China you'll know all those music.
Apart from the music choices, there's another thing this production has done that I highly appreciate is it really takes full advantage of the fact that it
is a visual media, they really did think through what they're gonna put into every frame and how they can add more layers of meanings, as if they are hiding
all kinds of easter eggs for audiences to discover, and admittedly, it would be harder for international audiences to spot all those things, but already
on internet, people have started to look at it with magnifying glasses and seeing how the drama, in a way, spoil itself with what is within the frame.
For example, early in this drama, when Xu banxia goes to Russia for that promised steel that she can get, she was actually
lied to and cheated and there's a whole fraud situation.
There's this shot of the Russian doll and five of them representing the five people who got cheated and went to Russia, and she is the tiny one.
She has a different direction facing than the other ones.
She's the smallest, weakest, and deepest in trouble, but then she becomes a person eventually, uh, come out of that situation winning.
When she got the steel back to China and then suddenly steel prices dropped heavily in China, when she saw that report, in the foreground there's
this clump of steel that just falls down at her stockyard of the steel.
That's such an intentionally designed shot or when she's talking to her father at this restaurant, she's broke and
she's like, you can kill me, but I don't have money to pay you.
So, you know, deal with it.
When she's doing that on a glass of the restaurant, it actually says 涨 which means the price is gonna go up.
There's no way that it happened coincidentally, it's all intentionally put in there.
And now audiences are also having fun.
trying to find out what this crew has done for their drama.
That means people who did this drama really wanna make something out of it instead of just like get in, shoot it, make money and get out.
Attitude is everything and I highly appreciate that.
Number three, I think the greatest thing about this drama is it is a Shi Dai Ju 时代剧, the drama that depicts an entire era.
I thought it's more really famous actors and actoress oriented drama because it's Zhao Liying, Ou hao, it definitely is
gonna sell it on the fandoms of the leading, uh, people.
So I was worried that it's gonna be a very floating, ungrounded, unrealistic, serving the famous people in the drama more than the story itself drama.
And it turned out to be completely not that.
The time, the era, the things that were going on.
The wild west of Chinese business world in 1990s is the main character.
Each individual person, whether it's Zhao Liying's role, Ou Hao's role, Li Guangjie, anybody, they are all just chess pieces on this big chess board and
the board and the time, the roaring nineties of China is the main character.
The drama actually did a lot of research and timed all the events with our individual character's fate to the actual policy changes,
specific things happening in steel industry from nineties to now.
And I really also highly appreciate that.
Personally, my graduation practicum of landscape architecture is actually the repurpose of a postindustrial
park that's previously a my hometown steel mill site.
So I actually had a lot of experience of going into those archaic, broken down and already being repurposed huge
sites on the river of a previous gianormous steel mill.
So some things show up in this drama and I'm like, oh, that's so familiar.
. Like, I, I have seen similar things like that.
So there's a weird kind of affinity I feel with the story and the characters and what's depicted in this drama.
So these I think are enough reasons for you to at least go in and try and see if this is your cup of tea.
And not to mention, because female lead is such a sassy and powerful woman, and she not only is very ambitious at
business, but she's also very highflying in her style.
So you're gonna see so many starting from nineties outfit of Zhao Liying's, runs along the time development to whatever year the drama is gonna end.
She's got like over 300 outfits, I think picked in this drama, and then they ended up with slightly short than 200 that you're gonna see on camera.
Also, she has limitless supply of earrings.
She pretty much changes it every scene.
And , it's her fashion show.
Okay.
So if you like looking at her and her hair and crazy amount of costumes, visual pleasure.
This drama is gonna, give you all that.
So what is not so good about this drama?
Okay, well I was watching this drama.
I have a split brain.
This is my situation.
One is personally I am not super interested, let's say in the whole angle and what this drama is about, that whole industry thing,
although I said I did my practicum in that, but not like I like it.
So personally, I'm not super hyped up about the story itself.
It is not the.
Entertainment as the ultimate goal drama, making you feel better at the end of the day, having a good laugh type of drama.
Such as the new life begins.
You know, that's also an iqiyi drama, that's totally just to make you happy and have a laugh and forget about it.
This is not that type of drama.
So if you don't, you know, like this type of story, or you're not interested in that period of history in China or the steel
recycling, then this drama kind of is like you don't have to watch it.
Also, this is not a fan service drama.
So if you really like Zhao Likying, I guess she would be the biggest star in the whole thing.
Or other actors, and you're ahuge fan, come in from the angle of being a fan and hoping that your idol just look really good in the drama.
And this is really not that type of drama, because I would say, as I've said in the positive point, it is the bigger
things that are important in this drama than individual than the actual actors, so specific actors become very invisible.
Their characters are more important, and then their characters come together and make up this big picture.
They're puzzle pieces that make up this huge 1990s to now one industry and every drama that can happen when you do this industry.
That's the main goal of this drama, and that's the boss of this drama.
It's not a fan service stuff.
If you are looking for fan service stuff, it may actually not completely fit your expectation and make you very happy because it's definitely
not gonna add the rosy lens on any of the specific actors and actresses, although it does tame down some of the more questionable deeds that
those characters did in the novel version, but I don't think it's done for the purpose of making the leading actors, themselves to look better.
It probably is just because if we actually shoot the original novel, it's not gonna go through censorship.
So the negative things are not really negative.
It just may need a little bit expectation adjustment.
Uh, , if you thought this drama would be this type of drama, well, It's not.
It's that type of drama.
So that would be my first impression on the drama.
Wild Bloom, Feng Chui Ban Xia, it is a drama you go into to look at the 1990s China one industry's growth development.
It is also a woman's journey fighting her way to the top of her business.
It is also a very classic business drama where you have so many clever people, the game theory of who can get what out
of it and who can best benefit themselves and all the on surface and below surface fight clever business people have.
And if that's your thing, you're gonna be very happy and that should be the end of this video.
Thank you for watching AvenueX.
Please take care.
I'll see you in my next video.
Meanwhile, live long and happy drama watching.