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MDZS Volume I thoughts
As of a few minutes ago, I have read Volume I of the official English MDZS translation. Below are some thoughts, fairly but not terribly spoilery (and not at all spoilery if you've seen The Untamed). I warn you: this review probably comes across as very negative because I'm basically comparing it to the show and it just doesn't measure up in any way for me. So if you don't want to read negative thoughts, skip this. HOWEVER! I actually thought the book was fine, I appreciated the much better translation, I'll keep reading the series.
First off, I have no idea how I would react to this if I hadn't already seen the show. I actually don't think it's all that interesting, but because I know where it's all going, I was able to kind of sit back and go with the story. But it's set up quite different from the show, and I suspect that if I had not seen the show, I would be...bored with this volume tbh. Or maybe not actually bored just...kind of confused at what all the fuss is about.
On CQL, we have two episodes of "WWX is back from the dead! Night hunts with the juniors happen!" and then we flashback to the Cloud Recesses Arc and move forward into the future from there. In this book, we have the same amount of time spent with juniors night hunting, but then we flash back just to Cloud Recesses Arc, which is shorter and less fleshed-out than it is on the show--and vastly less entertaining--before going back to the present.
Several of the major Cloud Recesses incidents are there, but more in a tell-not-show way. We don't get to see the moonlight sword fight along the roofs; instead, this is related second-hand and not in great detail by WWX. The porn-in-the-library scene is probably the most fully developed, but even it is not as delightful as it is in the show. The drunk!LWJ scene isn't there at all--which is a shame because I love nothing more in the world than drunk!LWJ. Neither is the Cold Spring Caves with Lan Yi, which I had not realized was an invention of the show, so we don't get the Cool Lan Yi stuff or the forehead ribbon handfasting. And the scene with the lanterns and WWX's vow--which is one of my favorite scenes in the entire show and which is the moment that LWJ really fell in love (I will die on this hill)--isn't there at all.
Honestly, the whole Cloud Recesses Arc felt kind of perfunctory. In the show, this is all laying the foundation of WWX's and LWJ's friendship--you get to see them meet, see how frustrated and overwhelmed LWJ is by WWX, how much WWX wants LWJ's attention in the most juvenile pigtail-pulling way, but then also see them come to respect each other. Plus, you've got the searching-for-the-Yin-Iron bit, too, in which we see them work side-by-side and flourish together. By the time we get to the end of the search for the Yin Iron, they're friends. We know how good they are for each other, how well they work together, how much they cause each other to grow.
In the book, none of that is there. WWX shows up for a few months at Cloud Recesses and annoys LWJ. That's it. Plus, all of it is from WWX's pov and we don't have Wang Yibo's genius performance that communicates all of LWJ's emotions to us. So you don't get to know LWJ really at all over the course of that arc.
Frankly, I don't feel like we get to know LWJ at all in the entire volume. We know what he looks like to outsiders (cold and righteous) and we know that he's stopped being terribly flustered by WWX's shamelessness and that this surprises WWX. But that's...it. And since LWJ is possibly my favorite character, I ended up missing him. Where is my sweet, overwhelmed boy who is completely incapable of interacting with the world on an emotional level? I had developed a suspicion over the past couple of years since I saw the show that book!LWJ is a different character than show!LWJ and that it's only show!LWJ I love...and this volume didn't do anything to convince me otherwise.
So the book is significantly more plot-driven and significantly less character-focused than the show, imo. I think the Cloud Recesses Arc was only a single chapter? Maybe two? And then we move back to the search for the parts of the dismembered body and that's where we stay. I have to say: I think the showrunner's decision to change that was a good one. By letting us see the entirety of WWX's first life, we care so much about him and his relationship with LWJ (and JC and even Jin Ling by way of JYL) by the time we get around to the hunting-for-body-parts arc that it doesn't ever feel draggy. Whereas in the book...it's fine! It's not boring, really. But it's not emotionally compelling like it is on the show where you're genuinely sitting there the whole time wondering when all of these characters are going to be honest with each other--when LWJ is going to help WWX understand how much he grieved him, when WWX is going to come clean about the golden core, etc. The emotional stakes are so high in that section of the show, and none of that is there in the book.
Jiang Cheng has zero ingratiating characteristics in this volume. We see no softness in him, he only yells and is annoyed by WWX even in the Cloud Recesses section. Part of this is, again, the lack of the performance by Wang Zhuocheng, so we have no idea what's going on with him emotionally below the surface. But even setting that aside, we're told that he and WWX became friends despite their rough start with the dogs, but we see none of it. I don't feel them as brothers who tragically lost each other due to their own decisions and inability to communicate at all. Maybe it's going to be established in later volumes--I certainly hope so! I adore show!Jiang Cheng and the JC/WWX relationship is vying for the title of most important relationship in the story to me, but he's just...not lovable here.
And no ladies. JYL and Madam Yu are mentioned a couple of times but neither of them nor Wen Qing or Mianmian ever shows up. Thank God the showrunners decided to have the ladies in the Cloud Recesses Arc!
XXC and SL and YX are introduced by way of storytelling at the end, and the ending clearly implies that Volume II will focus on the Yi City Arc.
Some good things: WWX is pretty damn delightful. He's just a fun character, a fun pov to read. I also really like the bits of Jingyi we get to see--that's my loud-mouthed boy! The worldbuilding is laid out in a clear way. The translation is very readable (as evidenced by the fact that I read it in about four hours).
That isn't to say that the prose is good. It's...not. Of course it's impossible for me to know what the original prose read like in Chinese, but I suspect that this might be less a case of unskilled translation and more a case of MXTX not writing very good prose. It feels very chatty and almost dashed-off (like fanfiction written very quickly and never betaed tbh--I've read literally hundreds of MDZS/CQL fanfic that have better prose/style) and not at all suitable to support the hugely emotional story I know is coming. It's not my style at all. But that is entirely a taste thing, and possibly other people love it for the very reasons I dislike it.
Basically, reading this book confirmed my suspicion that the show really improved on the story that existed in the book. I know that this review sounds horribly negative, but I really liked it fine and will definitely read the forthcoming volumes. I'm hoping it builds up the emotional stakes and lets us get to know the characters who aren't WWX. But for now: the showrunners elevated this stuff by making lots of really smart choices, and I still vastly prefer CQL.
I am open to changing my mind about this as we go forward! It wouldn't be the first time! But for now, I'm mostly, "Okay, that was fine, let me reserve a true judgment until I've read the rest." But it's going to take a loooooong time to get to the rest!
[eta] It somehow never occurred to me until this reading that NHS pretends to be so incompetent because he doesn't want to deviate and die young and by pretending to be unable to accomplish anything, he doesn't have to cultivate in a way that will ultimately kill him.
First off, I have no idea how I would react to this if I hadn't already seen the show. I actually don't think it's all that interesting, but because I know where it's all going, I was able to kind of sit back and go with the story. But it's set up quite different from the show, and I suspect that if I had not seen the show, I would be...bored with this volume tbh. Or maybe not actually bored just...kind of confused at what all the fuss is about.
On CQL, we have two episodes of "WWX is back from the dead! Night hunts with the juniors happen!" and then we flashback to the Cloud Recesses Arc and move forward into the future from there. In this book, we have the same amount of time spent with juniors night hunting, but then we flash back just to Cloud Recesses Arc, which is shorter and less fleshed-out than it is on the show--and vastly less entertaining--before going back to the present.
Several of the major Cloud Recesses incidents are there, but more in a tell-not-show way. We don't get to see the moonlight sword fight along the roofs; instead, this is related second-hand and not in great detail by WWX. The porn-in-the-library scene is probably the most fully developed, but even it is not as delightful as it is in the show. The drunk!LWJ scene isn't there at all--which is a shame because I love nothing more in the world than drunk!LWJ. Neither is the Cold Spring Caves with Lan Yi, which I had not realized was an invention of the show, so we don't get the Cool Lan Yi stuff or the forehead ribbon handfasting. And the scene with the lanterns and WWX's vow--which is one of my favorite scenes in the entire show and which is the moment that LWJ really fell in love (I will die on this hill)--isn't there at all.
Honestly, the whole Cloud Recesses Arc felt kind of perfunctory. In the show, this is all laying the foundation of WWX's and LWJ's friendship--you get to see them meet, see how frustrated and overwhelmed LWJ is by WWX, how much WWX wants LWJ's attention in the most juvenile pigtail-pulling way, but then also see them come to respect each other. Plus, you've got the searching-for-the-Yin-Iron bit, too, in which we see them work side-by-side and flourish together. By the time we get to the end of the search for the Yin Iron, they're friends. We know how good they are for each other, how well they work together, how much they cause each other to grow.
In the book, none of that is there. WWX shows up for a few months at Cloud Recesses and annoys LWJ. That's it. Plus, all of it is from WWX's pov and we don't have Wang Yibo's genius performance that communicates all of LWJ's emotions to us. So you don't get to know LWJ really at all over the course of that arc.
Frankly, I don't feel like we get to know LWJ at all in the entire volume. We know what he looks like to outsiders (cold and righteous) and we know that he's stopped being terribly flustered by WWX's shamelessness and that this surprises WWX. But that's...it. And since LWJ is possibly my favorite character, I ended up missing him. Where is my sweet, overwhelmed boy who is completely incapable of interacting with the world on an emotional level? I had developed a suspicion over the past couple of years since I saw the show that book!LWJ is a different character than show!LWJ and that it's only show!LWJ I love...and this volume didn't do anything to convince me otherwise.
So the book is significantly more plot-driven and significantly less character-focused than the show, imo. I think the Cloud Recesses Arc was only a single chapter? Maybe two? And then we move back to the search for the parts of the dismembered body and that's where we stay. I have to say: I think the showrunner's decision to change that was a good one. By letting us see the entirety of WWX's first life, we care so much about him and his relationship with LWJ (and JC and even Jin Ling by way of JYL) by the time we get around to the hunting-for-body-parts arc that it doesn't ever feel draggy. Whereas in the book...it's fine! It's not boring, really. But it's not emotionally compelling like it is on the show where you're genuinely sitting there the whole time wondering when all of these characters are going to be honest with each other--when LWJ is going to help WWX understand how much he grieved him, when WWX is going to come clean about the golden core, etc. The emotional stakes are so high in that section of the show, and none of that is there in the book.
Jiang Cheng has zero ingratiating characteristics in this volume. We see no softness in him, he only yells and is annoyed by WWX even in the Cloud Recesses section. Part of this is, again, the lack of the performance by Wang Zhuocheng, so we have no idea what's going on with him emotionally below the surface. But even setting that aside, we're told that he and WWX became friends despite their rough start with the dogs, but we see none of it. I don't feel them as brothers who tragically lost each other due to their own decisions and inability to communicate at all. Maybe it's going to be established in later volumes--I certainly hope so! I adore show!Jiang Cheng and the JC/WWX relationship is vying for the title of most important relationship in the story to me, but he's just...not lovable here.
And no ladies. JYL and Madam Yu are mentioned a couple of times but neither of them nor Wen Qing or Mianmian ever shows up. Thank God the showrunners decided to have the ladies in the Cloud Recesses Arc!
XXC and SL and YX are introduced by way of storytelling at the end, and the ending clearly implies that Volume II will focus on the Yi City Arc.
Some good things: WWX is pretty damn delightful. He's just a fun character, a fun pov to read. I also really like the bits of Jingyi we get to see--that's my loud-mouthed boy! The worldbuilding is laid out in a clear way. The translation is very readable (as evidenced by the fact that I read it in about four hours).
That isn't to say that the prose is good. It's...not. Of course it's impossible for me to know what the original prose read like in Chinese, but I suspect that this might be less a case of unskilled translation and more a case of MXTX not writing very good prose. It feels very chatty and almost dashed-off (like fanfiction written very quickly and never betaed tbh--I've read literally hundreds of MDZS/CQL fanfic that have better prose/style) and not at all suitable to support the hugely emotional story I know is coming. It's not my style at all. But that is entirely a taste thing, and possibly other people love it for the very reasons I dislike it.
Basically, reading this book confirmed my suspicion that the show really improved on the story that existed in the book. I know that this review sounds horribly negative, but I really liked it fine and will definitely read the forthcoming volumes. I'm hoping it builds up the emotional stakes and lets us get to know the characters who aren't WWX. But for now: the showrunners elevated this stuff by making lots of really smart choices, and I still vastly prefer CQL.
I am open to changing my mind about this as we go forward! It wouldn't be the first time! But for now, I'm mostly, "Okay, that was fine, let me reserve a true judgment until I've read the rest." But it's going to take a loooooong time to get to the rest!
[eta] It somehow never occurred to me until this reading that NHS pretends to be so incompetent because he doesn't want to deviate and die young and by pretending to be unable to accomplish anything, he doesn't have to cultivate in a way that will ultimately kill him.
no subject
- this translation is Not Good and I can tell you that because I’ve read some of the original in Chinese. MXTX is not Shakespeare but she is an engaging prose writer. Most of the issues with the prose that I’ve seen are a different way of translating Too Literally than the EXR translation.
- I’m sorry to tell you that the friendship between WWX and LWJ that you’re missing simply isn’t there. There are some key misunderstandings between them that drive the book.
- the best JC moments are yet to come!!!
- there are many LWJ moments I personally like, but I haven’t seen the show so can’t tell whether they will vibe for you.
Generally speaking, the show changed a lot of things to create a compelling relationship for wangxian that can end in a Good Triumphs ending where WWX definitely did not intentionally commit any war crimes and also they don’t get gay married before the book wraps. (Also added a lot of lady time - which is great! - but also… to add more het angles.) You’ve probably already heard about the reasons for those changes. Overall, I found them to remove many of the things I liked from the book! So I haven’t watched the show. I hope you’ll enjoy the lovely moments the book does have to offer. Especially some of the post-canon extras and some of the later chapters, I think you will like.
no subject
This makes so much sense! And I'm actually really glad to know it. I do wonder whether the translator they chose has any training/experience in translation, which is such an art. I suppose this small company couldn't afford to hire a really experienced translator, but that's such a disappointment.
I’m sorry to tell you that the friendship between WWX and LWJ that you’re missing simply isn’t there. There are some key misunderstandings between them that drive the book.
Yeah. I was aware of this from conversations with other people. I just love their show!friendship so so much!
the best JC moments are yet to come!!!
Yay! Good! I love him!
Overall, I found them to remove many of the things I liked from the book! So I haven’t watched the show. I hope you’ll enjoy the lovely moments the book does have to offer. Especially some of the post-canon extras and some of the later chapters, I think you will like.
Yes, I think so much of people's reactions comes from which one you encounter first! And comparison always happens with adaptations! (I could write an entire book about my feelings about adaptations of Jane Eyre, for instance.) While I acknowledge the rough patches of the show with regards to plot, pacing, homophobia, etc., I fell so very in love with the relationships between the characters (Wangxian, obvs, but also WWX and his siblings, WWX and the Wens, etc.). When something works so well for you and then it's not there in a different version of the story, the divergence feels like a let down. But I am definitely going to keep reading, and I am sure there will be things I really enjoy about the book. I will try to compare less and enjoy the book for what it is! I appreciate your thoughts! Thank you!
no subject
I think a lot of the problems you have with the (early, at least) novel are problems I also had, like the lack of relationship building, the pretty much complete lack of LWJ's personality, etc. But the show and the novel both have their ups and downs like the show's censorship and pacing issues -- why do they end episodes like that, why -- so I hope you'll find more about it to love in the later volumes.
RE: your point about NHS: I loved Fatal Journey for this! The closer look at NHS and NMJ and their way of cultivation was great.
no subject
Oh definitely! Since I can't read the original, I'm unable to compare, but I have now heard from several people who have read the original that the prose is much better than any of the translations.
I think a lot of the prose quality hinges on the translator
I do think I will! It's just so hard not to make comparisons when the show works for me so incredibly well on a character and relationship level, you know?
no subject
As you say, my osmosed take is that book!LWJ is essentially a different person from show!LWJ -- and also that his devotion to WW is just that, to Wei Wuxian, rather than the WW, whom he loves, and the principles of honesty and justice, which is really something of a dealbreaker to me. Unconditional love is not my thing.
no subject
the real dealbreaker was a triple !!!, iirc
YUP. There is definitely some of that. Yup.
rather than the WW, whom he loves, and the principles of honesty and justice, which is really something of a dealbreaker to me. Unconditional love is not my thing.
Same. Show!LWJ loves WWX because WWX is good--deeply flawed, but he's always trying to do the right thing. And that is also why I love him. So that is why I love them both.