Back from the Brink review

The ancient dragon Tian Yao had the worst wedding day ever. The woman he loved and was about to marry betrayed him by dismembering him, stripping him of his dragon scales and then sealing his body parts in five places. Fortunately, his soul manages to escape and he reborns, but with hardly any power. He encounters Yan Hui, a Taoist woman disowned by her sect, who happens to possess his heart protection scale. Tian Yao uses Yan Hui to retrieve his stolen body parts, but eventually they grow fond of one another and set on an epic journey to recover his body and restore balance to the world.

Characters

Tian Yao

An ancient dragon who was far too naïve for his own good, he learned the hard way not to trust humans — especially the Taoists who hunt down spirits like prey.

Yan Hui

A Taoist disowned by her sect, she is a free-spirited adventurer who believes spirits are equal to human beings.

Bai Xiao Sheng

A mysterious man who practices “dark arts”, he has an agenda that involves Tian Yao and Yan Hui.

Su Ying

Honestly, she’s the big bad for me, the one who caused Tian Yao the most pain. A stern, cold-hearted Taoist master, she has only one goal in mind: To use Tian Yao’s body to keep her lover alive.

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What I like

The dynamite premise

Seriously, wasn’t that story that grabbed your heart? A once mighty dragon falling down to low depths, betrayed by the woman he loved. That was what attracted me to the show.

Neo Huo as Tian Yao

He was really good. Congrats to his stylist! He sure did a good job because Tian Yao looked really good.

Sympathetic villains

What I found pleasantly surprising was how three-dimensional the bad guys were. They have good, almost relatable reasons to be bad. Well, except for the big bad. He was just nasty.

But for some of them, even the loathsome Su Ying, I find myself sympathetic to their grievances and hope somehow that they can getter a better life in the next life.

Interesting romance side plots

There were other couples in this drama whose romance I enjoyed. Some ended well, some tragically, and I felt for all of them.

What I didn’t like

Uneven tone

Is it a comedy or a tragedy? When the cutesy Pokemon-like spirits drifted into view, I just got thrown out of the moment. Was I supposed to think about it as a cute fantasy or an epic, dark fantasy? It veers from both themes wildly throughout the series.

The bad CGI

I have seen worse, but couldn’t they have stuck to the tragic tones of the story and do away with Pokemon visuals? I found it jarring.

Nosedive in script quality midway

I dropped this drama at episode 15 when the story took a turn for worse.

The tiresome love triangle

Bai Xiao Sheng (pic above), whom I really thought was unique and different, morphed into a stereotypical jealous second male lead. He deserves way more than that sad role. (Fortunately, they dropped this nonsense later.)

And then, Tian Yao did something mind boggling that didn’t make sense.

To add oil to the fire, the three of them ended up wandering around this alternate dimension, the love triangle dynamics in full force. And then there was something about pixie kids…

It took me about a month to brave this drama again.

But this time, I skipped the annoying episodes and started at episode 20.

To my surprise, I binged the episode in a few days. The storytelling improved a lot and the storu got decidedly more interesting and ironically, it wasn’t the main couple that pulled me back in but the story of the King of Qinqui and his twin brother.
Wow, the actor played both roles amazingly.

Conclusion

It will take a very patient viewer to stick with Back from the Brink and appreciate it.

Show is something that makes me sigh in sadness. It could have been soooo good.

If only the plot didn’t take a nose dive at episode 15.
If only the cutesy CGI was done away with.
If only they could be consistent with the tone of the show.

While the two leads were not mind-blowingly great actors or have awesome chemistry, they were good enough. But they were hobbled by the subpar script.

Rating: 7.5