August is full of new drama releases! But which one(s) are you most looking forward to and why? Vote and let us know why you can’t wait for the drama(s) of your choice! 🙂
Here are my two cents: I’m a sucker for rom-coms, so I’m most interested in Blind Date out of all the upcoming dramas. I loved Jiang Xin’s performance in Ode to Joy as a modern woman who values appearances a lot and pretends to be strong on the outside, so I’m intrigued to see her in another modern role, but as a character who seems to be the complete opposite from her Fan Sheng Mei in Ode to Joy. As to Lu Yi, he’s a great actor in my opinion, however, I’ve only seen him playing earnest roles so far, which is why I’m really curious how he’ll turn out in a rom-com. Last but not least, Blind Date is produced by Croton and I can’t even remember if there was a drama from them that I disliked. So what could possibly go wrong?
Other dramas I’d like to check out: My Mr. Mermaid, Negotiator, The King’s Woman, Prince Coffee Lab, Nothing Gold Can Stay, Tribes and Empires: Storm of Prophecy and LET’s Shake It.
What about you?
I really want to watch My Mr. Mermaid, it looks so cute!
I look forward to watch Tribes and Empires: Storm of Prophecy. It looks stunning!
I’m also most interested in Blind Date. More for Lu Yi than JX. I liked JX best in Zhen Huan. Despite not being a fan of the genre. Didn’t like JX much in Hua Qian Gu. I’m ok with OTJ. Not fond of the plot. The acting is good.
LY is a pretty consistent actor. I rarely dread watching his dramas, except for the one with AngelaB. LY was not a protagonist in If You Were Deceived By Life . A lot of pretty good actors in that one. Qin Hai Lu (frustrating character to watch though), Wu Yue, Guo Jing Fei, Shen Jia Ni. Geng Le may have been in that drama too. It’s a drama for grown ups. Not a rom-com. No “idol” actors. Lu Yi had a rom-com with Zhang Li and Geng Le. I don’t like watching Zhang Li, so I didn’t watch it.
Storm of Prophecy’s trailers have been good. I was a bit wary of Janice Man’s acting. Not a fan of Xu Lu half the time. But I was hopeful. But now people are saying Hunan TV bought the rights to that drama. So I’m not sure how that will turn out.
Do you like Croton’s period dramas like Princess Wei Young, Eternal Love, Princess Agents? I didn’t like any of the 3. You like Rush to the End of the Summer?
I’m hoping Wuxin Season 2 and Hunting Game will be watchable. I like watching dramas that are well made. I avoid committing to a specific genres. Afraid that will lead to disappointments. I just generally avoid watching dramas with a lot of blood shed. Revolution, etc.
OTJ is among my favorites, but that might be a genre thing. I enjoy slice of life a lot. That’s why I’m also currently liking The First Half of My Life a lot.
I guess you’re not a fan of Angelababy either? I wished they would stop casting her in promising dramas next to amazing actors. I really can’t stand watching her.
I’m actually quite behind with Rush to the Dead Summer and Princess Agents, have only seen a couple of episodes of both. I unfortunately don’t have as much time to watch dramas at the moment as I wished I would. As for the other dramas, yes, I liked them. However, although I also watch and enjoy historical and xianxia, I still prefer modern dramas, so it will be hard for a drama of such genre to get into my favorites.
Looking forward to Huntig Game as well. It has an amazing cast! As to Wuxin, I still have to watch the first season.
Thank you for sharing your likes and dislikes!
I do like the slice of life aspect of OTJ. It’s just somehow those OTJ characters are too different from my friends, so it’s hard for me to relate to them. I do like the production quality of First Half of My Life. I just wish it’s not about infidelity. Female characters in such stories are usually a lot more like real life women than Croton female leads. Realistic characters make for a nicer watch.
There was a drama with Deng Chao, Zhang Jiayi, Dong Jie on the story of 4 brothers’ struggle with poverty stricken childhood in Beijing. “You Are My Brothers”. It has slice of life aspect to it, but no glossy houses as in OTJ. Not a rom-com.
Definitely not a fan of Angelababy. She must be a great business lady though. How many people with her level of acting can get into the top 10 wealthiest Forbes C celebrity list? But I never could watch her acting much.
tbh, I don’t love watching Zheng Shuang (or Guo Jingming or Zhang Han productions). I only finished 1 of her dramas. I got oversaturated with some overused actresses. The actresses from Chinese Paladin series, Ruby Lin, and now Zhao Liying and Dilraba. I used to like them, but many of them have appeared in 40+ dramas by now. Even if I like eating pizza, I don’t want to have it every day. lols. Every 1-2 months, often there are 2-3 dramas from one of these actresses. That reminds me of Hawick Lau. He is taking a rest now? I like it when they experiment with newer faces with decent acting chop in C dramas. Shawn Dou, Liu Haoran, Zhou Dongyu, Han Dongjun, Jin Chen.
Sometimes it seems unfair. Tang Yan, Zheng Shuang get so many chances to work with various directors and actors throughout the year while other actresses like Tong Liya, Dong Xuan, Zhou Fang… have very few roles to do. Hard to be a great actress if you’re not employed.
I only liked the first twenty something eps of The Interpreters. I hope you’ll enjoy the sequel.
That could very well be. Every EXO fan voted for the TI sequel. Hilarious!
There are too many dramas every month. It’s hard to pick and choose what to watch. Happy watching!
I dislike watching Zheng Shuang as well, her figure is way too distracting. I can’t help and stare at her super thin legs and feel irritated, so I’m losing focus on the drama itself. They should forbid her to act in dramas before she doesn’t gain some weight. That would also be for her best.
I started watching Rush to the Dead Summer nonetheless because such youth/ coming-of-age dramas are right up my alley.
Now that you mention it, I wonder where Hawick Lau is as well. He used to be in one new drama after another, lol. I should look up if he has any upcoming projects atm.
I totally agree. Actors often seem not to be casted based on their acting skills. There are so many mediocre actors and actresses getting one big role after another while some real talents are losing out. But I guess this problem is existent everywhere, not only in China.
That being said, I’m looking forward to the Age of Youth remake. The actors are all new faces, so I’m curious if we’ll discover some new promising talents.
I liked how they depicted Yang Mi’s way to become an interpreter and the romance between her and Huang Xuan was really cute. Thus, I didn’t like the last couple of episodes of The Interpreter that much either, as the interpreting theme somehow was not focused on at all anymore and there was too much angst.
You find a lot of drama news that I’m not even aware of. Thank you!
I know what you mean. ZS manages to stand out even among all the thin C actresses. Previously I also heard people making similar comments on ZH’s thin legs. The thing is that if these 2’s acting had been really spectacular, I wouldn’t have been distracted by their limb size as much. lol. But I can’t speak for other viewers.
I’m a bit bothered by ZS’ acting. Her stare is emptier than most other actresses. It looks as if she was distracted and started daydreaming in the middle of some scenes. Occasionally it suits one of her roles. Her acting range isn’t the widest either.
TI sure had cute OTP moments. I suspect the scriptwriters ran out of interpreting-related materials in TI. That’s why they have to digress and spend a few eps on Wen Xiaohua and Huang Xuan’s adopted brother going a bit nutty and get all jealous. Then Huang Xuan’s mom and uncle get very upset for a while. Then it’s time for Yang Mi’s mom’s to have health problems. Finally it’s Yang Mi own health problems. Legal, medical dramas have more material to draw from. More technological breakthroughs, new innovations in tech-related fields. Artificial Intelligence, new medical research or new meds, can be incorporated into the drama. Plus there’s a crime, or life vs death angle to explore. The interpreting field has newly added vocabulary throughout the years, but it does not have as many groundbreaking new developments.
But I hope TI season 2 will be good regardless!
Btw, I happened to see a similar poll answered by Cnetizens today morning. According to that poll, over one third of all people are most looking forward to Negotiator, followed by The King’s Woman and Nothing Gold Can Stay. Number one was quite surprising to me! I wonder if Yang Mi is still profiting from her huge success with Ten Miles of Peach Blossoms. Or did all the Exo fangirls vote?
I was excited for the second season of The Interpreter as well when I first heard the news, however, what draw me to the first season was the interesting theme of interpreting, and I hate how they changed it to something else now for the second season. Makes me a lot less excited now. I wished they would have sticked to the idea of portraying Korean-Chinese interpreting for season two, but I guess it can’t be helped if government isn’t allowing it. They could have chosen any other language, though.
I forgot to mention. With regards to slice of life dramas, did you ever watch Hu Ge and Yan Ni’s Life Revelations from a couple of years ago? I thought it had good production values. It’s like hearing someone telling his/her life story. I hear a lot of international fans dislike it over YN’s looks and age. She doesn’t look anything like LSS or TY.
YN’s character is a bit willful at times towards the second half.
C dramas’ female characters are often a lot more willful than my friends. OTJ’s Liu Tao and a few other ladies are surprisingly sensible for C drama characters.
I haven’t seen this one yet. Thank you for the recommendation! I will check it out.
Did you watch Paper Marriage 2014 with Li Dongxue, Li Nian? Some of Li Nian’s dramas verge on slice of life. Sometimes Hai Qing too. Like her drama with Du Chun about life & career as a female reporter. That drama was criticized for not acknowledging how prevalent nepotism is in getting promotions. I only watched 12 eps of it. Also, HQ is an older actress. That bothers some C drama fans.
But OTJ does slice of life better than many others because OTJ offers life stories of multiple female characters, so it offers greater diversity.
You may want to watch something else first after First Half of Life before checking out Life Revelations. Both dramas start off with a jilted wife who’s the female lead. Watching the 2 of them together may get repetitive.
I find it curious how actresses like Yan Ni gets the flak over looks, but actors usually don’t. Sometimes they style Zhang Yi, Ryan Zheng Kai, Duan Yihong, Zu Feng, Huang Lei, Lei Jiayin, Wang Yanlin … into unusual looking characters too, but they don’t draw as much negative attention over their looks, And Nicky Wu’s age doesn’t draw as much fire as Yan Ni’s.
I haven’t had much time to watch dramas either. I end up spending reading about upcoming dramas more than watching the dramas. It’s great to have your write-ups for them. Honestly, I don’t know how you keep track of all the dramas. Kudos to you!
And thank you! I also like your new feature on trailers.
I’m sorry for the late reply, I somehow missed your message.
I haven’t watched this one yet neither. I really have to catch up on a lot of dramas. And thanks again for the recommendations! 🙂 I will definitely check them all out once I find the time. Me too, I end up spending more time on drama news then watching them, lol. Even before I started working on this website.
I agree that there are double standards when it comes to men and women in entertainment business. People seem to be a lot stricter with the women.
My most anticipated drama is Tribes and Empire (because I really like historical and fantasy dramas). Other dramas I am going to watch are The King’s Woman, Negotatior, Xuan-Yuan, Nothing Gold Can Stay. As for the other historicals I’m not sure yet, but as for modern dramas I’ll just watch Negotatior because of Yang Mi.
Negotiator, the king’s woman