‘The Righteous Fists’ (鐵拳英雄) is my first watched TVB series of the year. The 30-episode action period drama set in Bangkok’s Chinatown in 1960s has a story that follows the struggles of Chinese locals who are skilled in martial arts. The series starred Ruco Chan, Joel Chan, Natalie Tong, Elaine Yiu, Grace Wong, Philip Ng, Yuen Qiu, Cheung Kwok Keung, Jimmy Au, Carlo Ng, Tiffany Lau, etc.
When I first watched the series last month, I was immediately reminded of ‘A Fist Within Four Walls’, another action period drama that also starred many similar cast members and had won best series and also gave Ruco Chan best actor at TVB Anniversary Awards that year. And indeed…both stories are very similar. If you enjoyed ‘A Fist Within Four Walls’, you will enjoy ‘The Righteous Fists’ too. Same formulas applied all around.
Ruco Chan still has the charisma to take on this first male lead role that requires a lot of both physical and emotional effort. I usually am not impressed with Natalie Tong’s acting but I do enjoy her performance and character in here. Some have complained of her exaggerated acting in this drama but I felt that it actually suited her character and brought a bit of delight to the scene. Joel Chan should be given more lead roles. He is very good and his chemistry with Elaine is fantastic. Even all the cast playing supporting or even very minor roles in this drama performed well too (especially the veterans!).
The action sequences are something that I have high expectation on and I’m not disappointed. There are a variety of different styles of martial arts shown in this drama and some fighting scenes are indeed impressive and are full of energy. And again similarly to ‘A Fist Within Four Walls’, this series had us curious on finding out who is the big boss (main villain) as the series reached its later part. Although the plot twists are kind off predictable, but they do add interest and excitement as each episode progresses.
The only minor complain I have is the over exaggerated sound effect made to the fighting scenes to amplify the magnitude of each strikes. They do too much on that and distracted me a bit. In general, the series is solid with formulaic yet still workable storyline, great performances and awesome fights. Out of 10 points, I rate ‘The Righteous Fists’ a total of 8.2. What a good start for TVB series in 2022. I thoroughly enjoyed this series.
Images in this post are from various online sources)