Watch Lan Ling Wang Online here

Lan Ling Wang is historically very well known – he’s known as the Prince of Lanling while his real name is Gao ShangGong because, well, royalty (like Kate Middleton is Duchess of Cambridge). Anyways, historically, he’s known to be a war god, but his face is so beautiful that he needs to hide it with a mask. In this drama he is played by Feng Shaofeng who I initially found really unattractive but I don’t mind anymore. I think his extremely deep double eyelids makes him look pretty I guess but in some shots you can very obviously see that they applied a wing to his eyeliner. Ariel Lin plays Yang XueWu, who is a tian nu, which is a priestess with powers to… pretty much save the world, to put it in short.

Our story begins in Bai Shan Chuan with XueWu’s grandmother (Nai nai), who is also a tian nu. She provides a prophecy for Qi kingdom every ten years. Yang Guai is played by a pretty famous actor that I see often in dramas, but he only shows up in this episode – poor guy. That’s pretty much the only reason why I included a screenshot of him.

Anyways, Nai nai begins the prophecy. The country of Qi and the country of Zhou are constantly in the war. Nai nai predicts that in ten years, there will be four people that will be in control of the ‘world’ (which in this case is only China): Lan Ling Wang, Gao Wei, Yu Wen Hu, and Yu WenYong.

They did some pretty spiffy animations for this section where she explains every ‘future’ character. Yu WenYong is the future king of Zhou but unfortunately, his power is masked by his uncle. Nai nai likens them to two wolves – one hungry, and one aggressive and vicious – in the end only one survives.

Nai Nai says that Lan Ling Wang (LLW) will become a good leader because of his good heart and he is the one that is most likely to bring world peace to people. Unfortunately he’s destined to die because of his brother. Gao Wei is the rightful king of Qi but… long story short, he’ll be useless and spoiled.

So we finally meet LLW – and he’s pretty good looking. Pretty much he wins another war and outsmarts the Zhou army with his wits (and charms us with his good looks). Ta Xue, his horse becomes injured and he takes it (surprise, surprise) near XueWu’s salt spring to find sulfur to treat his wounds. And also upon seeing the salt spring he decides to go for a bath. Forreal.

We meet XueWu, and Ariel looks so beautiful! Her skin and her hair are on point. It doesn’t look like she’s wearing too much makeup too, which is nice because I think it’s really annoying when dramas tout the “girl-next-door” image and the actress has pounds of makeup and fake eyelashes on. Her hair quality is so good!!! That’s why she’s the spokesperson for Pantene I think. Makes me want to dye my hair black again.

So she’s introduced as a troublemaker because she’s trying to figure out how to make fireworks and they make it a point in this episode to stress that she has no friends and that no one likes her because of her weird behaviour. Normally this will turn a person bitter and jaded, but nope, somehow it’s made her into a kindhearted innocent young woman. Which is a stretch, but fortunately she does stand up for herself when she gets picked on, so she’s not such an unbelievable character after all.

Aite so this is where the first episode goes downhill and I pretty much face-palmed the whole way because it was so damn silly (there is no better word to describe it – just silly). XueWu decides to chase after her chicken… which leads her out of her village. How fast can a chicken go? How slow can you run to not catch up to a freaken chicken? Okok it’s tian yi (fate) so I get it, the chicken will run a lot faster, fine. Then she stumbles onto the same salt spring LLW is bathing at, and unlike a normal conventional person who looks away, she keeps watching, mistakes LLW for a woman, and decides to befriend LLW essentially after being a peeping tom and bathes with him. 

 So some of the Zhou soldiers somehow discover this spot and decide to ambush LLW. Which is a plot hole because LLW always wears a mask to war right – how the heck do the soldiers know to attack him? Either that or Zhou soldiers are just assholes that decide to attack civilians that are taking a bath, but at this point they’re both not a very strong argument.

XueWu sees that they’re under attack and manages to take down one of the soldiers with a rock. Yes, a rock, and manages to dominate him for the remainder of the time. What kind of freaken soldier are you when you can’t even take down an unarmed and untrained civilian that’s probably half your weight?! No wonder you guys are losing all your wars.

Upon looking onwards for a good few minutes, LLW finally decides to help. Coincidentally and luckily the Zhou soldiers didn’t decide to attack until he jumped out of the water too… Again, no wonder you guys are losing – who the heck trained you guys?

Omg the last few moments were so awkward. XueWu finally discovers that he’s a man, and…. he actually looks somewhat like a woman from some angles. Also LLW isn’t the buff type so… his shirtless look isn’t the most flattering. So awkwardness all around. I know it gets better from here but man, this scene was so cringeworthy.