Wang Xiaoshi is such a great, classic hero of the Wuxia genre: pure, selfless, moral and righteous. Joseph Zeng does a solid job portraying his earnestness in the beginning, his sense of duty and justice later, and the pain that comes with the losses and sacrifices encountered by all the greatest Jianghu heroes.

The heart (and heartbreak) of this story is in the bond between the three sworn brothers. Romance is secondary, maybe even tertiary. The female lead is admittedly pretty underdeveloped as a character, but she is not the main focus (to me, she is almost a supporting character, with the 2nd and perhaps even the 3rd FLs carrying more weight). Despite that, and despite her seemingly fluffy and somewhat spoiled personality, I still found her quite likable and very sensible. It's a healthy and supportive relationship with no annoying misunderstandings.

Like most Wuxia stories, our main character is but one of a large ensemble cast of important supporting characters who get a ton of screen time (but not in a boring, draggy way, IMHO): friends, family, respected elders, and powerful villains. Some are simple and somewhat one-dimentional, while others are compelling and intriguing from the moment they are introduced. Yang Tong, especially, is perfectly cast as the mysterious and complicated Di Feijing, and definitely a favourite. I'd love to see him in more leading roles. This is also my first period drama with Baron Chen, who was great as a revered hero and martial arts master within the Jianghu world.

I haven't read the novel, so I have no source material to compare it to. On it's own, I found Heroes to actually be one of the better Wuxia dramas I've seen, especially recently. It is visually well done, and the actors convincingly pulled off the respectable martial arts choreography. Nothing more distracting than obvious wirework and overdone slow-mo-fast-zoom effects! There is a bit of unevenness in the storytelling and some of the character developments, but in my view, none of it is as messy, convoluted or hackneyed as some have suggested. I have a Gold Standard for egregiously butchered storytelling and endings, and this one doesn't even come close! While it won't be high on my rewatch list, it was still worth my time. Don't let the 7.8 (at the time of this writing) fool you. While imperfect, Heroes deserves a much higher rating. (It's a 6.6 on Douban, which is a lot higher than Douban scores for other dramas with much higher ratings than Heroes on MDL (5.8 for Who Rules the World, for example) , in case that helps.)