Judging by the stills alone, it's hard to get anymore fantastical than Ice Fantasy 幻城, a Chinese xianxia telling the tale of a mythological era when the Ice and Fire tribes were embroiled in a long-standing war.
It is adapted from a novel of the same name written by Guo Jingming 郭敬明 who was only 20 when the popular novel was published in 2003.
The series stars Feng Shao Feng (Lan Ling Wang), Victoria Song, Ma Tianyu and Zhang Meng and the production seems to be going big on aesthetics by hiring Hollywood bigwigs such as Dan Hennah who won an Oscar for Lord of the Rings and I have to say that the sprawling sceneries look visually stunning, especially when endowed with a beautiful-looking cast to begin with.
The elven ears remind me of the Legend of the Nine Tails Fox if not a direct replica of LOTR. It is Feng Shao Feng's second attempt at producing and it has been an expensive affair with over 3 hundred million spent, 300 actors, 30,000 extras, thousands of costumes and mounds of manmade ice.
Even the likes of Korean actress Kim Hee Sun joins the cast as the Ice Queen but I'm most excited for Victoria Song having been a fan of her since f(x). I wonder if all the hype is enough for the series to garner attention in Korea as well or whether it will stay one-sided where Koreans cross over to c-dramas but not the other way around?
The series premieres Jul 2016 on LeTV and Hunan TV. Check out eng subs on Viki.
For synopsis, cast and other info, check out my 2016 Chinese historical drama recommendations.
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