As similar as the costumes look to The Legend of Miyue, this is not Sun Li.
We’ve been in kind of a period drought but stills have been released for what looks like a less wacky take on Investiture of the Gods, this rendition simply titled The Gods. This version stars Wang Likun as beauty-possessed-by-a-nine-tailed-thousand-year-old-fox-demoness-turned-country-wrecker Daji, Luo Jin as Yang Jian, Tang Yixin, Yu Hewei, and Zhang Bo. The drama is yet another weird Korean-Chinese historical drama collaboration with a Korean director.
More stills below the cut.
I don’t know why everyone online is comparing the outfit to Miyue. If anything, it’s clearly that both this poster, Miyue’s poster,and The Long Ballad and the Virtuous Queen of Han, are all clearly influenced by Ruby Lin and Wang Likun’s Schemes of a Beauty).
But clothing-wise, this outfit is a very basic and simple red dress that I’m actually pleasantly surprised by given the Daji in the current drama ….
Also, I think that you have to learn the language your drama is in before directing it. How else can you even understand the dialogue, and where the actors should pause and which words they should emphasize?
I think it’s the way they did the hair ornamentation… so it kind of looks stylistically more similar to Miyue’s than The Virtuous Queen of Han or Long Ballad… that and the type of cloth they chose to use for the clothing…
Definitely agree with you on the language portion but it is a testament to how much the Chinese drama market has grown to have other countries interested in pursuing projects like this as opposed to aiming solely at Hollywood and the U.S. I have the same gripe with some singers too on the language issue and how the people they choose may not understand the cultural or lingual context that shapes the art form…
Now that you mention it, the hair ornamentation does look more like Miyue.
I feel a little better with singers since they probably learn the song and probably have a voice coach to teach them enunciation. But for a drama, I think it’s just unprofessional to not learn each line if you’re the actor. I feel like you could tell that Love Across Time wasn’t by a Chinese director, not sure how this would go, especially since it’s all ancient.
Well… definitely don’t think they will be contributing as much as far as acting is concerned since that requires more language and cultural know-how and stuff but they probably do have some talents in producing and other fields that open an opportunity for people in the Chinese industry to learn from them… But you are right about learning the lines. Even though they do dub over everybody, sometimes the acting and atmosphere just comes off weird and stiff and since there really isn’t much communication between the two actors, things sometimes just feel off…
Wouldn’t it be more accurate to say that the outfits from the mentioned productions are influenced by paintings, murals and tomb figures from those historical periods?
Anyways, Wang Likun looks simply stunning here in a costume that looks more authentic and tasteful than the bizarre outfits worn in other productions about Daji.
Not always. A lot of costume designers don’t try to really reflect the historical time period and are more influenced by others’ works. After the success of MeiRenXinJi, clearly a bunch of dramas replicated their design choices instead of trying to come up with their own. The recent popularity of braids and dreads in ancient dramas is also a clear influence by previous dramas vs. influence by any new historical finding.
Is just me or the posters have way too many special effects? it’s like the oldies throwback effects with all the lens flare and all. Reminds me a lil of my old designs. I love the pictures though. Wish they had gone a more simpler/professional looking route. I get that it’s fantasy but it didn’t need all the effects to convey that…or rather it could have been done more tastefully. #endrant
OMG, Luo Jin as Yang Jian?? I am sold :3