A Lonely Hero’s Journey (2024)

Strong on character but short on plot.

A Lonely Hero's Journey is about a young man's brave and lonely resistance to Japanese occupation. It is set in Suzhuo in 1941, just four years before Japanese forces withdrew from China. At the time, Suzhuo was administered by the Wang Puppet Regime; which was formed by a faction of the KMT that defected to the Japanese. The Wang Regime called themselves peace seekers and didn't have much authority but are regarded as traitors in history. While Suzhou was not the epicenter of resistance against the Japanese, it is a gorgeous and culturally significant historical city in China. This drama highlights the scenery, architecture and culture of Suzhou, including authentic famous Suzhou ballads. Its not your typical highly trained spy vs spy espionage story but rather about the defiance of ordinary people.

Gu Yizhong is a Western educated architect and the young master of the prominent and patriotic Gu family in Suzhou. On a rescue operation went awry, he gets framed as a Japanese traitor and is isolated and condemned by friends and family. He infiltrates the Suzhuo Secret Service station run by Zhou Zhifei to find out who the real traitor Cell 8 is. Zhifei of course knows who the real Cell 8 is and doesn't trust him for one moment. Zhifei and Yizhong are parallel characters that at a high level, share a common hatred for the Japanese. As individuals they are pushed to make difficult choices at pivotal moments of their lives. To survive they both have to be flexible; sacrificing a father, or a a son and their first love. Somewhere along the way Zhifei lost himself and became corrupt whereas Yizhong manages to hold on to his beliefs. In Yizhong, Zhifei sees the better man that he could have been but is not. In the guise of a mentor, Zifei goes after him like he is exorcising a ghost; destroying all that Yizhong values to bring about his moral downfall. Zhang Songwen is compelling as this selfish, dark and diabolical character, who occasionally allows glimpses of his lost humanity to shine through in his dealings with the two women he loves, his son and his mentor Mr Li.

This drama is very well cast and in addition to Zhang Songwen, is anchored by impressive portrayals by veteran actors Zhang Fengyi and Zhang Yao. In fact I think Zhang Fengyi's Gu Xixing stole the show. The drama starts to go downhill when Xixing exits and completely falls apart after Ou Xinping exits. The younger cast also delivers credible performances against the older actors. At times, Zeng Shunxi's portrayal lacks intensity and could be nuanced with inner conflict when it comes to how he feels about Haimo and Ruotong. Instead, he gives us nothing there so the way they ended left me scratching my head.

One of the best features of this story is how strong all of the women are in their own ways. Ou Xinping is not just a survivor, she is a killer with immovable convictions. Zhang Haimo is cool headed and calm, someone who is motivated by personal connections and loyalty rather than ideology. Unfortunately Haimo's character is destroyed after her walk away is walked back almost as an after thought to try to salvage the shipwreck of a storyline. This is Chen Duling's best role to date and I must commend her effort in even matching the lip movements of the very hard to sing Suzhou ballads. At sharp contrast is the passionate Xiao Ruotong who is far more emotional and willing to sacrifice for her ideals. Wang Yuwen's acting feels very genuine, evoking a moving picture of a young girl somewhat overwhelmed by the tide of history.

Despite wholehearted performances from the cast, this drama is strong on character but short on plot. The plot arcs lack logic and don't hold up well against close scrutiny. It is debatable whether Yizhong needed to make such immense sacrifices to isolate himself as a lonely boat that infiltrates the Suzou Bureau. His codename 孤舟/Gū Zhōu or Lonely Boat is too close a homonym to his surname Gù/顾 he may as well advertise that he is the CPC spy. The identity of Cell 8 is too obvious, diminishing the sense of suspense and is uncovered without much help from him. I was ready to fling my wine at the TV when the enemy simply allows Yizhong to walk away with the only key piece of military intelligence he obtained because he shamed his country for occupying China! After Japan lost WW2, it was absurd that Zhifei still stuck around simply to try to frame Yizhong rather than fleeing like the rat he is. But I guess in these kinds of stories the bad guy doesn't get to sail off into the sunset with his ill gotten gains. This is one of those dramas that can only be enjoyed if you watch the character stories and completely turn off your brain when it comes to the plot.

Even though this starts well and the acting is good, it starts going downhill just before the halfway point. I can only recommend watching this if you are a fan of any of the main actors or if you are interested in Suzhou culture. If not, there are too many better Republican spy dramas out there with tight and suspenseful plots. My overall rating 6.5/10.0.

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Enjoyable if you are into any of the actors, Suzhou aesthetics and dynamic characters

I'll get the negatives out first
1. Show has choppy editing and transitions sometimes, some parts feel hasty and rushed for no reason
2. Plot is sloppy and the spy parts sometimes feels only a little bit better than child's play
3. Xiao Ruotong's character feels way too weepy and all over the place for someone with her responsibilities, sometimes.

Good things
1. Really enjoyable acting from everyone of the veteran cast, and Zeng Shunxi and Chen Duling also gave compelling performances.
2. Chen Duling's character felt like a very good example of how a woman can be physically weak, not skilled/knowledgeable/involved in the ML's line of work, but can still be strong-willed and an active participant of the storyline.
3. A beautiful visual feast of Suzhou architecture, Ming-Qing style furniture and elegant qipaos and suits.
4. As expected of a WW2 freedom struggle drama, it was very dark and brutal at times, but somehow not oppressively so like I found some other big shows about this era were: for example The Disguiser, which was like 5x ahead of A Lonely Hero's Journey in lots of aspects but I found it VERY difficult to root for the characters there and enter their headspace/relate to their povs. That didn't happen here. Most of the characters were pretty likeable to me in their own ways, even though they all stood on different spots of the morality spectrum. Which leads to my next point:

5. Huge kudos for making 90% characters so 3D regardless of their alliances. This show had baddies, traitors, opportunists who were treated empathetically nonetheless, and also the people on the "good" side who were not all that likeable all the time. If you see people spouting that Cdramas always have clear cut black and white censored portrayals of stories that take place in sensitive historical time periods, that they bend over their back to ensure the audience wouldn't root for the characters in the wrong side, just slap a show like this in their face. And this show isn't even the best China has to offer in this genre but it still has this basic quality.

Bonus:
This really beautiful old gramophone song
"Teach Me How Not to Think of Her (教我如何不想她) by 赵元任 (Zhao Yuanren)" was used in the bgm, and it made for a haunting, immersive experience of that time period's atmosphere. Even if you don't watch the show I HIGHLY rec you at least look that song up on youtube. The drama used two versions of the song, the og and a softer, modern cover by Zeng Shunxi.

And lastly, if you are a DMBJ fan, you'd especially enjoy seeing ZSX, who played the DMBJ hero Wu Xie before, flaunting architecture knowledge and going through a "curious and energetic youth to broken down and steel-willed" arc 🤭 It was quite like seeing an alternate universe Wu Xie lol

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