Aug 27, 2023
This is a brand new Chinese animation, also called Donghua, by Colored Pencil Animation who also did The King's Avatar. The show is based around 3rd-4th century China and adapts the manhua of the same title.
In terms of Chinese animation, this is a show that gets extremely overlooked, because there was barely any marketing surrounding Biao Ren, as far as I know, it could've also just been in China only. The only real marketing there was was a few posters and 3 trailers. This is a shame because of the impressive result of the show. It's been in production for a long time.
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Ever since the first trailer came out, I was hyped for it. It looked amazing visually and had a cunning art style and didn't spoil that much, only a single fight that maybe lasted 1-2 minutes.
Immediately off the bat, I'm going to name a few critiques I have with this show.
For one, the show has quite a few emotional moments, especially at the back end of the season, however the voice actors try their best at sounding emotional but fail massively. The voice acting for most part is bareable. However, and this is a critique I have with most Chinese voice acting, its really one dimensional and doesn't add much personality to the characters, except maybe Diao Ma and Xiao Qi.
While the animation is great, some of the character animations, for example when they are monologuing, is a little rough around the edges and a little one dimensional, especially in episode 2, where they have this really weird camera shots going around a little kid and the hand drawn animation is trying to follow the CGI camera and it just looks terrible.
For a show thats mostly hand drawn animation eye candy, the CGI is dreadful. Since its based around 3rd-4th century China, they use horses. However, horses are extremely hard to animate with hand. so I don't fault them for it. However, we also have a lot of crowd shots and people walking in the background with CGI and they just look like the black silhouette meme.
Now, let's get to the good points of the show.
The story is very, very well written. There's a clearly been a lot of thought going into every character and making sure they are the most fleshed out character ever. A lot of the show is mostly monologuing with dope fight sequences all over the place. The characters actually feel a part of this world, and thats what makes it really intriguing to watch.
There's a lot of thought in how the character move around with their sword and their fighting styles feel extremely refreshing to watch and don't just feel like the main character just swings a stick around like a child and somehow kills the enemy or villain.
Music is great, not generic whatsoever. The music actually is one of my favourite parts about this. It doesn't feel one dimensional or sounds like its been reused from different shows whatsoever.
I have a lot more positive things to say about the show, but I didn't want to make this too long. The show overall is a great watch to binge. However keep in mind that every episode has a different length but the pacing is still really good and keeps you more engaged than ever. Not to mention the opening looks absolutely amazing.
Yeah I guess my critique and love for the show start and end there, without going into spoiler territory. I wish it was longer, and I need more!
I'm feeling a strong 7 to a light 8.
Reviewer’s Rating: 8
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