I have been enjoying Legend of Fuyao immensely so thought I would take the time to read the novel as well. The novel differs from the tv drama quite a bit but the story was decent…just really long and tend to meander off into random tangents. With those flaws in mind, I would say the TV version has done an impressive job in making some interesting changes to the novel and keeping the plot moving. I figure there might be some of you who would be interested in the difference between the TV version and the novel so this will be an ongoing post that will list off some of the difference between the two. (I am only going to mention the differences that caught my attention…like I said, the novel was long so I skipped around quite a bit.)

1 In the novel, our heroine is an archeologist from the modern period who ended up getting pulled back in time. (Into a fantasy world.) Losing all memories before she was five years old for some strange reason (Our heroine was reborn as a baby in the new world but then lost her memory of her childhood but still remembers everything from her previous life.) our heroine’s first recollection was being raised by a crazy Daoist monk who taught her some fighting technique that supposedly will make her invincible…eventually. Sworn into secrecy to never reveal her master’s real identity, Fuyao (our heroine) joins Xuanyuan Sect as a disciple but is seen by everyone as someone extremely lacking in talent since her fighting ability has remained pitifully lacking through the years.

2 In the drama, Fuyao’s first love, Yan Jiagchen was kinda forced by his father to marry Pei Yuan and gave up on Fuyao because of her status as a slave but in the novel, Fuyao was never a slave but was abandoned by Jiagchen because of her “lack of talent”. It is worth noting though that just like in the TV show, Jiagchen really do loves our heroine…but he just figures that out too late.

3 Since Fuyao was never a slave so that whole bit in the drama with the elderly man who died while trying to free her and her little brother Xiao Qi never existed in the novel. Instead of using Xiao Qi to force Fuyao to jump off the cliff, in the novel, Pei Yuan took advantage of our heroine’s weakened state from her imprisonment and just pushed our heroine off the cliff. Knowing full well what Pei Yuan is up to, our heroine allowed herself to get pushed off the cliff because she had already had her whip ready to rescue herself.  Unfortunately, that really cool bit of where our hero saved our heroine didn’t happen at all in the novel. However, this is the scene where our two leads meet for the first time in the novel. (The show has done a great job in threading our hero throughout the whole show…the same can’t be said about the novel. Our hero kinda goes missing for a long stretch of time in the novel…which is usually when I start skipping like crazy.)

4 So a few notes about our two leads’ character set up. In the novel, our heroine’s personality is actually quite mischievous and has a special talent in driving her enemies crazy with her loose cannon sort of creativity when it comes fighting back against anyone who messes with her. Thanks to her background as a very experienced archeologist, our heroine also has a lot of random knowledge that comes in extremely handy at times.

As for our hero, let’s just say here is another god like crazy smart hero with supreme fighting skill. I actually feel like Ethan Ran has done a decent job in capturing the mysterious air of the hero in the novel. The only difference is that our hero never had to pretend to be Taiyuan’s clown-like crown prince in the novel so he was able to remain cool and ethereal he whole time.

5. Can I just say Vengo Gao looks mighty fine playing the fierce yet gentle general Zhan Beiye. I still prefer Vengo Gao’s look in Ten Miles of Peach Blossoms but this warrior look is great too. By the way, going off topic for a moment, I am SUPER excited that Vengo Gao will reprise his role as Dong Hua in the upcoming Three Lives, Three World, Pillow Book. Written by the same author of Ten Miles of Peach Blossom, Pillow Book will tell the love story between Dong Hua and Bai Fengjiu (Dilraba Dilmurat is reprising her role as well).

6. Back to Zhan Beiye. In the novel, Zhan Beiye actually fell in love with Fuyao at first sight and kidnaps her while on his way as a guest to Taiyuan’s palace. Her fighting power sealed by Zhan Beiye to prevent her from escaping, Fuyao runs into her nemesis Pei Yuan in the palace and would’ve been killed if it wasn’t for Zhan Beiye showing up in time to save her. Furious to see “his woman” hurt, Zhan Beiye vows to put “10 holes” into Pei Yuan as revenge. Ture to his words, the next time Zhan Beiye ran into Pei Yuan, he added another scar to her face.

7. A side note about Pei Yuan. In the drama, our heroine didn’t bother to hide her identity when she attacked Pei Yuan but in the novel, with the help of our hero, our heroine was able to fool Pei Yuan into believing someone else was her assailant.

8. Zhan Beiye’s character was a huge part of the plot in the novel. In fact, there were certain parts of the novel where I wondered if the author had changed her mind and decided to make Zhan Beiye the hero instead. In the drama, Fuyao stayed in the palace with our hero while Zhan Beiye leaves on a mission of his own, but in the book, Fuyao left with Zhan Beiye and their friendship became unshakeable after going through many life and death experiences together. By the end of that epic journey, Zhan Beiye knew that Fuyao is the love of his life while Fuyao sees him as one of her own that she would not hesitate to die for.

9. One of the things I thought the drama did quite well is showing how much loyalty and love there are between Zhan Beiye and his men. In the novel, the author kinda overdid it by writing scene after scene of Zhan Beiye’s men sacrificing themselves to save their general or Fuyao’s life. (They were willing to die to save Fuyao because they knew she is the one their general loves). The first time was really moving, the second time was still a tear jerker, but by the third and fourth time…

10. Speaking of male second leads who are wildly in love with our heroine: Zong Yue, the super physician is also another one that fell for our heroine in the book. I was really happy that the scriptwriter decided to make Zong Yue completely focus on his revenge in the drama instead of becoming yet another man who is hopelessly in love with our heroine. (It’s a personal pet peeve of mine when authors make their hero/heroine so beautiful and charming that EVERYONE they meet falls in love with them.)

11. In the drama, our hero is in great conflict after finding out Fuyao is the one he has been charged by his master to find. In the book, the one that was conflicted was actually our heroine. Being from the modern time, our heroine has never forgotten her sick mother is still lying in the hospital bed with no other family but her. Determined to find a way back to her own time, Fuyao sees no point in getting into a relationship since she will just end up hurting the man when she disappears. Trying hard to suppress her own growing feelings for our hero, Fuyao pushes him away again and again but of course that never works.

12. I was fairly surprised that our heroine’s first love and his evil wife, Pei Yuan were killed off so early in the drama. In the novel, Yan Jiagchen (the first love) was never killed. The last time we see Yan Jiagchen in the novel is him holding an urn containing his wife’s ashes. Yan Jiagchen never stopped loving our heroine but by the end, he also realized that Fuyao had found her equal while he had lost his chance a long time ago. Another interest side note, in the novel, Fuyao IS the one that scarred Pei Yuan’s face. Pei Yuan was certainly a horrendous master to her servants so when Pei Yuan was lying in the rain howling from the wounds Fuyao gave her, none of her maids came to her aid.

13. In the drama, the hero’s pet, Yuan Bao is just a very useful sidekick but in the novel, Yuan Bao was a great comic relief as well. Extremely possessive of his master (Yuan Bao’s favorite fantasy is that his master is his and his alone.), Yuan Bao takes an instant dislike to Fuyao and the two have a hilarious bickering relationship throughout the story. When our hero couldn’t be by Fuyao’s side, Yuan Bao is the one that has to begrudgingly keep her safe.

14. The one thing I am kinda disappointed in the drama is that our hero seems to take a lot of beating. (ie. the big palace rebellion scene when both of our leads battled Qi Zhen.) In the novel,  no one could mess with our hero and if he did take a beating…well, that was all part of his plan anyway.

 

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