The Untamed is based on the novel, Mo Dao Zu Shi, or The Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation, by Mo Xiang Tong Xiu
This is a discussion of the The Untamed written in a hybrid of opinionated guff and academic prose. Shamelessly boring.
Summary
At its core, The Untamed is a story about two soulmates, Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji, who share a deep bond that safeguards them through a world beset by megalomaniacs, evil spirits, soul eaters, and puppets.
Wei Wuxian (also known as Wei Ying & the Yiling Patriarch), is the precocious orphan of the Jiang clan of Yunmeng. He is mischievous, unconventional, and warm-hearted. His worldview lies in the gray area between order and experimentation. However, as an inventor of magical artifacts and a practitioner of demonic cultivation, his well-intended efforts are misunderstood, and his unorthodox methods using resentment energy for good leads him to infamy.
Lan Wangji (also known as Lan Zhan & the Light Bearing Lord) is an esteemed son of the Lan clan of Gusu. He is distant, severe, and intimidating, but under his cold exterior lies a loyal, loving heart. He upholds the virtues and principles of his clan, and rejects temptation. No playing, no drinking, no flirting. As a paragon of excellence, ain’t nothing shameless going on here. He believes in the division between good and evil, until he encounters Wei Wuxian.
The two meet as fellow students during a season of lectures at Cloud Recesses. With his brazen-faced teasing, Wei Wuxian upsets Lan Wangji’s rigid foundation. What begins as an antagonistic relationship becomes a fated friendship, then more. Together, they traverse the lines between innocence and corruption, persecution and vindication, and trauma and healing in the sweeping saga that is, The Untamed.
Beware the monstrous spoilers!
Preamble
There are many names for this story. The Chinese name, Mo Dao Zu Shi, is the genesis of all the others, most of which are English translations, like The Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation (my favorite), The Founder of Diabolism, and The Untamed, plus more. The story has been rendered in various mediums, including web novel series, paper novel series, animated series, live action series, manhua, audio book, audio drama, and an upcoming mobile game.
I read the web novel first, which had been fan-translated into English. It blew my head off. I liked it so much I read it again a few months later and found it had been censored. Then, I discovered the live action version of the story, The Untamed, and was skeptical about watching it. Would it totally disappoint me? But I watched it, and had my head blown off again! Since that first viewing, I have probably seen it six times, more or less. I learn something new every time I watch it.
After many viewings, I noticed three main polar themes in The Untamed: good and evil, science and religion, and nature vs. nurture. These are three very complex subjects, and I only introduce them in this article, but if you feel inspired, you could sift through every episode, connect the dots, and write a dissertation. That’s how deep it can go. Personally, I do not have the energy for that! Aside from these subjects, I also touch upon acting, love, special effects, horror, and falls. Wow.
Good – Evil
Chinese high fantasy, or Xianxia, is interwoven with Daoist ideology and Chinese folklore. In Xianxia stories, most cultivators follow the righteous path, including Daoist practices, in a world of mythical beasts and magic and flying swords.
On the Good side, Daoist heaven is ruled by the Jade Emperor. He reigns over a bunch of gods who are more like bureaucrats than angels. The next level below gods are immortal cultivators, or cultivators who are working towards immortality. Of course, these characters follow the righteous path. Most of the cultivation world in The Untamed falls into this camp, with the Lan clan as the prime example.
On the Evil side, Daoist hell is the dominion of outlaws, criminals, demons, and monsters, those who follow the demonic path. In general, they use nefarious or questionable cultivation to get what they want, usually power over the weak. Think Wen Ruohan and his posse, and later, Jin Guangyao and his minions.
Some cultivators are rogue or independent, existing outside the boxes of heaven and hell, and good and evil. They follow their own path, with one foot on an established route while the other wings it. Wei Wuxian is rogue, in my opinion, as was his mother, Cangse-sanren, and her teacher, Baoshen-sanren. In fact, sanren means roaming immortal, or wanderer, in the world of cultivation.
To make a dogleg Western comparison, it sounds a bit like the English monarchy and the wild, wild West back in the day. Anyway, The Untamed does not make any reference to Daoism, but in the novel, the story refers to the Daoist practice of cultivation at times. The word ‘evil’ is used liberally in all versions of the story.
If you could put a name on ‘misunderstood,’ it would be Wei Wuxian. The man has a heart of gold. He only wants what is fair and best for people, and lives by strong principles to that end. “I wish that I can stand with justice and live with no regrets,” he says in the famous lantern releasing scene. However, he is an adventurous experimenter by nature, which unsurprisingly leads him to invent effective, yet dangerous, ways to get the job done. In this case, the job is to fight the true evils in the world and maintain justice for all. Though he does wind up scaring people and upsetting the status quo, it is not his intention to be an evil overlord.
His inventions and spiritual practices harness energy caused by the resentment of the dead. This kind of energy is meant to be liberated, subdued, or eradicated. It is forbidden to consider any other means for it. Wei Wuxian, however, recycles it in an alternative form of cultivation. He says, “Grandmaster, spiritual energy is energy. Resentment energy is also energy … so why not find a way to make use of it?” Makes sense, right? Obviously, Wei Wuxian is not evil. He’s just not afraid to put resentment energy to good use. In this way, the line between good and evil is blurred.
As Wei Wuxian evolves from an upstart pioneer to a seasoned cultivator, Lan Wangji remains his truest friend throughout. Even as Wei Wuxian’s reputation plummets in the eyes of the cultivation world, Lan Wangji stays by him. At first, he tries to persuade Wei Wuxian to return to the righteous path, but eventually, he challenges his own dogmatic upbringing so that he can better understand him. In doing so, Lan Wangji takes actions that are so deeply opposed to his clan’s principles and the righteous way, he is viciously punished with the Discipline Whip. This whip is so terrifying it would cut my little non-cultivation body in two with one strike. Lan Wangji suffers thirty lashes and thus, bravely descends into the vague territory between good and evil.
This section of dialogue occurs just before the Sunshot Campaign, when Lan Wangji is disturbed by a changed and somewhat sinister Wei Wuxian following his return from the Burial Mounds. Lan Wangji asks his brother, Lan Xichen, “…how can we evaluate a person?” Lan Xichen says, “What makes us human can’t be judged simply as right or wrong. It lies within ourselves. As we evaluate others, we shall not label them as black or white, but know their deep intentions inside.” If this doesn’t illustrate the complexity between good and evil, I don’t know what does.
Right after the Sunshot Campaign, after he turned the tide of war in their favor, Wei Wuxian has recovered from a coma with help from Lan Wangji’s guqin. He asks, “Lan Zhan. Do you also think that the Stygian Tiger Amulet is evil and can disturb people’s minds? But in the world, is there really such an undetectable thing that can change people’s minds from loyalty to treachery and from good to evil?” Maybe a bit naive but spoken like a true scientist. Which segues into the next subject.
Science – Religion
Science has alway been in conflict with religion. In The Untamed, Wei Wuxian uses scientific reasoning for inventions made through trial and error. Like a scientist, he is a seeker of the truth, conquering the fear of the unknown. All throughout the story, he examines strange phenomena and analyzes clues that lead to a full picture. As such, he learns the way people think, their motives, and their habits. He judges how creatures work. In this manner, he is scientific, always questioning things before reacting blindly. His worldview lies outside the spiritual beliefs and political schema of the cultivation world, and he gets into loads of trouble because of it. He threatens to overturn its conventional foundation.
Lan Wangji, on the other hand, is a deeply religious man. He is solid in his belief of the righteous path. Religion not only means having a spiritual belief in something, but also abiding by a strict, consistent routine. Wei Wuxian often calls Lan Wangji rigid or inflexible because, though these characteristics make Lan Wangji dependable, strong, and loyal, he is unable to think outside the box. Wei Wuxian influences Lan Wangji to question his faith, ultimately leading him to take off the blinders and see things as a sceptic would. However, Lan Wangji does not abandon his principles. He just retains the parts that align with his principles, while letting go of the parts that don’t. To me, the joining of values between Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian represent the ideal relationship between religion and science.
Religion serves an important role in society because of tenets like the Golden Rule, and these particular commandments: Do not murder. Do not steal. Do not commit adultery. The rest of the commandments need a make-over, or maybe a make-a-toss-into-the-trash. Believe in God? This is where science comes in. Perhaps there is a God, whether or not science can prove it. What science can do is keep hurtful dogma from ruining an ever-changing world by questioning authority. Science is rational where religion is supernatural. Religion and science are both similar in that they both require repetition to work, both have principles, both give people hope, and both aim for the greater good. In this way, Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian are also similar.
Besides the character representation for science and religion as seen in Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian, there are also story elements that mix science and religion together in a baffling mess. A big one is Wei Wuxian’s resurrection, which is a very religious theme, without a hint of science guiding it. If Wei Wuxian is a scientist, then how did this happen to him? Ah, but wait. Despite the bloody mess he finds himself in post-resurrection, sitting inside a demonic array with tattered cloth flying around in the chaotic wind, he uses analytical thinking to figure it out. The spells themselves are born of scientific trial and error. Even though The Untamed is filled with crazy religious-like fantasy, the story uses a scientific mindset to navigate and explain this landscape, and because of this, it makes sense.
Could this possibly be a method for joining religion and science together harmoniously? Questions, my friend.
Nature – Nurture
Imbedded in this story is the theory of nature versus nurture. For short, nature stands for what we are born with, our biological make-up, our genes. Nurture represents our experiences gained in the environment, and how they affect us.
For example, people, situations, traumas, and joys we experience can cause dormant genes in our biological make-up to express themselves. A trauma in early childhood may cause the gene for bipolar disorder to develop. If the trauma hadn’t occurred, then the child may have lived its life without a significant mental illness. Some of our characteristics are hard-wired and cannot be changed by our environment, for example, Down’s syndrome. The point is, who we are, or who we become, is caused by the interaction of these two poles, nurture and nature. It’s actually a debate among scientists, hence the term ‘nature versus nurture.’
Three characters come to mind when considering this subject: Jin Guangyao, Wei Wuxian, and Lan Wangji. Let’s assume these characters were born perfect little babies with the world before them, yet to be shaped by life experience.
If Jin Guangyao had been raised with love and acceptance, I have no doubt he would have become a well-rounded, healthy cultivator. I don’t think he was born thinking ‘I’m going to be rotten to the core.’ I don’t think he was a psychopath by nature. In his case, the conniving, deranged, twisted, power-hungry personality he developed was created by his experiences. Being rejected, bad-talked, ostracized, and thrown down the steps did a real number on him. He did what he did because he was chasing after the love and acceptance of a father who continued to reject him. Once Jin Guangyao became rotten, every step he made was painstakingly manipulated for the endgame of revenge. I think his character was created more by nurture than by nature.
Then, there’s sweet Wei Wuxian. He also had a hard-knock life. He was an orphan who suffered abuse, poverty, and terrors in the streets. Even after he was adopted by the Jiang clan, he was still abused by the mother figure and made to feel like he didn’t belong. Like Jin Guangyao, he was ostracized, beaten, chased, burned, stabbed, whipped, and thrown down so many times it would be hard to count, but unlike Jin Guangyao, he had positive support in the father, sister, and brother of his adoptive family. He was also born with innate goodness and altruism for his fellow human beings. He retained his sense of humor and had a flexible disposition that allowed him to roll with the punches. Nature had the bigger influence on Wei Wuxian’s personality, and nurture merely developed his ‘career’ as the Yiling Patriarch, particularly following the annihilation of his clan and the loss of his golden core.
Finally, let’s take the example of Lan Wangji. He was born into a noble family of good character and was well-trained and cared for by his uncle. It appears he was born naturally reticent and taciturn, but with a good heart. He suffered a blow with the death of his parents, but it did not affect him to the point that it knocked him from the righteous path even one centimeter, indicating a natural ability to maintain focus and loyalty. However, through his relationship with Wei Wuxian, he began to question right and wrong, and the rigid ways of his clan. He began to understand that the world isn’t simple when considering matters of right and wrong, and good and evil. This is an example where nurture steps in and alters one’s mindset through life experience. However, I believe that nature was also the stronger force in this case, with nurture serving to broaden his worldview and become a more tolerant person.
Poor Jin Guangyao was not as fortunate as our two love birds. Lan Xichen’s warm influence just wasn’t strong enough to combat the long-term abuse our sneaky dictator received. Who he became was not his fault. He really did have it worse than Wei Wuxian. The question is, was he sound enough to refrain from murder? I feel those were choices he had control over, and he messed it up big time, man.
Interesting, huh? I’m still in a quandary.
Acting
Xiao Zhan’s performance as Wei Wuxian is amazing. Starting with the first episode, he seamlessly plays the mentally deranged Mo Xuanyu as a cover for the expert cultivator that he really is, Wei Wuxian. He also plays the innocent, teenaged Wei Wuxian who matures over time into the rogue Yiling Patriarch flawlessly. He expertly uses his body and facial expressions to switch between playful trickery and serious business. By the time he is resurrected, Wei Wuxian is a grandmaster, completely in control of his craft, and not afraid of anything that comes at him. Xiao Zhan must portray a wide range of maturity and emotion, and he does so wonderfully.
Wang Yibo is perfect as the Lan Wangji. He never breaks character and you fully believe in him as Lan Wangji. His acting is mostly nonverbal. Those micro expressions are so well-crafted, you can read everything in his eyes and face, and even his subtle body language. For example, Lan Wangji’s impenetrable face sometimes cracks just a sliver to let out a ray of light, and only for Wei Wuxian. It might be the ghost of a smile, or the transparency of love. When he is angry, it’s deadly micro-vibes. Lan Wangji is graceful and aristocratic, which Wang Yibo accomplishes in the way he holds his body. And those eyebrows. Now I know what sword brows and phoenix eyes are. Kudos to the make-up artist. I sound superficial going on about his looks, but that is partly who Lan Wangji is.
Xiao Zhan and Wang Yibo together are inseparable. I can’t imagine The Untamed without either actor in their respective roles. It would be as if either one of the characters did not exist in the story. There would be no gravity and everything would fall apart. Extremely boring.
Other memorable performances were those of Wen Ning, the Ghost General, played by Yu Bin; Jin Ling, Wei Wuxian’s nephew, Jin Ling, played by Qi Peixin; and Wei Wuxian’s younger brother, Jiang Cheng, played by Wang Zhuocheng. When I say memorable, I don’t presume to judge the performances as good or bad or discount the other talents in the production. I just liked them. No snobbery here.
Love
In The Untamed, Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji are soulmates, which in this case, is a euphemism for lovers. The original story, Mo Dao Zu Shi, includes explicit sex, which leaves no doubt whatsoever that these two are in a romantic relationship. In the live action series, however, there is no physical romance. No hand-holding, no kissing, no making out… You get where I’m going. There is no shameless behavior whatsoever. The boys communicate all things bordering on romance with their eye gaze, along with a clever subtext.
And since this is a gay romance, someone else has done a phenomenal job outlining gay-queer subtext in The Untamed, so I won’t say anymore except, “Nailed it!”
Special Effects
The Untamed is mostly a theatrical production. There are a lot of hand made sets, mechanical creature effects, and choreographed body positioning and movement. Overall, I enjoyed the special effects, even the theatrical hanky janky creatures. I felt like I was watching The Dark Crystal some of the time. Not a bad thing at all.
Finally, there is plenty of black smoke, which looks like a living entity.
Horror
Fierce corpses, evil spirits, soul eaters, puppets, possession, diagrams made of blood, dismemberment, graves and tombstones, monsters, skeletons – you name it, The Untamed has it. And through it all, Wei Wuxian is a master navigator through this phantasmagoric domain. He’s just smarter and more resourceful than everyone else. Where blood and guts and tattered bits of bodies might scare someone else to the grave, he remains unfazed and completely in control of the situation. He’s come across nearly everything you could possible dream up and invented many of the artifacts and spells used to combat these evils. The Untamed is a great show to watch around Halloween. In fact, Wei Wuxian’s birthday is October 31st. Go figure. I promise, I didn’t make that up.
Wen Ning is my favorite fierce corpse in the show. I love Wen Ning’s make-up. Not to mention, Yu Bin’s performance as Wen Ning is amazing. He made the creature adorable, vicious, and profound all together. Well done. Since I already included a bunch of pictures of creatures above in Special Effects, here are some creepy pictures of Wen Ning.
Falls
Before Wei Wuxian’s final fall off the cliff in Nightless City, he is forcibly made to fall from an object or by a person several times. Perhaps this is symbolic of persecution, for learning lessons the hard way, or a fall from grace? I don’t know. Below are some of the falls that I found.
Honorable Mentions:
The opposite of Wei Wuxian falling is PROTECTION from falling! And, surprise surprise, Lan Wangji is our hero every time. He may not let on how much he loves Wei Wuxian, but these actions speak volumes.
The Ending
If you haven’t read the original novel/book, then the ending for The Untamed might leave you worried that Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji have parted ways for good, but I agree with this assessment. Please read it and be rest assured of a happy ending. Love wins.
So, who can guess what the golden core of The Untamed is?