Detective Dee and the Four Heavenly Kings (狄仁杰之四大天王) (2018)

Like 2013s Young Detective Dee: Rise of the Sea Dragon, this third Tsui Hark-directed Detective Dee movie is a prequel to 2010s Detective Dee and the Mystery of the Phantom Flame and again involves the titular character, Di Renjie (an actual Tang Dynasty historical figure embellished with Sherlockian powers of deduction) investigating a gong'an crime - a crime steeped in the supernatural that ultimately looks like threatening the life of the Emperor - and it is clearly meant to be a bigger and better blockbuster than the previous movies and boy does it feature some spectacularly realised bad guys, but ultimately this wuxia costume drama ends up suffering 'the curse of the third movie' with the drive to be bigger and better coming at the expense of a sensible ending.

★★★☆☆

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Detective Dee and the Mystery of the Phantom Flame (狄仁杰之通天帝国) (2010)

It may disappoint Western audiences hoping for the big budget magic realism of Hero, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, etc, but despite its not quite so sumptuous staging, Detective Dee is a solidly entertaining mystery adventure, like a Chinese-Hong Kong Young Sherlock Holmes with its intriguing mystery of people bursting into flames in ancient China, a mystery investigated by historically real but embellished Tang Dynasty official Renjie 'Detective Dee' Di.

★★★★☆

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