Thousand Autumns is a Chinese wuxia-style redemption donghua based on a Chief Disciple (clan successor) of the righteous sect Mount Xuandu, Shen Qiao who becomes involved in a plot of assassination. In the world of Thousand Autumns is mainly split into 2 factions: righteous and evil; Shen Qiao finds himself targeted by assassins from the evil Beimu Clan by the conspiration of his fellow brother disciple and elders. Shen Qiao becomes poisoned and falls of a cliff narrowly evading death and chances upon Yan Wushi, Evil Huanyue sect leader. Now a crippled blind, Shen Qiao has been replaced in Mount Xuandu and no longer has status; However, Yan Wushi takes care of him and tests Shen Qiao's righteous resolve as he encounters the world from the bottom of society. Eventually, Shen Qiao opens his eyes on worldly affairs from the bottom and shares his sympathies with commoners like his Master insists. His journey of the world is a test he takes upon himself to find his identity.
Story: 5/10
Thousand Autumn has an interesting plot that I have not rarely seen in other donghua, it reminds me of Mortal's Journey. The way Shen Qiao falls from the top and integrates himself in the bottom of society experiencing hardships and enduring it to progress is a nice show don't tell method of story-telling that isn't restricted to montages or timeskips unlike Mortal's Journey. However, that is also why I didn't particularly enjoy this series - it has a lot of inconsistencies and parts that I just don't understand. Firstly, Shen Qiao who has now fallen and become somewhat of a cripple is injured and blind - In the entire series when he fights he is always projecting himself as he has internal injuries that haven't healed. Logically, I would heal myself and grind cultivation to not get hurt again and stay out of the spot light. Secondly, in the beginning of the series Shen Qiao constantly makes it a point to visit Mount Xuandu but he has no place there anymore so his journey there is only to talk to his brother disciple the main co-conspirator in his betrayal - Now he needs to fight his brother disciple to leave the place but with no inner qi or cultivation base for that matter and ends up getting saved by his bestfriend Yan Wushi. Thirdly, multiple times throughout the series he has encounters with Bai Rong who is literally all red-flags because she is the enemy yet she helps him (probably because of the second Solarity) and a second later she is in conflict with him - eventually switching between those two states as the story progresses. Essentially, the execution of events are what I didn't like about the story; Shen Qiao is constantly taking Ls because of his twisted, stubborn logic which is a sign of progress in the beginning but it just gets to the point where it doesn't become enjoyable.
Art & Sound: 7/10
The art and animation were very high quality which is a sign of large budget; The male characters faces are very glossy and soft and peachy red with a lot of smooth seemingly motion tracked facial expressions. The fight scenes are well coreographed and have somewhat significance in the development of the plot and also aren't over the top overpowering. The blow exchanges appear realistic apart from the colorful qi particles that exit characters during the fights. However, I did notice at 8:04 in episode 1 Kunye was fighting on the top of a cliff when Shen Qiao fell and when he entered the scene he's seen floating on a raft at the bottom of the cliff - how he can find/make a raft in a matter of minutes beats logic but there are many instances of scenes that don't make logical sense like this in the series which is kind of hard to un-see.
The sound, music and VA were very high quality. Most of the series is covered in suspenseful music which definitely suites the aura of fighting and mystery.
Character: 2/10
This series doesn't appear to value characters as every other character apart from Shen Qiao and Yan Wushi are used to set the scene. Characters like Bai Rong come and go in the series which makes them hard to grasp and more like a filler character to narrate the story for us to consume. Other characters like the monk create friction between Yan Wushi as they come and go as well. They are afraid to kill of superficially developed characters because they still have value in Shen Qiao's redemption and its the commoner characters that get killed off instead. Also one instance where the character development makes no sense is when Shen Qiao trusts the commoner guy that sides with the powerful emperor assistant (or something) when they get the carriage to leave the city, Shen Qiao literally leaves the city without the carriage which doesn't really make sense since he asked for a carriage and also nobody thought to pursue them outside of the city....
Enjoyment & Overall: 4/10
The story is good but I don't like the characters, especially the main character because of the illogical decisions and personality that is developed throughout the series is not fun to watch. This might not be suitable for my taste anyway but in terms of progression Mortal's Journey is much better structured and reveals more information to viewer.
