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PaperclipPerfector  26d ago (text post)   2888 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for January 25, 2026

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I am vaguely aware of the Romance of the Three Kingdoms, but haven't ever read the source material or a good translation.

Anyone have any suggestions? As I've declaimed and disclamed before, my Chinese is limited to nihao-ing at some fine ABGs. A solid translation, or visual media would be fine. Subs or dubs, don't care. It just has to be faithful to the source

The recent Chinese TV series from 2010 used to be available on Youtube with subtitles - it looks like it isn't for me anymore, but it may in your region. Needless to say, it's comically long but has entertainingly cheesy and mid-budget acting, and that gets the 'vibe' across well even if it's not the most artistically accomplished.

Thanks! It doesn't seem to be available here either, though the 1994 series is. Is that any good or should I go hunting?

The 1994 version, from what I hear, is the most faithful to the original novel, but suffers occasionally from pacing issues.

(I haven’t seen any of the TV series as I read it in text)

The 2010 version is receiving mockery and dismissal on Chinese social media constantly. One of the biggest meme generators actually. I think the show itself is ok, if you treat it as a story on its own unrelated to the actual history and the novel.

The 1994 version is fantastic, a perfect balance between the director’s own interpretation and the material it based itself on. Music is great, casting is legendary, but it’s filmed three decades ago.

Out of curiosity what did they do to the story to make the 2010 show such a meme?

A couple of reasons.

  1. The casting was terrible. The actors themselves are mostly fine but they’re badly miscast. You end up with what feels like a Lu Su playing Liu Bei, a Yuan Shu playing Cao Cao, etc. When the core characters, Cao Cao, Liu Bei, Guan Yu, Zhang Fei, Zhuge Liang are all miscast at the same time, the entire show collapses.

  2. The script writing was very bad. The 1994 version used a classical vernacular script that preserved historical immersion, the 2010 version uses modern vernacular Chinese. On top of that, the dialogue is constantly trying to sound clever, punchy, and “memorable.” You get lines engineered for quotability and trying too hard to sound deep but without gravitas. That left the audiences with too many lines that can be turned into memes when the time is ripe.

  3. It was made during a period obsessed with “reinterpretations” of classics. I don’t know how closely you follow mainland media, but this show came after Yi Zhongtian’s hugely popular reinterpretation of RoTK. He had a very cynical view of the history (not his invention), Liu Bei as hypocritical, Cao Cao as selfish but pragmatically “real” (in his own words 真小人>伪君子), and everyone stripped of moral elevation. That clearly influenced the show’s script writing and acting.

The end result is that no one really respects the show. Compared to the 1994 version, it’s obvious that the newer one completely lacks 形 意 神. Add in the often silly dialogue and awkward acting, and what you get is a meme generator.

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