Guimi Zhi Zhu: Xiaochou Pian

Honestly all the negative comments come from a Telegram Group that constantly upvotes One Piece and FMAB and downvotes everything else that has the potential to surpass them. So I wouldn't take 99% of the reviews and rating on here or IMDB seriously. The show is great, as a novel reader I don't think they could have done a better adaptation in 13 episodes. Animation is probably the best we've ever had from donghuas and animes. The story is complex but if you actually watch it, it's easy to understand and pulls you in immediately. My brother who has never read the novel loved it, ... and although found it a little more fast paced in the first three episodes, it was all cleared by the 4th. I suggest watching "Old man Neil's mysticism lessons" and the Chibi shorts as for some reason they're put separately in Western streaming media and contribute a lot to the explanation of powers and world building of the story!

OK, I'm anime only here so this will probably be different for novel readers, but I found this series to be incredibly interesting and worth watching and yet it was incredibly confusing at times.

This isn't my first donghua so I know than they tend to move quicker that japanese anime and they expect you to pay attention to details and come up with your own explanation at times and generally I don't mind that type of story telling, I like it a lot when they don't spoon feed you every answer in like 5 seconds but this was a bit too quick pacing wise.

This is ... a high concept worldbuilding and people who haven't read the novels might struggle to follow along at times. This is definitively NOT a brain off kind of watch. I highly recommend the English dub as it's very well made and it's easier to follow along (at least to me but English isn't my first language so subs are a bit harder to follow for me because I'm basically juggling 3 languages lol) The cast did a fantastic job in selling me the victorian steampunk-ish vibe of the world, so maybe consider watching the dub.

But that said the production value is off the roof, every frame is screenshot worthy, the music is emotional or epic and scaring at it fits the Lovecraftian vibe very well. The characters are interesting and I liked most of them even if I would have liked a little more time to get to know some better.

I'm definitively keeping an eye on this project, with a few tweaks it could easily become one to remember.

Watching this feels like someone hit “skip cutscene” and “fast-forward” at the same time. Every episode zips from lore dump to action to cryptic reveal like it’s trying to finish the story in record time. No time to grind bonds with characters, no time to explore the world, no time to care. The pacing kills everything. Scenes that should matter are gone in a blink, like speedrunning a boss fight without leveling up. Even Klein, the supposed protagonist, feels like a passive NPC just tagging along.

Sure, the visuals are cool—like a game trailer with insane production value. But it never stops feeling like a trailer: ... flashy, hollow, and over before you know it. Feels less like an anime, more like a badly edited game highlight reel.