Tian Xun Zhe

The storyline is getting worse and so predictable. Too slow and so many unnecessary parts that should be edited out. So far episode 1 is the best, this series might be much better if the production team planned 6-8 episodes instead of 20. Can't continue following.

I confess to being a fan of Korean and other Asian supernatural romantic comedy/dramas, so I am favorably biased here. With that said, the basic premise is a good one: the Ghost King, whose job is to catch errant ghosts and demons, is drawn to earth when an evil ghost escapes from the underworld and drags the King's seemingly unrequited love interest with him. So, the setup for action, romance, comedy and friendship, with various introduced humans, is all there. But, the pace of the inevitable love triangle is too slow, and more action would help. I particularly do not like the failure to include enough subtitles-too much dialog passes without knowing what is said. It's pretty good now, but could, in fairness, fully earn that 7 I gave it when it outgrows its growing pains.

The first 6 or so episodes were enjoyable and had a good pace. After that the show came to a grinding halt and any progress takes forever. This whole show could have been shown in 10 episodes instead of 20.

The Devil's Punisher is more enjoyable in its earlier episodes where the plot is less convoluted and the pacing more balanced. The evolution of Anson Chen's character becomes almost laughable because of his sophomoric acting and total lack of understanding of mature nuance. He makes Austin Powers look subtle in comparison!

The second challenge is that I'm not convinced the writers knew where the plot line was heading so to move the story to some sense of conclusion in its later episodes, they resorted to instances of Deus ex machina making the end of the film appear contrived, convoluted and campy. In terms of cinematography, it looks like one of the film editors discovered colour enhancement and went wild with over-saturated scenes and colours that appeared artificial. In one of the episodes, everyone and everything is bright fuchsia.

On the whole, though, the series has its moments but is in need of much better directing, particularly for Anson Chen, as well tighter editing.

This show had a really great starting premise making the first few episodes the best of the series for me. The acting on everyone's part thoughout the whole show was phenomenal making you want to watch it more. However, this show really could have been closer to the 12 to 16 episode mark (and 16 is pushing it). Each episode was over an hour long but had very little plot progression. The "is he...Isn't he the bad guy" question the WHOLE SHOW was frustrating. The ending parts were interesting plot wise but they still made it feel like it was dragging by making the hero too non chalant about the whole world ending thing and still not seeing him trying to figure out what he needed to do. I will also say that I was a little disappointed with the final battle, as i expected tit to be more explosive and it was way more low key. Again the acting was fantastic but I do not recommend this show outside of that.