Watching the Blood of Youth is like running a marathon.

TDLR: The first half of the show is very fun and interesting, however the second half becomes too political and loses the adventurous charm. Overall a decent show, however minus points because of the low screentimes of more interesting characters and dragging relationships.

Non-Spoiler:
And the beginning, the race was exhilerating. I watched episode after episode as they came out. But sometime after the main characters went to Tianqi, the drama began to drag out and I skipped or sped through large portions in order to find out what happens at the end.

To start off with, the story is not bad. The plot is very interesting and the motivations of everyone is complex. The problem is that the first half of the show is adventure based, where the main characters travel to fight different people and discover their newfound power. Hence, the blood of youth. This half of the drama is very fun, getting to know the characters and their powers is a charm of this part of the show. My favorite moments have to be the characters meeting Wushuang and Lei Wujie going up the tower to become a disciple. When the characters went to Tianqi, this adventurous arc for them was cut short and instead the story became about the next Emperor. The problem with this change in setting is that Xiao Se gives away his true intentions and who the Emperor will be by saying what he and his brother's chose when asked what type of Emperor they would be. Because of this, a lot of the scenes that were about the Red Prince or the Second Prince went over my head.

Spoiler:
As for the characters:
~ Xiao Se started off as a funny character during the adventurous phase. His cunning side came out a lot and often times would be in the background, making sarcastic jabs at Lei Wujie. During the second part of the plot, his character became more bland and I felt as though Li Hongyi made the character flat as cardboard in the emotions department. This especially is true during more emotional scenes or ones with Qianluo. I read a few chapters from the novel and found myself surprised at how animated the Xiao Se in the novel came off as. I personally would have preferred a more forward actor for Xiao Se, but there were some fun moments like him running away from Qianluo or bragging about the worth of his sleeves.
~ Wuxin was very funny and the actor was ever so charismatic. I have zero complaints about the actor, but I was very sad that he did not have much screen time during the plot when the characters were in Tianqi. His character was basically used as plot armor so that Xiao Se, Wujie, Qianluo, and Rouyi could stay alive during difficult times.
~ Lei Wujie was a consistent character who stayed humorous and brazen even during difficult battles in the latter half of the show. I thought the actor did well and definitely felt the character grow on me as the story went on. His relationship with Rouyi did not have any chemistry just like Xiao Se and Qianluo, in my opinion, however it made more sense and was cute when responding to her.
~ Rouyi was an interesting addition, at first I felt as though it was a little weird for her to be in the story as a strategist instead of one of the pillars, but she grew on me as time went on in the story. I definitely think it is such a shame we couldn't see more of her power, the use of leaves in the CGI was so pretty.
~ Qianluo was a very likeable character for me, I feel like this is an unpopular opinion though. She definitely comes off as childish in the beginning, but in Tianqi she shows her resilience and seriousness when it comes to her position as the Vermillion Bird. I find that the writers did not give her many extravagant fighting scenes which was a bit sad, even Rouyi had the scene with the dance with Wujie.
~ Tang Lian was probably the most likeable character and by the time I came to realize that, he passed away. I have seen the small special ending clip, but it did not make enough reparations for me. I definitely think it was cruel how the most powerful of the Four Pillars ended up dying first, because the fights that come after his death are lackluster.
~ My personal favorite characters who weren't part of the main line up was Wushuang and his box of swords, truly he was given some of the best lines and scenes. I really liked the disciple and Fairy Luoxia, the hint that they would probably be endgame was everything to me. I also really liked the Huajin and her rich disciple.

My notes so far may seem pessimistic, but I still did tune into every episode even if I skipped quite a bit later on. A lot of the characters are worth meeting such as Tang Lian, Wuxin, Wushuang, Huajin, and many others that make up the supporting cast of the show. Also the general production felt very high, great styling for the most part with grand background sets. The CGI is among the best, I never skipped a fight sequence due to the intricacy of the fighting scenes. Overall, 7.0/10 which indicates that it is a great show that loses steam as it goes on.

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