It is impossible to simply comment on this TV series that runs through 40 years of Chinese history.
I paraphrase a Chinese review that highly encapsulates the strengths of several different aspects of this TV-series, and his views agree with mine: this is the most daring description of ordinary civilian life that I have seen so far, the most sad and helpless story for me.
The following is paraphrased, please forgive me for the inaccurate translation.
This is a Chinese chronicle "Historical Records" (since 1948-1988), this is a "Les Miserables" which background is cooperated by the Kuomintang and the Communist Party, this is a report on the results of socialist experiments, this is a survey on the planned economy that makes people unemployed, and the market economy makes people live, this is a record of two generations of intellectual young people being coerced by the political party and reduced to pawns and destroyed, this is the contrast between the speculators of the times and those who adhere to the faith, and this is a debate on the questioning and defense of the regime. --- pay tribute to the tragic fate of the older generation of intellectuals, to history, to screenwriters!
