This is a guide I have written specifically for all of the friends that I have hyped into watching The Untamed, but it is also generally for anyone with an interest in watching the show who might be more used to the conventions of American TV, like me. Apparently there’s a steep learning curve to getting into The Untamed, but I’m here to say if you stick past the first four or five episodes, you’ll be richly rewarded with ̶s̶a̶t̶i̶s̶f̶y̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶f̶a̶n̶t̶a̶s̶y̶ ̶w̶o̶r̶l̶d̶-̶b̶u̶i̶l̶d̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶d̶r̶a̶w̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶f̶r̶o̶m̶ ̶x̶i̶a̶n̶x̶i̶a̶,̶ ̶T̶o̶l̶k̶i̶e̶n̶,̶ ̶G̶R̶R̶M̶,̶ ̶a̶n̶d̶ ̶i̶m̶p̶e̶r̶i̶a̶l̶ ̶C̶h̶i̶n̶e̶s̶e̶ ̶h̶i̶s̶t̶o̶r̶y̶;̶ ̶g̶o̶r̶g̶e̶o̶u̶s̶ ̶a̶c̶t̶o̶r̶s̶ ̶i̶n̶ ̶s̶u̶m̶p̶t̶u̶o̶u̶s̶ ̶c̶o̶s̶t̶u̶m̶e̶s̶;̶ ̶l̶u̶s̶h̶ ̶p̶r̶o̶d̶u̶c̶t̶i̶o̶n̶;̶ ̶m̶y̶s̶t̶i̶c̶a̶l̶ ̶m̶a̶g̶i̶c̶ ̶s̶h̶i̶t̶ ̶a̶n̶d̶ ̶d̶e̶m̶o̶n̶i̶c̶ ̶f̶l̶u̶t̶e̶ ̶p̶l̶a̶y̶i̶n̶g̶;̶ ̶b̶u̶n̶n̶i̶e̶s̶ ̶w̶e̶a̶r̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶h̶e̶a̶d̶b̶a̶n̶d̶s̶;̶ ̶a̶n̶d̶ ̶p̶e̶r̶h̶a̶p̶s̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶m̶o̶s̶t̶ ̶s̶a̶t̶i̶s̶f̶y̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶a̶n̶d̶ ̶s̶q̶u̶e̶e̶-̶w̶o̶r̶t̶h̶y̶ ̶o̶n̶s̶c̶r̶e̶e̶n̶ ̶r̶o̶m̶a̶n̶c̶e̶ ̶t̶h̶a̶t̶ ̶I̶’̶v̶e̶ ̶s̶e̶e̶n̶ ̶s̶i̶n̶c̶e̶ ̶S̶e̶a̶s̶o̶n̶ ̶1̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶O̶u̶t̶l̶a̶n̶d̶e̶r̶ forty-five more episodes of two beautiful men falling in love.
Here is a little guide to all the stuff that I wish I knew or appreciated better when I first started watching:
What is Boys Love and How Did It Produce a No Homo Masterpiece?
The first thing that you need to know about The Untamed is that it’s a boys love drama, also BL or 耽美. Boys love, danmei, yaoi, slash fanfic — these all describe stories largely written by women and released to fan communities online usually using characters from existing intellectual properties to create fantasy pairings that often didn’t explicitly exist in the original IP. These are frequently (but not always) relationships between men, and as a genre, it is extremely horny.
Why do women write what are often quite sexually explicit romances between imaginary men? For a lot of reasons, but in a nutshell because BL writers implicitly understand how shitty and limiting traditional gender roles are, particularly those imposed on women, who often aren’t at the center of the plot and don’t act with as much agency as male characters (the damsel in distress, girl next door, manic pixie dreamgirl, etc.) (For more, see Lavin, Yang, and Zhao; Zhao; and this podcast.) So why imagine yourself into a heterosexual romance when you could just as well write a queer one that transgresses all the ways in which we’re used to narrative agency otherwise being suppressed? BL, as a genre, is an outlet for the horny, the lonely, the repressed, the shy, the kinky, the obsessed — anyone who needs something more out of the stories that predominantly circulate mainstream mass entertainment.
This brings us to perhaps the most central and fascinating paradox of The Untamed: this is the television adaptation of the BL novel The Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation 魔道祖师 by Mo Xiang Tong Xiu 墨香铜臭 depicting the star-crossed romance of two men in a fantasy xianxia world, Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji. But to make it to air in China, the show could not explicitly depict the gay stuff. So instead of holding hands they grab wrists, and instead of confessing their love they confess to being “lifelong confidants 毕生知己.” This is no homo at its finest.
I’m saving my comments on some of what I think are the fascinating consequences of depicting a gay romance on mainstream TV while simultaneously maintaining plausible deniability. I wanna talk about it with you once you get into the show. For now, here are a few of the genre and narrative conventions that might be useful to know as you dive into The Untamed:
Things You Need to Know: The Timeline is Fucked
The show starts in the middle of the timeline, with the death of the main character, Wei Wuxian, and then immediately flashes to his spirit being summoned into another person’s body sixteen years later. He returns in the body of a man named Mo Xuanyu, but Wei Wuxian and Mo Xuanyu look the same because why would you want to mess with (the actor) Xiao Zhan’s exquisite face. Also, when the story skips around timelines, the main characters go from being like 15 to 31 and back again but with no aging up or down of actors largely in their twenties, so take your marks from costume and context instead.
Wei Wuxian died on bad terms with a lot of people, so he wears a mask to avoid being recognized. Specifically, he’s trying to avoid being recognized by his brother, Jiang Cheng, and he’s not ready to see his e̶x̶-̶b̶f̶ estranged super close male friend, Lan Wangji. Wei Wuxian is mischievious, impulsive, and a chaotic flirt, and if you find his character obnoxious, please know that he is at his worst here because he is genki and just got resurrected.
Things You Need to Know: Wei Ying, Wei Wuxian, Wei Gongzi, Yiling Patriarch, and Mo Xuanyu Are All the Same Person, and Everyone Has Like Four Names or Titles
Every major character has multiple names. This can get a little confusing, but they are constantly saying each others’s names and titles all the time, so you’ll learn them pretty quickly. They are significant because the story is partly told through which registers the characters choose to interact with one another at different times. Some important names:
Birth Names vs. Courtesy Names:
Every character has a birth name and a courtesy name. You receive your courtesy name in your late teens/early twenties, and it’s the name by which most people know you. Wei Wuxian 巍无羡 is the main character’s courtesy name, and Wuxian means “without envies;” ergo Wei Wuxian is a young hotshot. The other main character’s courtesy name is Lan Wangji 蓝忘记, and “wangji” is a Daoist phrase for asceticism and forgetting worldly concerns.
Birth names are used by those with whom you are closest. It’s rude for people who don’t know you well to address you by your birth name, which Wei Wuxian does to Lan Wangji several times when they first meet to irritate him. Wei Wuxian’s birth name is Wei Ying 巍婴 (Baby Wei), and Lan Wangji’s birth name is Lan Zhan 蓝湛 (“zhan” meaning azure, or deep clear water).
Things You Need to Know: About Clans and Cultivators
There are like five major clans in the series, sort of like the different houses in Game of Thrones. They’re basically landed gentry, and because the xianxia genre/this show has no class analysis, all the major characters are aristocrats too, and therefore carry titles. Lan Wangji is also Lan Er Gongzi 蓝二公子(Second Master Lan, second because he has an older brother), and his title is Han Guang Jun 含光君 (“the lord with light-emanating from within”). Wei Wuxian is often called Wei Gongzi 巍公子 (“Master Wei”), and he earns the dubious title Yiling Patriarch 夷陵老祖 after he breaks bad. (Not a spoiler because you learn this in like the first two minutes of the show!)
Cultivators:
In this story, there are normal people and then there are cultivators 修师. Everybody wants to be a cultivator, who are sort of like Daoist knights that can perform wizardry and spells. Cultivators train within their clans, but sometimes there are like academic exchanges conducted with other clans, and the plotline where young Wei Wuxian trains at Gusu for half a year is sort of like the youthful, naive, high school/academy genre portion of the show.
Once you become a powerful enough cultivator you can do things like jump onto a roof thirty feet high with balletic grace, ride a sword like a surfboard and use it as a flying means of transport, play instruments but like magically and violently, smite legendary monsters, or use talismans to open doors, restrain people, raise the dead, etc. Some of this stuff is explained on the show, but some of it isn’t, so just roll with it. Cultivators usually have a named sword 佩剑, and some of the more powerful cultivators might develop signature “first class spiritual tool 一品灵器,” which is like a weapon that develops its own spiritual presence. A focal point of polite cultivator society is the ceremonial hunt.
War of the Five Clans, Sort Of
A few more words about the clans: they each have a seat in a different part of China, and the set design, costume, and makeup, all take their cues from the geography and cultures with which each clan is associated. The Lan clan are like elvin warrior monks living in the misty mountains of Jiangxi province, and Wei Wuxian’s Jiang clan are like a prosperous river-trading clan of Hubei province. The big baddie Wen clan lives in the demonic Nightless City, and the set looks like Mordor meets the desolate coal mines of Shanxi. The Jin clan are basically the Lannisters, rich, presumptuous, and always draped in gold, and the Nie clan is supposed to be from Hebei — historically important but also kind of useless, which kind of explains a lot as the story goes on.
Things You Need To Know: C-Drama Is Not Prestige TV
Another thing to keep in mind is that this is c-drama. It is not prestige TV, and doesn’t look or sound like it. All the faces you see are lit in the softest of light, and all the voices you hear are dubbed. It’s rare to find a costume c-drama series that is not dubbed. But that doesn’t mean the acting can’t be subtle — Wang Yibo’s success as Lan Wangji has everything to do with his mastery of the stoic microexpression, and watching Xiao Zhan’s face as he performs Wei Wuxian is like a Stradivarius in the hands of a world-class violinist — you find yourself wanting to see what his face looks like in different lighting, at different angles, turned different ways, in motion with the full range of expressions.
Also, because this is c-drama: it is melodramatic, and it is going to give you what you want. You will be primed for major plot reveals well in advance, reminded of important events as they occur, and probably also get a nice montage afterward summarizing the emotional impact of what just happened. The soundtrack will cue your emotions with Pavlovian immediacy, and after characters get separated in a heart-breaking way, you don’t have to wait like four episodes for their long-awaited reunion/your emotional payoff. As soon as you get the feels, the show is going to give you more.
Things You Need to Know: It’s Not Just You, Everyone is Gay
If everyone seems gay to you, that’s because they are. Heterosexual relationships are in the minority on this show, and they are also the most disappointing and frustrating. I will say no more but fuck Jin Zixuan and Jiang Yanli, lotus root and pork rib soup isn’t even that good don’t @ me. The only on screen kiss is completely wasted on a disgusting clan leader and sex worker.
Instead, let’s focus on what’s good: not only do we get a gay couple at the center of the show, everyone else is definitely ambiguously gay! The show queer-codes villains like Xue Yang with lascivious smiles and giggly laughter, but somehow when you also queer-code the entire supporting cast it doesn’t feel problematic the same way Ursula or Jafar’s queer-coding does.
Everyone exists in overlapping circles of homosociality and homosexuality: Lan Xichen, Nie Mingjue, and Meng Yao/Jin Guangyao are “sworn brothers” but also a little more, while Xiao Xingchen and Song Lan are just like two inseparable dudes who wander the earth and belong to one another, and eventually become your committed gay couple mentors. The show is a sausagefest, albeit one that hits different, or at least not the way that gif of all the sausages falling on your face does. At its best, the show joyfully expands the sorts of platonic and romantic male intimacy depicted on mainstream TV, but a word of caution: this comes at the cost of reproducing the dispensability of women characters (pay attention to how the plot lines end for Jiang Yanli, Wen Qing, Mian Mian, and Yu Furen.)
So, I’m going to end it there. There’s more to say, but I think these are the essential things to know if you want to make it over The Untamed’s steep learning curve. There’s lots of bunnies and happily ever after on the other side.
