History Series / JourneyToTheWest1996

** Within the same note, it's later revealed that the volcanic mountain range that Wukong needs to extinguish with the Princess's fan was created by a giant pot of lava Wukong had kicked during his rampage across Heaven.

* SelfFulfilingProphecy: Discussed in season 2 when Tang Sanzhang narrates the story of Buddha's past teahings, where Buddha as Siddharta has a disciple named Ajatsharu who can predict the future. Ajatsharu managed to divulge to a paranoid King that he will be someday usurped by the prince, leading to the King attempting an OffingTheOffspring when the prince is a ''baby'' (if not for the queen's intervention) and abusing his son throughout most of the prince's childhood, eventually framing his own son for attempted murder, sentencing the concubine which the prince had fallen in love with to death, and throwing the prince into a dungeon. Alas, the prince has allies ''outside'' prison loyal to him, who then poisons the King until the King is reduced to a state of madness; as the Prince is an only child he's immediately granted the throne, where the Prince then gleefully [[TheDogBitesBack abuses his own father who mistreated him most of his life]] leading to the King suffering a slow, agonizing death. Ajatsharu predicted his own demise where he's EatenAlive by wolves, too; Siddharta tries a ScrewDestiny by restraining Ajataharu the night he's propecized to die, only for Ajatsharu to free himself and allow hungry wolves to do him in, gaining enlightenment as a God and revealing his divine form eventually to Siddharta as part of his self-sacrifice.

%% * GoldAndWhiteAreDivine: Guanyin

* HumanPopsicle: Snow Demoness abducts Sanzang by non-lethally freezes him before taking him away.

* LadyLand: The Woman Country. Interestingly, most of them seem to be UsefulNotes/{{asexual|ity}} (and if one, such as Flying Tiger General, falls in love with a man, it's portrayed to be an unusual case, although not necessarily forbidden) and they can procreate by drinking water from a magical well to be a TrulySingleParent.

* WholePlotReference: The Long Armed Ape's backstory is a rather blatant one to ''Literature/TheHappyPrince''; when the heroic Long Armed Ape eventually dies in battle, the citizens decide to erect a golden statue in his honor, only for a terrible winter to follow. The Long Armed Ape somehow managed to possess his statue after death and communicate with a lark (yeah, it's NOT a swallow, so this is ''[[SarcasmMode totally not a ripoff]])'' to help the citizens by plucking the golden flakes from his statue to save the village, ending with the statue's jewel eyes removed. His noble deed earns him a spot in heaven in the aftermath.

* CrosscastRole: Nezha and Red Boy are supposed to be young boys looking in their preteens but in this series they are portrayed rather unconvincingly by female actors in their early twenties!

* MaybeMagicMaybeMundane: The story arc in Woman Country. Was it real or [[AllJustADream just a dream]]?

* ObliviouslyEvil: The Black Bear Demon, due to his own idiocy as well as poor guidance from the elder monk Jinchi, had an atrocious interpretation of Buddhist concepts/parables such that his deeds are well-intentioned but wrong and at times even harmful. To the protagonists he was initially a mere comedic nuisance who continually pester them in order to get Sanzang's beautiful kasaya. However, when Jinchi decided to self-immolate out of shame (for being exposed as a greedy man hankering after Sanzang's kasaya), the Black Bear Demon concluded that he must bring in more spectators (innocent ones) and set them on fire together with Jinchi, the rationale being that killing these folks would end their suffering quicker and bring them closer to Buddha. These turn of events alarmed the protagonists to call for Guan Yin's help to stop him.

* AdaptationalVillainy: Long Armed Ape Monkey in the sequel is derived from Chinese mythological figure who is heroic. While this is present as his backstory, he later becomes RivalTurnedEvil.

** The Three Kings of Lion Camel Cave. Their goals, motivations, and the general plot were completely altered. In the original novel, they are crafty villains seeking to eat Tang Sanzang, whom Wukong can't defeat by himself. In the 1998 Hong Kong TVB Adaptation, they are a trio of cowardly glory hounds, and are barely a match for Bajie even when fighting together.

* IneffectualSympatheticVillain: In this adaptation, the Three Kings of Lion Camel Cave are thoroughly portrayed as a trio of cowardly jerkasses who could barely fight back Bajie physically. Their quest for power, wealth and fame failed rather miserably, be it easily defeated by Wukong and sent packing, or having their plans going out of control and forcing them to run away yet again.

* AshFace: What Bajie and Wujing had gotten in the last story arc of the first season. Wukong found an explosive meant to kill him and the rest of the protagonists. He casually put up a magic shield to cover himself and also protect the very vulnerable Sanzang, but [[{{Troll}} did not bother to do so for Bajie and Wujing]]. This trope was justified given that Bajie and Wujing are demons who are far more durable than any normal human.

** This series' White Bone Demon is a CompositeCharacter of the novel's White Bone Demon and Yellow Robe Demon. Unlike the novel's White Bone Demon who sought power by eating the flesh of Sanzang, this version's motivation was to gain a human form so that she can "love" her husband properly. And given this incarnation doesn't have a real human body, she never raped the person who was forced into marrying her - An atrocity which the novel's Yellow Robe Demon did commit.

* CrosscastRole: Nezha and Red Boy are supposed to be young boys but portrayed rather unconvincingly by adult female actors in their twenties!

** Sun Wukong battling the Red Boy, who earns a power upgrade turning his flames into Samadhi Fire, Wukong's greatest weakness. Cue Wukong getting [[ManOnFire incinerated alive]] to the point he gets reverted to SleepModeSize.