Originally Posted by
PrinceKrillo
I agree with the people that hate The Return of the Condor Heroes. I can only base my judgment on Zhang Ji Zhong's TV productions, but wow ... not even the beautiful Jessey Meng Guang Mei was enough to keep me awake during that trainwreck of a series. Although I have a feeling it had everything to do with the novel being a cheap, pointless sequel (unlike its predecessor, which had an ACTUAL epic story and therefore, a POINT) and nothing to do with the production values of the series itself.
Although I did feel like bashing in Huang Xiao Ming's face with a baseball bat throughout the entire series.
Story-wise, I found The Legend of the Condor Heroes to be immediately engaging. Return, on the other hand, is a mistake of Zha Liang Yong's that he never should have written. The story goes from being non-existent, petty crap to being the same rehash and only a shadow of its predecessor's far superior narrative. Not to mention the pathetic cameos of LotCH characters.
The Return of the Condor Heroes (2006) is like some direct-to-DVD Disney movie sequel.
Which brings me to ZJZ's 2006 adaptation, in which pretty much EVERY new actor playing a returning character was INFERIOR to the cast of LotCH (2003). Hong Qi Gong and Ouyang Feng were particularly pathetic. I may hate Ouyang Feng, but You Yong was fantastic in the role, unlike the old fart from Return.
The old guy that plays Guo Jing is also NOTHING like the character ... nor Li Ya Peng ... an epic fail on the part of whoever was involved with the casting.
In addition, Liu Yi Fei is overrated at best, and Yang Guo is easily my most hated character of any wuxia series/novel to date. Huang Xiao Ming's horrible fake acting, fake laughing, annoying little dick personality, and jackass face made it 10x worse. Their little showmance bored me to tears ... when it wasn't causing me to vomit up food.
The only thing that kept me watching was Jessey Meng as Li Mo Chou. Beautiful, fantastic actress ... dark, twisted, entertaining character. And maybe also Yang Mi as Guo Xiang.
The few actors from LotCH (2003) that actually DID reprise their roles (like Wang Wei Guo), made far too few appearances. This series just mostly had me pining for Zhou Xun and Li Ya Peng, a far more believable and engaging wuxia pair than Liu Yi Fei and Huang Xiao Ming.
Not to mention a narrative (the fall of the Jin Empire and the rise of the Mongols) that didn't suck.