Audience reviews
20 · Sample from the first available page, separate from the total number of ratings.
krispygabu
This show was adapted from the work of someone whos the chinese equivalent of a Wattpad story author. They toned it down quite a bit but the BL undertones still felt uncomfortable since they're meant to be martial brothers , but thats just me.
The plot was seemingly simple but actually incredibly complex when coupled with subtle switches in timelines , the barely noticable changes in appearance don't help many to notice the switches either.
Pacing is very fucked. There was one comment I read about the pacing that was fucking hilarious how accurate it was.
"Yo want to hear about this badass demonic sorcerer who is betrayed, then reincarnated back years later and will seek his revenge? Before we tell you about that, let me tell you the story of how he wound up betrayed in his previous…
Read at the sourceterwa
I liked the manga and the novel ,but the anime was a big disappointment
the art and Chinese voice actors were good ,but what the use
As the story filled with ugly and boring fillers , twisted of events ,and skipping important details ,focusing on other unimportant details ,and they made a short past long story (longer than the present) while in the manga and novel it focus more on the present than the past ,and that how it should be
And I don't know why they skipped all the ai shounen light cute love between the 2 mc? it was pure ,funny ,enjoyable and cute ,not to mention that some of it was deeply related to the story in an important way
And the most important thing they made Wei Wuxian is wrong and being possessed by evil power, which is not!!!
Wei Wuxian is a great character and the wri…
Read at the sourcealquimistablanco
Long ago, the cultivation clans lived together in harmony. Then, everything changed when the Wen clan attacked. Only the Yiling Patriarch, master of harnessing negative energy, could stop them. But when the world needed him most, he went kinda batshit crazy, killed a bunch of his friends and exploded. Now, my brother and I have found the new Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation, a lunatic named Mo Xuanyu. And while his fluting skills are great, he's got a long way to go before he's ready to save anyone.
Ok, I promise I'll try to keep the ATLA comparisons to a minimum from here on out, but you get the picture. While this series has the bones of a good story and some awesome art and sound, its plot languishes unnecessarily for almost the entirety of the series. All the information in the para…
Read at the sourcepopeyepokedmyeye
Let's talk about this donghua which stole my heart and soul and had me out of breath by the end of just the first episode.
The donghua Mo Dao Zu Shi is based off a BL webnovel by Mo Xiang Tong Xiu. Even though the donghua is censored, it doesn't make it any less amazing.This review might be biased as I'm writing this after reading the novel. I am sooo in love with MXTX novels, my favourite being Heaven Official's Blessing(Hualian is loovee), but let's talk about Mo Dao Zu Shi for now.
STORY 10/10
The Yiling Patriarch was a very hated figure. He is shown to have died thirteen years ago. The donghua starts with the scene where Mo Xuanyu is seen performing a soul summoning ritual with which he summons the Yiling Patriarch a.k.a Wei Wuxian a.k.a our awesome uke's soul from the dead, into his…
Read at the sourcewappeul
Watched the donghua after reading MDZS and watching The Untamed and although I know the story and the characters, the donghua makes little to no sense to me.
Nothing is explained and I really wonder how someone who starts by the donghua might even understand anything.
You've got to know about cultivation and the plot, I guess. I would really, really not recommend watching it without reading the novel or at least watch the drama adaptation that is The Untamed.
Why does Meng Yao appear so late? [SPOILER] Why is nothing explained about Jiang Cheng's golden core? [/SPOILER] Why adding filler scene but putting the plot to the side? ... I had so many questions.
Some characters have a different personality, too. Like Jiang Cheng sounds more composed as an adult, compared to his original or d…
Read at the sourceyoukayouka
I am utterly disappointed by this adaptation.
I must make it clear that I watched this series AFTER I read the novel Mo Dao Zu Shi, which this series was adapted from. I had my expectations when this series came out: it was adapted from an extremely popular novel and was made by a rather experienced studio. I realize that I cannot ever get the same enjoyment as I had when I first went through the story, but at least this adaptation should present the story in its full glory.
What did I get?
I got a long 15 episodes of... fancy animations and good voice actors and beautiful art and... the studio did not disappoint me in their willingness to spend money on this show. It was well made and impressive compared to low-budget series.
But they missed out on one key aspect of what differenti…
Read at the sourcemmmspicyboi
Writing – I found the story to be rather complex and confusing at first. I think this is mostly due to the over-abundance of terminology, locations, and names that is used throughout the series. For instance, one of the characters has three different names: Hanguang-jun, Lan Zhan, and Lan Wangji. And he’s not even the only character to have three different names. There’s also a lot of world-building terminology like a “night hunt” and “fierce ghost” or whatever. So it can get very confusing right off the bat. Honestly, this is where I recommend the book to anyone interested, as the book does a lot better job at explaining a lot about the world more in-depth. However, getting passed the confusing terminology, there is a great story underneath. I don’t want to spoil too much about it but thi…
Read at the sourcekogimp
I cannot imagine going back to Japanese anime after this show. It has obliterated all current standards. The worldbuilding, storytelling, music, ART, plot....everything has surpassed my expectations.
I watched the donghua before moving on to the novel, and suddenly realised there are tons of easter eggs hidden within the show, waiting for me to grasp the meaning of. And when i did, ho boy. I fell so fast and so hard.
It is rare to empathise with more than a handful of characters in shows - but not for this. You don't finish this series without having strong feelings for close to 20 characters. You won't even find it a burden that some of the main characters have up to 3 names each.
I digress. Please do your eyeballs and soul a favour and watch this.
Read at the sourceAnjin77
Mo Dao Zu Shi is absolutely awesome! The story is very interesting with amazing plot structures. The setting of fiction ancient China creates a tons of charming experiences to the audience.
And the most importantly, the characters are SO CUTE!
Speacially the main characters, Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji. They kind of have the opposite personality, but their inside are the same...I don’t know how to describe it. Just pls, watch Mo Dao Zu Shi!
Another thing is Mo Dao Dao Zu Shi is actually very deep. Each of the character is so wrong when you only think about it in one perspective. But at the same time, each of the character is so right if you think deeply in that chracter’s perspective. To be honest, I cried for a least 10 times when I was reading the novel (I personally love to cry for ani…
Read at the sourceayeitzanime
I personally really enjoyed this show. The art was amazing the soundtrack was amazing and not only that but the story telling was extremely well done. Although most people will tend to avoid this show because it contains BL. I really think that people who usually avoid BL, can actually watch this because the story is so amazing and you can somewhat ignore the aspect of it being BL and pass it more as bromance. So whether you are into BL or not I think this donghua was very well made and I really enjoyed it(literally got me obsessed lol).
Read at the sourceasalich07
Now, I have never written any reviews on any anime whatsoever. However, Mo Dao Zu Shi has me sister stoked in such a good way that I cannot hold myself back from writing a review on this masterpiece.
Story (9.5): The reason why I'm not giving this a 10 is that the story starts off quite confusing. That being said, the pacing of the story will definitely give you enough time to clear off all your confusion and misunderstandings about the world, the characters and whatnot. The show starts off with more comedic scenes that are funny and exciting. Yet, the anime will turn an entire 180˚and move you to tears when it needs to.
Most of the story is not predictable, and even if it is predictable, you'll still enjoy it. The ending (or at least, the last ep) is satisfying and ties the entire anim…
Read at the sourceViest
The art is realistic but not to a point where it's annoying or far-fetched. The story is extraordinary with its tearful moments that brings jabs to the heart and overjoyed moments that make you want to jump off your seat. Mo Dao Zu Shi contains plenty action, some BL, comedy, drama, and heart-felt scenes that brought myself to tears. The sound is even greater than any anime i've ever watched in the past years with its exquisite music. Not just the music, the sound effects as well. The characters were my favorite of course due to the development of Wei Wuxian's character and the relationship development between Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji. Overall, this anime is the best i've ever watched. I highly recommend anyone who has not seen this anime or read up on it to do so. I cannot wait for seaso…
Read at the sourceJairus_Kersey
I was amazed to my "Golden Core" ! [SPOILER-FREE]
This is undoubtedly the most beautiful anime I've ever seen in my life! It's much better than any other anime in the year of 2018, I would dare to claim. I would definitely recommend this to anyone who loves anime as I do.
I have mostly great things to say about this anime with a couple of complaints.
First of all, the arts, style, music and character design in this series absolutely amazed me to my "Golden Core"!
The artistic portrayal of ancient China is breathtakingly beautiful. Every frame seems like a picturesque poem. In fact I would call the animation style in this series as "Visual Poetry".
The music and all the ancient instruments appeared in the series are out of this world. The opening theme instantly brought me into this fa…
Read at the sourceNeolavender123
I heard nothing but good things about Mo Dao Zu Shi (hereinafter referred to as MDZS) that in spite of having never seen any donghua (Chinese animation) before, I was willing to give this one a shot. Reading the MAL synopsis, I would have guessed that this show would mainly be a slow-burn romance between two ancient dudes with a touch of supernatural/fantasy. I mean, probably nothing new in the BL fandom, right? Wrong. If you were a viewer who avoided the genre like a plague or just merely someone who was turned off by reading that synopsis (hey, I was skeptical too!), chances are you might’ve thought “Huh, I think the synopsis was miss-described,” by the time you finished the show.
[STORY: 8]
I’m going to be frank here. My experience watching MDZS was divided into two: before and after…
Read at the sourcesepid_96
so i watched this chinese ONA because one of my friends recommended it :D
i came to watch this for a first try and never would have thought that i would like it to this point :)
everything was perfect for me...i watched spirit pact but i watched the japanese dubbed ver of it so it seemed like an anime and it was so beautiful with a good enough story...i hope chinese animation industry will bring us more and more ONA's like these :D i personally adore them...they are so good *~*
STORY 10/10 :i watched the first episode and i was like whats happening...i watched chinese dramas before so i got used to their language but everything was so messed up but it got better and better until i fell in love with Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji after 5 or 6 episodes :D
i love these kinds of stories tbh....his…
Read at the sourceasckj1
Where do I begin with? I was doing a search on pinterest for some traditional media pictures and some fanart of chinese illustrations and some pictures with long haired guys that looked like anime images would pop up again and again. So I finally decided to do a reverse image search. And I can't believe what a gold mine I stumbled across!!
This anime... first and foremost there are breathtaking landscapes in almost every frame of each single episode. I kept on imagining how ancient China must look like before its modernization but I feel that most part of China (probably the central parts) might still be as breathtaking to look at as they have been depicted in the anime. The backgrounds in this anime are simply heavenly!!!
The story... It has a solid base- an action, adventure, fantasy…
Read at the sourceHaruko_Miya
Im going to start off by saying, this is the first review i've ever written, you'll surely find grammar mistakes along the way and maybe silly reasonings, but bear with me!
I got recommended this anime by a friend of mine who's really into Shounen ai, and i know what you're thinking "shounen ai, this doesn't look like ai" At first i was hesitant to why it was tagged as specific. So i got curious and decided to give it a watch... And OHHHHHH Boy! was i surprised. I guess this is one of those things where "Dont judge the book by its covers" Same thing can apply anywhere honestly.
The scenary of the places shown in the series is spectacular, This kind of art i would say is able to rival most, if not all artstyles drawn in "Japanese Anime" and others.
Story: 8.5
Personally i've not read th…
Read at the sourceanarcheia
I never really write any reviews on anime but this time I felt like I had to. This anime is truly a masterpiece. The plot is outstanding and it doesn't get tiring at all. Although it is a bit confusing at first it's not hard to understand and follow it. All the characters are very well drawn and portrayed. The animation is beautiful too, their movements are so smooth and it's almost hypnotizing to watch. The voice actors have done an amazing work showing the characters feelings (especially in the last episode). The music is truly magnificent as well. I really liked the fact that the opening and ending were both created specifically for this anime but the music during the episodes is absolutely perfect as well. I thoroughly enjoyed this anime and the novel a lot more since the plot is expla…
Read at the sourceNjut
Hi, I'll make it short for you guys, put some headphones, and dive into it, the music, art and plot will do the rest.
You'll get hooked, and get sadder and sadder as the prospect of the end of the season approaches.
The ancienT China lair, and character development are really sofisticated, voice actors are great and it deservs its reviews.
The 3 best points are for me : the main character , the music, and the art and smoothness of the animation, the combining of ccg and drawings is really well done, and immersive, I know really few japanese studios that could rival with this level of dedication. Pay attention all along to the backgrounds and number of frames used.
That's all for me have a try, it's tagged shounen ai, but it's clearly from someone that didn't read the novel or underst…
Read at the source-Heika
I usually write reviews either because I hate it or love it. In this case, it’s the latter.
I’m so in love with Mo Dao Zu Shi in general, (not just the animation) and I’ve started reading the novel and caught up on the currently translated Manhua. [SPOILER-FREE]
Story: 10
If you haven’t read the novel or Manhua, (like me—because I started with the anime/donghua) then it might be a bit confusing at first but you’ll get the gist of it. I personally started reading the novel and Manhua, and they give more explanations and you’ll appreciate the story more.
This is a BL/Shounen Ai Story, so if you’re not into that, then watch something else. (Spread love, not hate)
The story is, so far, heavily focused on flashbacks. Only the first 2 episodes are set in “the present”. I am currently on episod…
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