Alli :') I love your MDZS art so much, but I still couldn't dive into it. Also, there is so much content that I'm kind of overwhelmed and don't know where to start. Also I thought, would you maybe like to talk a bit about MDZS for your followers who're not familiar with it (outside of your art of course). Lots of love ♥♥♥
Thank you for your ask, Emma! It is Jin Guangyao’s birthday!
You have to love a story where the big bad is a guy who wears a hat just so he’s not the shortest one in the room :D
Jokes aside though, MDZS can be difficult to get into for those unfamiliar with the chinese xianxia (magical martial arts) genre because of the terms and many character names. Most start with the donghua, but it’s the least faithful to the novel and suffers from poor rearrangement of the story’s present/flashback integration. I would suggest newbies start with the manhua first, then read the novel, then the audio drama (probably the best adaptation), then watch the donghua just for the giggles. You can find it all at exiledrebels.
What makes MDZS a wonderful story is that it is truly an epic–the scope of its themes and emotional territory is massive. Fundamentally it’s about love and forgiveness, both what happens when people are given those things (Wei Wuxian, Lan Wangji) and what happens when they are not (Jiang Cheng, Jin Guangyao).
But it also has an underlying thread about choice and the journey to overcome circumstances we find ourselves trapped by–especially problems we inherit from family. In the words of Lan Wangji’s audiodrama voice actor, MDZS is great because it contains the themes from all four classic chinese novels:
Romance of three kingdoms - war, revenge, political unrest
Journey to west - traveling quest, self-improvement, penance for past bad deeds
Dream of the red chamber - unrequited love, familial duty v. romance
Water Margin - heroism and chivalry, corruption
Let’s not forget it has the greatest public love confession of all time.
