Light on Series: Gold Panning (2022)

Kept me glued to my seat for so long that I might need an adhesive remover to get off now—

All in all, Gold Panning has everything I could ever ask for in a mystery drama: a compelling storyline, great execution, perfect cast, beautiful visuals and an amazing musical score that complemented each scene it accompanied.

✦ Story ✦
The unique premise of this drama, which is obviously about the cutthroat industry of gold panning like the title indicates, may or may not appeal to everyone but regardless of whether you're into it or not - this drama's main focus still lies in its premise. To describe it in a simple phrase, Gold Panning is about "Dog-eat-dog world" or "Survival of the fittest" as greed for gold (which everyone believes can grant them a better life) basically drives the actions of all the characters, but despite being greedy, they might not be completely selfish and have their own reasons that are unveiled at a steady pace with each episode.

And one thing that sets it apart from typical mystery/thriller dramas is that Gold Panning doesn't rely solely on gore and body-horror to make the drama dark or depressing. There's slight gore, there's slight body-horror, but neither of them is the main point.

However, this drama demands your full attention. You can't just play it in the background as you do other chores as each scene is crucial, purposely added, and greatly contributes to the plot. Sometimes you might think "what the hell is going on?" (I did too lol) but it's like completing a jigsaw puzzle whose picture you don't know beforehand; You only discover what it's all about after you put more and more pieces in place, and together, they start resembling something. The unpredictability, foreshadowing, and plot-twists here actually make sense in the end and this makes Gold Panning a perfect drama to binge watch as you're never bored while watching it.


✦ Characters ✦
Most of the characters were complex, flawed, morally grey/vague and fleshed out which makes them compelling to watch. I especially loved how the female characters were written, despite neither A Qiu nor A Lai getting much screentime compared to the two main characters, they still managed to be one of the most memorable characters in this drama; I mean, two strong women—one who's a single mother and the other who cross-dresses as a man—working by themselves in a male-dominated field, what can be cooler than that? Not to mention, A Lai has to be the best cross-dressing character I've ever come across. Every character here just felt so humane, so realistic, so alive. I simply loved it.

But talking about the two main characters, Chen Baojin and Wu Jianchao, separately - here's what I personally think of them:

♟ Wu Jianchao — It's the first time I've seen Liao Fan's performance and the amount of screen presence he has accurately described to me why he's known for his acting. His role as Wu Jianchao was so complex that I couldn't figure out if he's the bad guy or one of the good guys most of the time, it just kept me guessing.

♟ Chen Baojin — Chen Feiyu's acting has improved a lot! At first, I thought he can't portray 'vulnerability' during emotional scenes because it always looks as if he's holding back pent up anger (his acting isn't at fault, he just have fierce-looking eyes imo). But then, I realised it's not necessarily a bad thing and only adds to his character. Chen Baojin is a proud, stubborn teenager who's determined to go to any lengths for his main goal, so even when he cries, he doesn't look 'broken' - he looks angry like he's going to seek vengeance and want everyone to suffer tenfold for the suffering they've inflicted on him. In short, Chen Feiyu nailed his role.


✦ Music and Visuals ✦
The music, both instrumental and lyrical, really amplified the ambience that the visuals initiated. I also never felt like skipping the opening and ending themes because they were really addicting.
However, my favourite thing has to be the colouring in this drama, especially how most of the scenes had a tint of gold/yellow (they really stayed true to the title and concept even in terms of visuals) and some certain scenes were black & white - which made them seem more serious and sombre than they would've looked in normal colours. I actually had to delete some photos off my gallery because I took way too many screenshots...

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Good show but just not good enough.

Gold Panning told the story of Chen Baojin who came to Simu Goldfield to pan gold. But that's not his real intention. He came to find his brother who mysteriously disappeared. Soon, he was caught in confrontation between forces who owned each river beds, though in the surface they all acted normally, deep inside they plotted to get rid of their rivals. Greed can kill but not every man aware of that.
The twelve episode show brought us a tight package of drama without any boring second. All the actors & actresses acted good. Haunting opening soundtrack. The use of unique local dialect (when you heard it's just like a westerner who learned to speak chinese). But sadly i can't give this show a high rating more than 7 due to some cons:
1. So many scenes got cut off, especially the action part. Eg: when Alai went to Ma's hut & Ma suddenly returned, there was a tense standoff between the two. One in front of the door who realized someone was inside, & the other who prepared to attack behind the door. But the next scene, Alai was already got bound at the chair. There were just so many scenes like that. Smh.
2. A kid who in 12 episodes went missing 3 times. LoL. This already crossed the border of nonsensical.
3. Plot in the cave was rather messy, who's inside, how did he even get in, that was unclear, especially Baojin's brother who went Rambo guerilla mode & started killing people.
In conclusion, this show is good to watch but don't hope it is better than The Bad Kids, Burning Ice, or The Long Night.

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Human nature is just more complicated than this!

I'm writing this out so I can try and put my thoughts in order about this drama - cause I have so many conflicting ones...

First of all, communities existing outside of common law and the constraints of civilization is probably my favourite theme in the cinema as a whole. That's just to give you an idea how excited I was when I stumbled upon this show. And it did start very promising, weaving a pretty intricate web of suspense and ambivalence among several intriguing characters...

This doesn't follow the tired narrative where we'd see the younger brother arriving at the remote goldfield to unravel one big mystery step by step. Instead the story unfolds from several different POVs at the same time, with the brother just being one link in the chain of events. Thanks to that, there's a steady pace of reveals and new mysteries happening - you just have to have the patience to put together the various puzzle pieces sprinkled here and there by yourself. What's more, you get quickly and deeply immersed in this world thanks to the incredible attention to detail and quite creative cinematic style!!!

But then as I kept watching, I'd pause the video more and more often to let my mind focus on other things. By ep10 I had to actually force myself to continue watching.
I think the main reason for that is they just didn't delve deep enough into the psychology of the characters. Every episode has a sub-title that is like an aphorism about gold and greed f.e. "Apart from wildness, gold can lead to nowhere''. At some point, it became clear that whatever these characters do next - strike a deal, form a bond, etc. It would all just circle back to that message in the end. Which is fine, if they planned it like that - it's a storytelling device. However, what's missing is the struggle! Humans struggle with conflicting emotions (like I am now;), even if in the end we go with the predictable choice. That complexity is majorly missing in this script - and I needed that human quality to be able to connect to these characters.

This is further compounded by a very weird narrative flow. There are quite a few scenes where we'd have a very suspenseful situation, at times turning into Mexican-style standoff ...and then ...nothing.
No blow-up! No tension release!
We go from build-up straight into the fallout.
Like we'd see two characters standing at the opposite sides of a door readying for a fight. The camera would switch back and forth several times between them racking up the tension… Then next thing we see, one of them is already tied up on the floor!
So disappointing. I was like: OK, thanks! Is this freaking IKEA for me to have to play this scene in my imagination and add it by myself?
Doing it once is fine. But after it happens several times, the story just becomes monotonous, especially as there's also no surprises in how these people would act in any given situation.
Hence, needing to force myself to continue watching. Maybe if they condensed the story into 8 or 10eps, this wouldn't have irked me so much.

In the end, there were aspects of this drama I greatly enjoyed, but as a whole it awfully tired me out. Zero rewatch chance for that reason.

Still, I'm not discouraging anyone from checking it out. Gold Panning is a uniquely themed and well executed series with high-quality production values! Plenty of people seem to love it too - just sadly not me.

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A gripping drama about brotherhood and the corruption of greed

Wow, I binged this after a feature went up in the main MyDramaList page. It seemed a refreshing concept for the Light On series, which I'd heard great things about, and a good choice for my first drama with Chen Feiyu in the lead.

I was not disappointed; this was great. The greed for gold was like a lurking horror in the background, coaxing the worst out of every character and lending crowd scenes a terrifying aspect. This and the moral ambiguity of almost every character really let the moments of humanity and compassion shine through. I really felt the devotion of Baojin to his brother, to endure such conditions and danger to try to find him.

This drama felt like a classic western in the best way, the lure of gold leading to switched sides and loyalties more than once, and a threat of violence at every turn giving great thriller tension. The length and pacing was great, bingeable and not too drawn-out. The acting, effects, and overall production quality felt cinematic, and I couldn't stop watching. The ending was totally satisfying.

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When mixing good actors, script, and team, you get something awesome.

I watched some of Chen Fei Yu's dramas before and knew he was a good actor, but this production shows how good an actor can be with the right team and script. The story and the acting are excellent. This far exceeded my expectations. The whole cast was really good, The locations, photography, lighting, makeup, and sound were awesome.
We don't use to see this quality of filming standards in Chinese video production, where you use to see beautiful faces and scenery, with light and fancy stories. Obviously is not the only exception this is clearly one, and I can say it's one of the best I've seen. I think the cast was awesome, from the director to the last gaffer, Acting was superb.

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