Wu Shan Wu Xing: Xichuan Huan Zi Lin

It's a shame that not more people are watching this. It's such an underrated and slept on show.
Close to if not same level fight animation & coreography as One Punch Man Season 1 or Eminence in Shadow. The story and characters might not be as interesting to some people but just going by the fight scenes alone it's so worth watching. I feel like if this had a Japanese Voice Over it would be incredibly popular. The music fits so well, the art style is beautiful, it's a nice breath of fresh air if you're used to just watching Japanese Animation.
To be honest it ... took quite some time until I got used to the Chinese voices when I watched the first season/first part of this show but it's so worth it if you can appreciate pretty visuals and epic fight scenes. There's even some comedy mixed in aswell which will at least make you smirk. Overall the only downside for me was that it's so short and very hard to find online.

Lot's of Japanese made big title Anime with subpar animation cluttering the release season while gems like this get buried.

Highly recommend you give it a watch even if you're just skimming through.

Review for Season 2:

Just learned a studio of six people created the best fighting animation I've ever seen in my life.

What I wanted from the series was a much more appreciated engagement with the characters, and yes, it's very little time to actually get there. Four episodes aren't nearly enough to flesh out a story… But I was wrong about that. It isn't a masterpiece in engagement, but it's an incredibly solid foundation for the character's because of their backstories.

Instead of context clues, the writers delved deeper into the why's and when's of each person, and by god, now I'm locked inside the ... series. It's a story that builds towards personal stakes, and how those destroy the world by sheer consequence of the minority. Give strong people the power to change everything, and a simple motive to do it for, and heads will instantly roll.

I took a pause from the series after the first season, but even still, the context is given to you even without fully remembering the first season. It's given organically, it isn't force-fed into the audience who might be coming instantly after, but it builds in what you knew, and recontextualizes more. The pacing, man.

It's the pacing which manages to build all these concepts on top of one another, and lead the story into a quest filled with obstacles that instead of being hyped up slowly, it just explodes. You don't need somebody to tell you how dangerous a person, or an enemy is, the series drops them into the gang, and absolutely demolishes everything in their path. I talked about the story, the characters, and their motives. The pacing, but now, what is it about those fights?

Imagine, a person is dropped into a scene, and as soon as we know their motives don't align, we don't need any other reason. The action just explodes, the choreography bursts with creativity, with an immaculate flow that can't be compared with anything else I've seen. Imagine looking at what a Dragon Ball fight tries to feel like, and actually pull off the visuals required for such an image. There are no shortcuts, there's no blur on actions, or a close-up to cut to and save money or time.

Each frame has a clear point, a clear hit, or need to be where it has to be. A character is launched, we won't get a monologue, or an analysis on what to do next. The character follows, and tries to beat the ever living sh*t out of the enemy with pinpoint accuracy, and the enemy will react and not let that happen no matter what. Instead of people saving their best movies for the end, they directly set them up, they execute them, and the damage is always seen on the sound design, on the faces, the reactions.

There's no time to waste. If a person got hurt, that's a window to keep destroying them. If there's two involved against another, both synergize and set-up attacks for the other to follow and keep fighting. There's air control, there are moves that cost too much physical power, and even when used in desperation, they might not work.

There are fights the heroes don't always win, there's loses, there are highs, there's self-destruction that doesn't do a dent.

I can keep talking about the dynamics, but I'll resume by telling you this is by far the greatest effort I've ever seen put to animation. It's the kind of animation you can't believe exists, that no human could ever in their right mind try to make, much less by a group of SIX PEOPLE. A miracle can't make something like this.

Apart from being an immaculate work of art, the story accompanying it is well worth experiencing. I care about these characters, and I want to see the protagonist win against all odds stacked against him. Specially since he doesn't even end on a good note for this season.

9/10. If the story was perfect instead of just good, this would probably land in the hall of fame in the animation landscape, at least for me.

The second season improves on what the first was good at. The visuals are more consistent, as no longer some elements look like they don’t match well with others in some scenes, and the animation during non-action sequences has improved.

The big improvement of this season was the sound effects which were mediocre in the previous one, and are now good. The music and the voice acting retain the same level or at a bit better, since now more demons appeared and they all have cool and differently sounding and well mixed and edited voices. A big change I noticed where the opening and ending, as ... the ones from the first season where quite inferior and more relaxed, and the ones from this one are slow but powerful rock ballads with traditional Chinese music vibes, very appropriate.

The fights didn’t have the same spectacular level of destruction of the ones we’ve seen so far, but had a bit better choreography since the newer characters added a bit more to their fighting styles and techniques than just an element and martial arts. The guardians use the environment far more than the protagonist, and in general the fights are no longer one against one and involve more teamwork and a bit more of strategy.

The downside has to do with the plot, since despite the first season ending with what seemed to be the setup for a big conflict, there was veeeeery liiiiittle progression from the point it left off, and the big expectations led to…nothing special, just a setup for the next and final season, as things just keep moving slowly.
There is even a problem with the writing which is the demons being unguarded. They are sealed alright, but letting them without someone watching them is plain dumb, that’s how one of them escaped in the first place. Also, characters bump into each other casually or appear out of nowhere for a fight or to save someone at the right time.

At least this season bothered to show a little more of how its world works, and gave the protagonist a backdrop story, an objective, and a strong connection with another character. By the end of the previous one, every secondary character had something they wanted to achieve, but he had nothing, he was just a badass plot device, so this season turned him into a bit of an actual character. With that said his background was shown weirdly, in the middle of a fight, as the demon itself pointed it out. Another cool aspect is how there seem to be shortcomings for using his power, as it affects his body and energy and makes the fights harder for him, and he even needs the help of others.

As a whole, if all you want is action and cool visuals, this mini franchise still keeps being a blast, but plot and characters are still very basic, mostly absent, and barely progressed much, in a far longer season, so I still can’t openly recommend it, but it is ok enough to kill some time.