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douban scored 8.1, the best suspense drama in 2024, a large-scale drama with ruthless characters... there have been many voices praising "border water memories" in recent times.

the curious story, good actors and the spectacle brought by the exotic make "backwater" particularly special among the summer tv series that are coming to an end.

although it has received rave reviews, judging from the current broadcast status, "the past by the water" still has some aspects that are worth discussing. some of these not-so-good aspects are unique to "the past by the water", but more are common to domestic tv dramas.

it is hard to say whether "the past by the water" can maintain its original vitality and reputation until the finale.

the pros and cons of language

"bian shui past" is adapted from the novel of the same name by writer shen xingxing. the author wrote it based on his one-year experience as a truck driver in southeast asia, delivering daily necessities to drug dealers in the mountains.

the tv series blurs the boundaries between countries and regions, and creates a fictional southeast asian border town called sanbianpo. in sanbianpo, everything that happens can be called a spectacle, with no modern civilization, no laws, smuggling, gambling, and drug trafficking everywhere, and local armed forces living in savagery with gangs from various gray industries.

the protagonist shen xing, played by guo qilin, broke into this wonder and presented all the subsequent stories. compared with the protagonist in the original novel who appeared as a cold-eyed bystander, shen xing in the play was completely immersed in it.

guo qilin plays shen xingtu/official weibo of "bian shui past"

in fact, the audience is not unfamiliar with themes such as drugs, money, and violence. in order to bring the audience into the spectacle, the film crew has obviously put a lot of effort into it, and the architecture, costumes, props, and colors of the pictures are all very sophisticated. in order to enhance the degree of immersion in the spectacle, "waterside past" has created a unique systematic language called "bomo language".

according to official introduction, "bomo language" is not made up, but a brand-new language system created based on linguistic principles. in the creation process of "bomo language", not only the authenticity of the language was taken into consideration, but also the difficulty of learning for the actors. in the design of initials and finals, sounds that are easy for native chinese speakers to pronounce were selected, including 17 initials and 7 finals. in terms of tones, "bomo language" has designed 4 tones, which are similar to mandarin. actors only need to master one tone to speak "bomo language" with regional accents.

creating a language is not uncommon. tolkien created the elvish language for the lord of the rings, and the klingon language in star trek, the na'vi language in avatar, and the dothraki language in game of thrones all add color to the work. the significance of creating a language is to make the audience believe that the group has coexisted for a long enough time and has produced a unique culture or even a new civilization.

this is also reflected in "the past by the edge water". as the plot progresses, the concept of "bomo language" is constantly strengthened, and the shocking and unconventional sense of absurdity is also strengthened.

in addition to the "bomo language", the film uses a large number of actors who are proficient in southwestern dialects, such as jiang qilin, wang xun, li xiaochuan, jiang qiming, qi xi, etc. the geographical proximity of the actors' native places makes the language of the actors create a sense of authenticity and reliability, making people believe that the fictional sanbianpo is the legendary place known to everyone on earth.

this language setting makes actors who do not use "bomo" and southwestern dialects seem out of place. the language used by mao pan played by xin haojiang and yan baimei played by song jiateng can easily make the audience feel out of place. the language discomfort and immature performance caused xin haojiang's reputation to collapse.

xin haojiang was even called by the audience as the actor they most wanted to replace. if his language could be more refined, it might be able to ease the anger of some viewers.

xin haojiang plays mao pantu/official weibo of "bianshui past"

compared with the supporting actors, the main languages ​​of the two male protagonists are not "bomo" and the southwestern dialect. fortunately, the plot has laid the groundwork. shen xing, who speaks mandarin, is an outsider who accidentally entered sanbianpo, and wu zhenyu plays uncle cai, who speaks cantonese, and his father is a herbal medicine merchant from guangdong.

even so, it still makes the audience feel out of play, but compared with mao pan and yan baimei, it is bearable.

the story is still ahead of the characters

if the confusion of some languages ​​due to the establishment of "bomo language" is a problem unique to "past events by the border water", then the fact that the story starts to run wild before the characters are well established is a common problem in our tv dramas in recent years.

"past events by the border water" adopts the form of a unit drama, using several episodes to tell a story with the same characters and connected stories, trying to outline a complete appearance of sanbianpo.

the initial "pigeon blood red" section is indeed exciting enough. shen xing went to his uncle, entered sanbianpo, and accidentally joined uncle cai's gang, and then embarked on a bizarre adventure. in this story, the audience's perspective is similar to shen xing's, everything is unknown, everything is new.

when money, greed, and violence are pushed in front of us all at once, the arc of human nature is magnified at the same time. dan tuo played by jiang qilin, wang anquan played by jiang qiming, and wu haishan played by wang xun all stand out in this link, and even qian lei, who plays a crazy stone gambler, has portrayed the character very fully.

the fundamental reason is that the story of "pigeon blood red" is relatively complete, with prominent contradictions, logical connection and distinct characteristics.

but when entering the "cold chain cattle trading" section, the story speeds up suddenly, and the characters suddenly fly. aisuo, chapa, lanbo and even mao pan are all stereotyped and instrumentalized, and the protagonist shen xing shuttles among these instrumentalized characters and continuously upgrades and grows smoothly.

this sense of detachment is particularly evident in the section where shen xing finds the tapir and seeks to exchange for his uncle. the "auspicious sign from heaven" makes ai suo look like a fool. the plot advances too fast, so that the rationality in the middle is lost.

this feeling is very similar to domestic mobile games. when players first download and explore the game, they will still think about the plot and operations. suddenly, after spending money, all the plots are skipped.

shen xing's growth rate is so fast that it is distorted, making this character suddenly blurred, and this feeling is particularly obvious in the "casino" section. shen xing, who suddenly became independent, is no longer as convincing as he was at the beginning, both in terms of internal logic and behavior.

more importantly, guo qilin was very good at presenting the segment of "the stupid son of a landlord experiencing life", but it was really difficult for him to play the role of a big brother who could protect his younger brother. after wu zhenyu gradually entered his comfort zone, it was difficult for guo qilin's performance to be applauded.

guo qilin (left) and wu zhenyu (right)'s rivalry photo/official weibo of "waterside story"

some of the scenes between guo qilin and wu zhenyu even made people ignore the spectacular scenes of sanbianpo, and instead returned to the hong kong movies of ten years ago. when the emotional scenes between shen xing and liu jincui gradually increased, the audience felt a sense of déjà vu.

the actions of some characters lose their motivation, and the growth of the protagonists seems insincere.mental disability, the protagonists’ success doesn’t seem that impressive.

the marvel universe has proven this to us many times.

not ending badly may be the key

compared with the original work by shen xingxing, the tone of the drama version of "the past by the water" is much warmer. although the naked, cold and cruel human nature is presented, it is not so sharp. the jungle feeling of each character caused by survival is not so strong, and sometimes it even deliberately creates some warmth for the audience to adapt.

from the perspective of safe broadcasting, these adaptations are fine, and some of them are even quite clever. however, with the improvement of public aesthetics and the growth of social media, it is difficult for a tv series to just rely on editing roadshows, short videos of cp, and repeated playback of trailers to cover up its shortcomings.

no matter how brilliant it was before, once a tv series or film has some flaws, it will be immediately criticized, and even face the loss of public opinion and the collapse of word of mouth. so compared with the flattering words, for "border water past", whether it can maintain a high reputation at the end may be the key to whether it can be truly recognized in the end.

the common bad ending patterns of suspense dramas are nothing more than: loss of logical motivation, the mastermind suddenly jumping out and then being suddenly eliminated, the protagonist suddenly giving up on growth and turning to love, etc.

since the show was aired, the producers still have a few questions left unanswered. the first is what role kyaw sin tun will play in the later part of the story, and what kind of tug-of-war will there be between shen xing and kyaw sin tun. but whether it is shen xing turning against him and sending uncle chai to prison, or uncovering kyaw sin tun's identity as a corrupt policeman, there was too little foreshadowing for kyaw sin tun before. kyaw sin tun is too mysterious, and another "auspicious" turn will disappoint the audience.

gan yunchen plays juexin tuntu/official weibo of "border water past"

the second is the transformation of shen xing's co-worker guo limin. in the series, he has shown a tendency to become abnormal as he is constantly humiliated. in fact, guo limin's existence is a mirror for shen xing. the two are the same kind of people, but they have taken completely different paths. guo limin's ending may be an explanation for the logic of shen xing's previous behavior. whether guo limin's story can be told well is also an important basis for judging whether the show has a bad ending.

of course, as a product that provides entertainment value to the audience, "waterside past" has already advised the audience in the carefully crafted ending song, which can be said to be sincere:

"climb the mountains, collect water, and make a living; brother, sister, don't think too much."

author: ji an bing