***** I will start without any spoiler here *****
As someone who was born in the 2000s I never read any of the condor trilogy novel and only watched the newer version of the condor trilogy which are Legend of condor heroes (2008 and 2017) and Return of condor heroes (2006) and I would like to say that this HSDS is the best compare to the other. and You don't need to watch any of those before watching this.

The strongest point in this show is their casting. Chen Yuqi really did an outstanding job portraying Zhao Min, I who never cried for watching movies/tv cried quite a few times because of her. Chen Yuqi might be my favorite actress in the world because of this series.

Visual wise, they also did a great job. It's not too colorful like 2014 Roch which was very annoying, that's one of the reason i didn't watch it till the end. But here, you just have that right amount of color and beautiful scenery. The costumes also fit perfectly dominantly by white color. It really made me feels like living in the medieval China.

There are some dragging in the plot presumably to fulfill the 50 episodes, also the fighting scene and choreograph isn't the best compare to the previous installment. I feel that action or martial arts isn't really the focus point in this adaptation. they are more like a side-dish.

Other people told me that this adaptation really differ from the novel or that the 1986 version was so much better. But if you never read HSDS or watch any other adaptations before, I don't think you would mind some alterations here and there. Besides, 1980s Chinese tv series really had a bad quality camera and Cantonese language that I'm not used to.

Anyway I'm just crazy for Zhao Min hehe.

****** Spoilers ahead *********

First of all Chen Yuqi is a goddess dang. Finished this series at 10pm and the next day I woke up, I still can't move on from her and feel really sad. This series has turn me into Yuqi's fan lol.

The story starts of pretty lame. It took me a whole day to finish episode 1, but Yang Xiao's appearance brought new wind to the series. I really like those calm but almighty characters and Yang Xiao is just that. But, the pacing still feels little bit too slow until ZWJ went to butterfly valley. Now, that's where things got interesting for me because he finally learn something amazing.

But yeah, zwj feels like using a cheatcode here. he's already become the best in the world after mastering heaven and earth great shift. this is why I think that HSDS is more about romance rather than martial arts unlike 2 previous installment. Also, poison is so overused in this series. After Fan Yao appear, suddenly Yang Xiao is nowhere to be seen. Even in Ming's sect meeting he's not there anymore, also after ZWJ got matured, it feels that YX got nerfed. YX from the early episodes was a badass but he turns to be pretty useless.

Then Zhao Min came, and she really blows my mind with her personality and great acting from Chen Yuqi. If i were wuji, i would definitely fell in love when minmin asked him to a first date in Wan'an pagoda.
Some people keep complaining that after eps 40, her personality changed and keep relying on wuji. but i found that to be okay and that's called falling in love. in fact I had watery eyes several times after eps 40, and rewatch some specific moments after eps 50. although it's a happy ending , it still made me quite sad. because her last real dialogue was a hot-headed argument, I really hope that at least there would be a marriage scene or some romantic moments. Really want to see a happy zhao min, she really makes me feel like i'm in the story and experiencing things with her.

After searching through the wiki, i found out that actually beyond eps 40++ are differ from the original work but that's fine. I also noticed that most people who has watched 1986 adaptations or read the novel said that this show isn't that good but people who are new to HSDS give really positive feedback toward this show. So, i would say that this show is really good if you didn't compare it to other adpt or the novel