"The Sword and the Fairy" is one of those series' that could easily be missed by people as being disposable garbage. I had never heard of the series prior to reviewing it, nor knew what it was about. I made the classic mistake of assuming the picture of the two leads in period clothing indicated a TV series that would be a sweeping epic like "Curse of the Golden Flower." When the DVD arrived in hand and the description spoke of battles with "evil snake spirits," I began to get suspicious of what the following 34 episodes had in store.

I have always felt a new television series should be able to hook you in the first few minutes. I don't have to know the plot exactly or even know who the characters are, but the opening scene (or scenes) should have me invested in the remainder of the episode. For me the high mark in vague opening scenes definitely goes to "Lost." Unfortunately, "The Sword and the Fairy" falls flat on its face in terms of a hooking opener. The viewer is treated to a frantic sequence set in ancient China of a woman being ordered to death. What follows next, out of nowhere, is a battle between a dragon-woman and a monster; the viewer is then thrown without context into a mid-air battle between what we could guess is our hero and a shadowy figure. All these fights are aided by some of the worst CGI I have ever seen and the sequences concludes with our protagonist waking up and entering a slapstick exchange with his aunt. I shook my head at the screen, got up, and turned off the DVD player.

I had to come back to the set and get through it for the sake of this review, but much to my surprise, despite featuring one of the most jumbled, nonsensical openings, "The Sword and the Fairy" turned out to be a fairly entertaining series. The series, also known as "Chinese Paladin" (named after the popular role-playing game it was based on) is your classic tale of a young hero on the path to greatness. Xiao Yao is our hero and his quest begins in a clichéd (a common occurrence) fashion. His aunt is dying and his initial motivation towards adventure is to find the cure to save her. As the story continues we get more poorly rendered CGI fights, plenty of action, but also a healthy dose of soap opera style romance as Xiao Yao meets Ling Er.

It's hard to write the series off as utter garbage, because it's obvious that the writers wanted to make a dramatic show that is still essentially light-hearted in nature. When the show is dealing with character issues and is on it's A-game it's a very pleasant experience, but at times it's held back by some sappy, uninspired dialogue, and a lot of bad CGI. The two consistent aspects of the show that did keep me hooked were the two leads; both are likable and have a lot of on screen charisma. The second aspect is the fantastic costumes; for as bad as the CGI gets, the costume work on this show definitely helps set the tone and setting.

"The Sword and the Fairy" is not going to appeal to everyone. It's far from high quality programming and honestly feels more like a show for teens, but the problems I had with the series are most likely still going to be a problem, even for that demographic. As pure escapist programming though it delivers the goods.