Palace: The Lock Heart Jade (2011)

Chinese dramas are often neglected in this whole kdrama wave. But this one really deserves attention.

I have to admit 39 episodes are somewhat of a challenge. But after ep1 the director made very efficient use of cliffhangers. Hence, you'll just watch on and on and the 39 episodes just fly by!

Story: A beautiful Chinese time traveller story. Qing Chuan gets zapped back to the Qing dynasty. And we follow her meet the great Emperor and his numerous sons. The story is full of love, hate, revenge, intrigue!

While the emperor's sons struggle for favour in court and for the position of crowned prince Qing Chuan is right in the middle of it all.

I loved how all the Princes were portrayed with different characteristics, worries, goals, dreams, faults. Over the course of 39 episodes there was room enough to develop every character. And while we start out hating some and liking others, the story convincingly takes us to other perspectives, different problems and we may just change our minds about some of them or at least find it harder to judge them in terms of black and white.

The actors were doing a great job. Every single one of them did a brilliant job. Yang Mi (Qing Chuan) was probably my favourite character. She was able to portray Qing Chuan so well with all her different facets.

Feng William and He Mickey were just unbelievable. Playing the two may male leads (8th and 4th prince) they excelled at playing intrigue, ambition, hate, cruelty, love, cold heartedness, softheartedness ... the whole range really.

But the Royal Consorts, Princes, Ministers, Eunuchs, Palace maids ... deserve merit as well. This drama was huge. Not just cast wise. But also as far as locations and sets were concerned and the costumes were so detailed and beautiful. The directors and producers put a lot of effort into this drama and the result truly reflects the passion they must have had making this series.

Sometimes the scipt was just a bit lengthy. And the intrigue was getting slightly out of control. In some episodes you can really feel the artificiality of the script. With the Qing Chuan Doppelgaenger, I really feel that was not a necessary episode.

Anyhow I thought all the tiny side stories of some characters were well interwoven with the plot and made the whole drama richer and more complete.

This was my first Chinese historical drama and I had to get used to the difference after being used to historical k dramas. All in all I think i like chinese traditional clothes better than the korean but that hair ornamentation... phew must have been really heavy. I also liked that the females here were all far away from being silly, naive and spoiled. They were all very believable characters.

A must watch for every one who enjoys historical dramas!!!

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