The Legend of the Condor Heroes (2017) Review: Is This the Best Modern Wuxia Series?
Some television series take three episodes to get going. The Legend of the Condor Heroes takes 52 episodes to finish going.
That sounds intimidating, particularly if your recent viewing habits have been trained by eight-episode streaming dramas that still somehow find time for an entire episode about someone’s childhood trauma. Yet the length is part of the appeal here. The 2017 adaptation of Jin Yong’s enormously influential wuxia novel has room for rival martial arts schools, doomed romances, political intrigue, Mongol warriors, wandering masters, secret manuals, betrayals, bizarre techniques and enough dramatic entrances to make walking normally through a doorway seem rather unimaginative.
Directed by Jeffrey Chiang, the 2017 series stars Yang Xuwen as Guo Jing, Li Yitong as Huang Rong, Chen Xingxu as Yang Kang and Meng Ziyi as Mu Nianci. It runs for 52 episodes and adapts Jin Yong’s classic novel with considerably more patience than many modern television adaptations would dare attempt.
For anyone curious about wuxia but unsure where to start, this remains one of the easiest modern introductions to the genre. It can be melodramatic, the visual effects occasionally show their age, and the pacing definitely expects commitment. I also found it ridiculously easy to become attached to its world.
Seven Swords rating: 9/10
The Legend of the Condor Heroes at a Glance
| Detail | Information |
|---|---|
| Original title | 射雕英雄传 |
| English title | The Legend of the Condor Heroes |
| Year | 2017 |
| Genre | Wuxia, historical adventure, romance |
| Episodes | 52 |
| Director | Jeffrey Chiang |
| Based on | The Legend of the Condor Heroes by Jin Yong |
| Guo Jing | Yang Xuwen |
| Huang Rong | Li Yitong |
| Yang Kang | Chen Xingxu |
| Mu Nianci | Meng Ziyi |
| Country | China |
| Language | Mandarin |
| Seven Swords rating | 9/10 |
The series originally aired in China in 2017 and is one of numerous screen adaptations of Jin Yong’s novel. That history matters because Condor Heroes is less like an obscure book receiving a television adaptation and more like a major cultural property being interpreted by another generation.
What Is The Legend of the Condor Heroes About?
The story unfolds during the conflict between the Southern Song, the Jurchen-led Jin dynasty and the expanding Mongol world.
At its centre are Guo Jing and Yang Kang, two young men whose fathers were friends but whose lives develop in radically different directions.
Guo Jing grows up among the Mongols. He is earnest, loyal and spectacularly incapable of spotting certain kinds of deception. He is not stupid exactly, but when Huang Rong enters his life it becomes immediately apparent which member of the partnership has been allocated most of the cunning.
Yang Kang follows a darker route. Raised believing himself to be a Jin prince, he becomes trapped between his birth, status, ambition and the truth about his family.
Around them sits a much larger martial world of masters, sects and wandering fighters. Central to many of these rivalries is the Nine Yin Manual, a legendary martial arts text coveted by some of the most dangerous fighters alive.
The political story matters, but Condor Heroes is ultimately about character. Who deserves loyalty? What makes somebody honourable? Does upbringing determine identity? What happens when ambition becomes more important than principle?
And, perhaps most importantly, how many martial arts masters can mysteriously appear in one person’s life before they start asking questions?
Quite a few, apparently.
Guo Jing Is an Unusual Kind of Hero
Guo Jing is one of the main reasons the story works.
Modern fantasy protagonists are often clever, sarcastic and conveniently competent. Guo Jing is almost aggressively sincere.
Yang Xuwen plays him as a young man whose greatest strengths are perseverance and decency rather than intelligence. He frequently needs techniques explained repeatedly. He trusts people he probably should not. More sophisticated characters run intellectual circles around him.
Yet he keeps learning.
That makes his progression as a martial artist satisfying because it feels earned. Guo Jing collects teachers and techniques throughout the story, but his development is based on persistence rather than discovering that he was secretly brilliant all along.
There is also something refreshing about a hero whose morality is not treated as naïveté that must eventually be abandoned.
Guo Jing becomes formidable without becoming cynical.
Huang Rong Quietly Steals the Series
Then there is Huang Rong.
Li Yitong’s performance is probably my favourite part of the adaptation.
Where Guo Jing is straightforward, Huang Rong is mischievous, observant and strategically ruthless when necessary. She can read a situation several moves ahead while Guo Jing is still deciding whether everyone involved might perhaps become friends.
Their relationship works because the contrast rarely feels forced.
Huang Rong is not simply there to admire the hero. She solves problems, manipulates enemies, understands martial politics and regularly rescues situations that physical strength alone cannot fix.
Li Yitong gives her an infectious combination of intelligence and playfulness. Huang Rong can move from charming to dangerous surprisingly quickly, which feels exactly right for a character raised by Huang Yaoshi, one of the strangest and most formidable masters in the story.
The chemistry between Huang Rong and Guo Jing gives the series much of its warmth.
Yang Kang Makes the Story More Interesting
If Guo Jing represents loyalty and moral consistency, Yang Kang represents compromise.
Chen Xingxu gets the more complicated role.
Yang Kang discovers truths that threaten his entire identity. Instead of accepting them cleanly, he struggles against them. Status, resentment, family and ambition keep pulling him in different directions.
This could easily have produced a fairly basic villain.
It does not.
Yang Kang is frustrating precisely because you can understand enough of his choices to keep hoping he will make a better one next time.
He frequently does not.
There is something painfully human about that.
His relationship with Mu Nianci adds another layer because it repeatedly places genuine affection against his capacity for selfishness. The result is one of the darker emotional threads running through the series.
The Martial Arts Masters Are Half the Fun
The younger characters provide the main narrative, but Condor Heroes becomes truly entertaining once the legendary martial artists start arriving.
The martial world is dominated by figures including:
- Hong Qigong, the Northern Beggar and master of the Eighteen Dragon-Subduing Palms
- Huang Yaoshi, the eccentric Eastern Heretic and father of Huang Rong
- Ouyang Feng, the dangerous Western Venom
- Reverend Yideng, the Southern Emperor
- Zhou Botong, the wonderfully unpredictable Old Urchin
- Wang Chongyang, whose reputation hangs over the martial world
These characters make the world feel older than the protagonists.
Guo Jing is entering a martial culture with existing grudges, reputations, rivalries and philosophical disagreements. Masters recognise one another’s techniques. Schools have histories. Knowledge passes between generations.
It gives the setting a sense of continuity that many fantasy television series struggle to create.
It also means that somebody who initially appears to be a random elderly man wandering around the countryside may turn out to be capable of flattening half the cast.
A sensible rule for wuxia generally: respect the old people.
How Good Are the Fight Scenes?
This is where the 2017 adaptation earns much of its reputation.
The fights retain the exaggerated qualities of wuxia without turning every encounter into weightless digital spectacle. Characters leap impossible distances and channel extraordinary martial techniques, but there is usually a physical rhythm beneath the fantasy.
Weapons clash. Bodies move through space. Footwork matters. Fighters circle and probe rather than immediately exploding into clouds of computer-generated energy.
The choreography also reflects personality.
Guo Jing’s fighting gradually becomes powerful and direct. Huang Rong relies more heavily on agility and deception. Hong Qigong’s techniques have the relaxed confidence of somebody who understands precisely how dangerous he is.
The production is not flawless. Some visual effects are considerably less convincing than the physical choreography, and there are moments where the wires and digital enhancement become rather enthusiastic.
Oddly, I found that part of the charm after a while.
The important thing is that the fights usually tell you something about the characters rather than merely interrupting the plot.
Swords, Spears and Weapons in the Series
For a site called Seven Swords, we should probably discuss the pointy things.
One of the strengths of The Legend of the Condor Heroes is that its martial world is not built around swords alone. Different weapons support different fighting traditions and character identities.
Jian
The straight, double-edged Chinese jian appears throughout the wider martial setting. Its associations with precision, refinement and skilled swordsmanship fit naturally within the series’ world of elite martial artists.
Dao
Single-edged dao blades represent another major family of Chinese weapons. Their cutting-oriented design provides a visual and practical contrast with the straighter jian.
Spears
Spears feature prominently within both military and martial contexts. Yang Kang’s connection to spear techniques is particularly significant because of his family history.
Staffs and Sticks
The Dog-Beating Staff is among the most famous weapons in Jin Yong’s fictional martial world.
Its importance is not really about the object itself. The staff represents authority within the Beggars’ Sect, while its associated techniques depend on timing, deception and technical skill.
Bows
Guo Jing’s Mongol upbringing also gives archery unusual prominence for a wuxia protagonist.
The bow connects him to the steppe environment in which he grows up and distinguishes his early martial identity from the sword-focused fighters commonly associated with the genre.
How Historically Accurate Are the Weapons?
This is wuxia rather than historical reconstruction, so expectations need calibrating.
The broad weapon families have historical foundations. Jian, dao, spears, staffs and composite bows all belong within China’s enormous martial and military history.
Their presentation in the series, however, operates within a deliberately legendary tradition.
People cannot actually propel themselves across courtyards using qinggong, unfortunately. Nor will mastering a sufficiently impressive palm technique allow you to start violating basic physics.
The interesting historical element is the diversity of martial culture shown on screen. Civilian martial traditions, military weapons, regional identities and philosophical schools overlap constantly.
It is fantasy built upon recognisable Chinese martial concepts rather than an attempt at documentary realism.
The Mongol Setting Gives the Story Real Scale
One aspect I particularly like is Guo Jing’s upbringing among the Mongols.
Genghis Khan and the expanding Mongol Empire are not simply distant background references. They become part of Guo Jing’s personal story.
That gives the series an unusual geographical scale.
The narrative can move from steppe warfare and mounted archery into the intricate social world of Chinese martial sects without making either feel completely disconnected.
Tay Ping Hui portrays Genghis Khan, placing a historical figure directly alongside Jin Yong’s fictional characters.
Historical purists will obviously find plenty to challenge. This remains fiction. But the political backdrop gives the personal conflicts considerably more weight.
Guo Jing’s loyalties eventually matter beyond martial arts rivalries.
Production and Visual Style
The 2017 adaptation looks remarkably confident when it trusts physical locations, costumes and traditional staging.
There is greenery everywhere. Mountains, rivers, courtyards and forests give the story a tangible landscape.
That matters in wuxia.
Martial arts fiction often treats geography almost like another character. A mountain is not merely a mountain. It is probably where an eccentric master has spent twenty years developing a technique with an unnecessarily poetic name.
The series was filmed at locations including Xiangshan Film and Television City.
The production generally avoids making the world look excessively polished. Costumes feel worn enough to belong to travelling characters, while natural landscapes help sell the enormous journey undertaken by Guo Jing and Huang Rong.
The CGI is more inconsistent.
Some effects work perfectly well within the heightened style. Others look very much like television effects from the mid-2010s.
I would not let that put you off. The physical production does most of the heavy lifting.
Does the 52-Episode Length Hurt It?
Sometimes.
There is no point pretending otherwise.
At approximately 45 minutes per episode, 52 episodes represents a serious commitment.
Certain storylines linger. Characters separate and reunite. Misunderstandings occasionally survive longer than my patience would ideally permit.
But the length also provides something increasingly rare in television adaptations: space.
Guo Jing’s development does not need to be compressed into a montage. Supporting characters can disappear and return much later. Relationships change gradually. Martial techniques become recognisable because you actually spend time watching characters learn them.
The world becomes familiar.
By episode 30, somebody mentioning a martial master or sect does not feel like exposition anymore. You know who they mean and probably have an opinion about them.
That is difficult to achieve in eight episodes.
How Faithful Is It to Jin Yong’s Novel?
The 2017 version is generally regarded as a comparatively faithful adaptation, and that closeness to the novel is one of its major attractions. Viewer responses have particularly praised how closely the characters and early plot resemble the source material, although some material is inevitably compressed later in the series.
That does not mean every scene or detail survives intact.
Television has different requirements from prose, and Jin Yong’s story contains enough characters, martial lore and political context to overwhelm an adaptation that tried to reproduce absolutely everything.
What the 2017 series gets right is the underlying structure and personality of the story.
Guo Jing still develops slowly.
Huang Rong remains central rather than decorative.
The martial masters retain their eccentricities.
The political world continues to intersect with personal loyalty.
Most importantly, the adaptation understands that Condor Heroes needs time.
What Hasn’t Aged So Well?
The visual effects are the obvious answer.
Some CGI sequences look rough beside newer Chinese productions. One contemporary review of the series specifically praised the fight choreography while describing some of the effects as noticeably weak.
There are also stylistic conventions that may take adjustment for viewers coming to Chinese television for the first time.
Characters can be extremely earnest. Emotional revelations are rarely treated casually. People explain martial techniques with completely straight faces regardless of how wonderfully extravagant their names sound.
Personally, I would rather have that sincerity than endless ironic dialogue.
The series believes in its own world.
That confidence carries it through many of the rougher technical moments.
Best Characters in the Series
My rough ranking would be:
Huang Rong
Clever, funny and consistently capable of moving the story somewhere unexpected.
Hong Qigong
Exactly the sort of wandering martial arts master you hope will appear in a wuxia series.
Guo Jing
His decency becomes increasingly endearing as the story develops.
Huang Yaoshi
Intimidating, eccentric and impossible to predict.
Yang Kang
Frequently infuriating, which is precisely why he works.
Zhou Botong
Proof that becoming one of the world’s greatest martial artists does not necessarily require becoming emotionally mature.
Is The Legend of the Condor Heroes Good for Wuxia Beginners?
Yes, although you need to accept the episode count.
If you have watched films such as Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon or played games influenced by Chinese martial arts fantasy and wondered where many of these ideas originate, Condor Heroes provides an excellent route into the broader wuxia tradition.
You will encounter:
- martial arts sects and schools
- legendary masters
- named techniques
- qinggong
- secret manuals
- wandering heroes
- political conflicts
- questions of honour and loyalty
- highly complicated romantic relationships
- elderly people who are terrifyingly good at kung fu
By the end, many conventions that initially seem strange begin to make complete sense within the genre.
Who Should Watch It?
Watch The Legend of the Condor Heroes if you enjoy:
- wuxia and Chinese martial arts stories
- long-form character development
- elaborate fight choreography
- historical fantasy
- martial arts rivalries
- adventure stories with large casts
- traditional weapons and fighting styles
- fantasy worlds where techniques and schools have their own histories
You may struggle with it if you need extremely fast pacing, consistently modern CGI or television seasons that can be completed over one conveniently unproductive weekend.
This is a commitment.
Fortunately, it is a rather enjoyable one.
Where Can You Watch The Legend of the Condor Heroes 2017?
Availability varies by country and can change, so streaming listings should always be checked locally.
At the time of writing, the series has an official listing on iQIYI, where it is listed as a 52-episode Mandarin wuxia drama.
I would favour official licensed versions where possible, particularly because subtitle quality matters enormously with a story containing this many characters, techniques, titles and organisations.
A dodgy translation can turn an already complicated martial hierarchy into advanced administrative work.
Final Verdict
9/10
The Legend of the Condor Heroes is not flawless television. Its CGI can wobble, the pacing occasionally wanders and 52 episodes will immediately eliminate viewers looking for something short.
Yet I would hesitate to recommend cutting much of it.
The time spent travelling with Guo Jing and Huang Rong is what gives the story its weight. Masters become familiar faces. Techniques acquire meaning. Rivalries develop histories. Characters who initially seem ridiculous can become unexpectedly moving.
Li Yitong’s Huang Rong is particularly good, while Yang Xuwen gives Guo Jing the sincerity required to stop his character from feeling simplistic.
Most importantly, the series understands why wuxia is compelling. The fighting is entertaining, but martial skill is rarely treated as the final measure of a person. Power matters less than what somebody chooses to do with it.
And yes, occasionally that moral philosophy involves someone being launched across a courtyard by an elderly martial arts master.
I see no problem with this.
