Ouran Chuang Ru De Shijie (2021)

A mix of fantasy and romance that actually worked!

Story: It's complicated but it's also quite straightforward. In a nutshell, this is a fantasy story about a guy who could travel between "dimensions" - which were essentially stories from many different novels. His mission when travelling to the different stories was to collect "spiritual energy" by completing missions given to him by the "system". Once he had collected enough "spiritual energy", he would be able to return to his own world. The female lead was a college student who may seemed at first, un-connected to whatever the male lead's doing - but by accident, found herself in a story where the male lead had just completed. In order to bring her back to her own world, the male lead decided to enter the story again to help her complete her mission. Hence, begun a fantasy joyride of jumping from one story to another - from sci-fi to ancient to modern. The romance between the male lead and female lead developed as they completed missions together. My personal favourite was the ancient story part. :) There was also the underlying sarcasm about how many of these stories featured predictable romance between a female lead (who's always given the character of a victim and requiring help) and despicable male characters who took advantage of the female lead. There were also scenes and things the book characters did that were "standard" that provided some comedic relief.

Acting/Cast: Mostly new actors. The female lead acted well. The male lead's a bit stiff but his character will slowly grow on you. Side characters all acted well.

Music: Standard music.

Re-watch value: With only 12 episodes and with each episode adding to the progression of the story with no boring bits, it has excellent re-watch value for when you run out of good dramas to watch. You can very easily marathon this in one day.

Overall: If you want to be really picky and question things like, "What was the identity of the male lead and why could he travel between dimensions? The Book Spirit merely mentioned that "Master is different"- what did that mean? Was he even human? Which world did he came from? What was the logic of collecting "spiritual energy" to send the male lead home? How did that work? Which world did the female lead belong to? Was "the real world" where she came from actually part of a story as well? etc etc etc - then you will struggle to understand and enjoy this drama. Personally, I think the answers to these questions are not important for the enjoyment of this drama. The fantasy bits were merely settings. What this drama did really well was merging the idea of a fantasy story with a smooth progression of romance. It's really a weirdly successful formula despite the many potholes in story and acting. Overall, this was a worthy watch -much to my dumbfounded surprise!

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Good mix of Romance, Fantasy, Adventure - but could be confusing

9/18/2021

I was attracted to the unique plot of this drama, even though I haven't read or heard much about "Serendipity". This short drama doesn't really have a big budget, nor does it have a superstar cast. However, I thoroughly enjoyed it and was concerned when I saw the MDL rating of it at 7.8. This drama is by no means a high quality, big production. But for my personal enjoyment, I quite like it. It has a good mix of romance, fantasy, comedy and adventure.

This 12-episode drama tells the story of 3 different worlds. The first one is a little confusing to start and the acting wasn't at its best. It might take 1-3 episodes to get you interested. The second world (historical) is my favorite out of the three. I am less confused and there are quite a few funny moments. Romance is also more developed here with some cute moments. The last arc is the most confusing to me, and it's the most serious world. I still don't quite understand the general story of how this all started and ended. How did Yan Sui and Wan Wan get into this situation? What really need to happen to get everything back to normal? I am still not sure. Hence, I only gave this a 8.0 instead of 8.5.

I wish China would produce more short dramas, as the pacing is perfect and the story is tight. There is no unnecessary filler or misunderstandings over and over again. This is a good quick, light break from watching a serious drama.

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