Female representation is discussed a lot, as many female characters in movies often end up being very one dimensional, recently I have started to think that it's pretty much similar for male characters too, particularly in romances directed more at young girls.
Representation matters because it really influences our views of people, what you read and watch will determine your so called experience, which is surely why people are giving social media bubbles so much thought. This is such a big deal to me because since I was 14 I've been at an all girls boarding school, my ideas about romance and men are just stolen from what I've seen.
I was brought up with one parent English and one Chinese, because of trouble in younger years to do with my ethnicity, I hated that I was part Chinese and was not interested at all in the culture. I could speak the language but I had no interest.
Since I was 13, I've enjoyed typical teen girl things like Twilight, Divergent... I watched after, I watched To all the boys I've loved before, clueless, mean girls, wild child, endless love. After telling my mum I had no idea why Robert Pattinson hated Twilight, she basically bullied me into watching a Chinese TV show that's directed at a similar audience but the characters are 1000x more convincing and compelling, especially the male lead.
Love and Destiny is a Xianxia romance, it's really a Chinese genre that doesn't really exist anywhere else. Almost all the main characters are gods and immortals.
The highly respected Go of War, Jiu Chen, having sacrificed himself to defeat his mortal enemy, the demon king, is awakened from his grave after having been dead for 50,000 years by a young immortal Ling Xi. Jiu Chen soon realises that despite her seeming innocent and powerless, she has the power to not only revive him, but the demon king who Jiu Chen gave his life to kill. The story is a constant struggle for Jiu Chen who struggles between his duty to protect the world from evil and his love for Ling Xi. as he attempts and fails to go through with killing her multiple times.
First off Ling Xi is a really interesting heroine. She's extremely lazy, before Jiu Chen makes Ling Xi work, she's often seen lying on the floor, sleeping during the day, eating a lot and getting into trouble. Her powers are quite weak, she's the lowest status of immortal, her martial arts are not great, she's not that smart and not got a particularly strong moral compass.
Ling Xi's father often describes her as beautiful and useless, so Ling Xi really lacks a lot of the qualities I'd expect of a heroine. Her stand out quality is her strength of will. Multiple times she fights characters in situations where she will undoubtedly lose, often on behalf of the God of War Jiu Chen who she's smitten with. After meeting Jiu Chen she does become a lot more serious though. In the end, she actually becomes a lot more powerful and responsible, for a brief period of time near the end of the series, she serves as princess of the Shan Ling tribe to help them in their conflict.
Even though their relationship is very complex and Ling Xi often struggles to overlook Jiu Chen's many attempts to kill her in some ways it's very nice and simple. Their wedding, which should have been a huge event, as the god of war getting married consisted of him giving her all the wedding gifts and Ling Xi throwing herself at him as usual and then getting super drunk which was very funny.
Obviously I did like the defiant character of Ling Xi, but Jiu Chen steals the show. It was a huge slow burn, getting to know him, and he's surely an imperfect like a real person, he gave his heart for Ling Xi but still would never put her before his job. In the end you respects Jiu Chen for integrity and authenticity.
Another things that's interesting about these Xianxia fantasy dramas is the sort of femininity and masculinity ideas. Almost all the characters are gods, and they all have equal capacity to become very powerful. All the characters, men and women also wear long sweeping silk dresses and have very long hair. So you can't really differentiate with those superficial feminine qualities so the contrasts between the two are a lot more profound.
So yeah if you got this far, and you're a bit sick of cheesy, cringey romances that seem like endless copies of each other, try Love and Destiny. It's on youtube with English subtitles if you've got the patience to watch in a foreign language. For the first couple of episodes, you will surely be infuriated by the cold Jiu Chen and oblivious Ling Xi, but stick it out.
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