This under-the-radar Netflix show is ‘like Monkey on steroids’
When I fell into watching Judge Dee’s Mystery, my very first C-drama, it was with an overriding sense of relief - and joy.
C-drama, for the uninitiated, which until very recently included me, is Chinese drama, usually in Mandarin with English subtitles. It is immensely popular with vast Chinese audiences inside and outside China. But it has barely attracted any Western attention. But now Netflix is streaming this big-budget murder mystery action drama about Di Renji, a humble detective who becomes a judge and an imperial court official. Critics have likened him to a Chinese Sherlock Holmes.
Actor Yiwei Zhou as Di Renjie in Judge Dee’s Mystery.Credit: Netflix
This show is so under the radar it doesn’t even have its own Wikipedia entry, and Netflix’s own PR needed to look it up when I enquired.
But in just a few episodes Judge Dee’s Mystery has become my favourite thing on TV, which is a lot for a diehard Doctor Who fan to admit. It feels like the series I had been waiting for since I was a kid back in the 1980s entranced by ABC cult hit Monkey.
“It’s like Monkey on steroids” is how my brother and life-long TV-watching companion described it.
Like Monkey, the Japanese series based on a 16th-century Chinese novel, it has big action sequences and an oddball gang of charming misfits. But unlike Monkey, it is very complex, violent and gory.
This time around, instead of supernatural demons and monsters blowing tiny minds of 1980s school kids, intricate murder mysteries and head-spinning plot twists – as well as lavish depictions of the bustling imperial court and rural outposts – leave adult audiences with a sense of joy.
The stolen imperial seal of Empress Wu Zeitan places her reform agenda in jeopardy.Credit: Netflix
Our hero is Di Renjie, a calm, B-type personality who embodies ancient Chinese values and favours logic and the law over superstition and the supernatural. He’s a dab hand at martial arts but drinks too much, which is a dangerous habit when shadowy forces are out to get you.
His gang consists of his patient old family retainer Hong Liang, himbo man of action Qiao Tai who provides the muscle and comic relief, and streetwise offsider Ma Rong, who finds herself in a drinking challenge with local henchman in a scene that recalls Raiders of the Lost Ark.
“Drink with Ma Rong? You are courting death,” Qiao Tai declares.
Watching this show was a relief because this Chinese storytelling is a break from standard Western drama. Detective Di doesn’t say “f—” all the time, doesn’t partake in trauma porn and is not in a daytime soapie dressed up as an expensive Regency costume drama. And it was a joy because the show, which China Daily called a “modern take on ancient detective tales”, was so good.
As the series opens, the imperial seal of the Empress is stolen, plunging the royal court into turmoil. The seal is then used to order the governor of Yangzhou to take his own life for “going against the rules of Heaven”. Then an ancient tree is hit by lightning and bursts into flames, stunning locals into believing it is a sign from the gods. And that, literally, is all in the first two minutes.
We are in China during the first century Tang Dynasty and reformist Empress Wu Zetain is vulnerable to power plays from palace officials.
“Like you, she loves to fight against fate,” an ally of Di Renji tells him.
The spirited action sequences give way to hints about the young Di Renji and the mysterious fate that befell his father. And then there’s the delicious political intrigue at the palace as forces range against the vulnerable Empress who is keen to modernise. Or, at least that was how it seemed to this ignorant Laowai. Things are never quite as they seem in this series.
Di Renji fights off an opponent in one of many spectacular action sequences. Credit: Netflix
There’s something rather wonderful to know that a real-life detective who lived from 630 AD to 700 AD and became an official in the Tang Dynasty lives on in contemporary culture and is providing much-needed entertainment during these chilly winter nights of 2024.
This is thanks to ancient Chinese storytelling and author Dutch author Robert van Gulik who adapted the stories in the 1950s. His novels were regarded as a cultural bridge between East and West and now this series is too, thanks to Chinese networks CCTV-8 and Youku as well as Netflix.
It’s the distraction you need. The series is 32 episodes of about 50 minutes each, so that’s your winter sorted.
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