Douluo Continent Blu-ray Box 1

Xiao Zhan stars in Douluo Continent, a lavish live-action adaptation of Tang Jia San Shao’s hugely popular fantasy novel. The actor rose to fame across Asia through The Untamed after joining the C-pop group X NINE. His performance here earned the Popular Actor award in the 2021 Film and Television Role Model annual selection organized by the Beijing Daily newspaper group.

Wu Xuanyi, known as Xuanyi in WJSN and as a leading member of Rocket Girls 101, makes her drama debut as the heroine. The ensemble brings together emerging performers and established actors, including Qiu Xinzhi, Fahrenheit’s Calvin Chen, model-turned-actor James Wen and Hong Kong star Kenny Bee.

The original release campaign highlighted the drama’s leading number of user ratings on Douban, ahead of Word of Honor by around 150,000 participants. It also received the Most Popular Chinese Web Drama award at Thailand Headlines’ SIAM SERIES AWARDS 2021, reflecting its reception beyond China.

The source novel has sold more than ten million sets and has inspired successful comics, games and animation, including games released in Japan. Tang Jia San Shao is a platinum author on the web-fiction platform Qidian. The release introduction celebrated his Guinness World Record for updating fiction for 142 consecutive months, roughly twelve years, and his repeated place at the top of China’s online-writer rich list. This television adaptation brings that expansive world to live action.

Director Yang Zhenyu draws on his cinematography work with Peter Chan, John Woo, Gordon Chan and Andrew Lau, and on the Steadicam expertise recognized by the Zhejiang Television Peony Award for The Brink in 2011. Production designer Sun Li, whose work on Wu Xia earned Golden Horse and Asian Film Awards recognition, develops the richly detailed settings. Costume designer Chen Tongxun brings experience from Ruyi’s Royal Love in the Palace, The Legend of Mi Yue, Legend of the Demon Cat and The Crossing. VFX supervisor Zhuang Yan and ART+ build on the ambitious worlds of Tribes and Empires: Storm of Prophecy and The Longest Day in Chang’an.

In Holy Soul Village, Tang San lives with his blacksmith father. Since his mother’s death, he has looked after his father, whose drinking has taken over his life, while training at the forge and secretly studying the Xuantian Treasure Record. One day, a giant venomous spider attacks him in the forest. A stranger saves him at the last moment: Su Yuntao of Spirit Hall, who can transform into a wolf.

Su Yuntao reveals that everyone possesses a martial soul, that the spider is a spirit beast whose power can be gained by defeating it, and that he himself is a soul master. Tang San attends the village children’s awakening ceremony and earns a recommendation to a junior soul-master academy. Before he leaves, his father forbids him to join Spirit Hall and warns him to keep the secret manual hidden.

At the academy, Tang San encounters an unusual handyman called the Grandmaster, an expert in martial-soul theory, alongside a host of eccentric personalities. The city lord’s son takes against him. Soon Tang San, the Grandmaster and Xiao Wu, a spirited girl with a rabbit martial soul who loves a fight, become embroiled in an incident that forces them to flee. Box 1 presents episodes 1–16 of their adventure.