Zhu Lian Yu Mu (2024)

A Crying Shame.

The Story of Pearl Girl is the story of an intrepid pearl diver's harrowing journey from the despair of a slave farm to the heights of the prosperous Yangzhou jewelry guild. Aided by an erudite nobleman Zhang Jinran and a ruthless and calculating merchant Yan Zijing, Duanwu escapes from the exploitative clutches of the Cui clan. She throws her lot with Yan Zijing, choosing to make her own way in the world as a merchant galley serf over the more certain future of a nobleman's harem. After multiple betrayals and double crosses in the dog-eat-dog culture aboard Zijing's ship, she emerges clear eyed and better equipped to survive a ruthless, avaricious business world. She learns that underneath his merciless facade, Zijing is saving her by teaching her to save herself; that they have a shared past that she has barely scratched the surface of understanding.

Set in a cruel world fraught with treachery, avarice and oppression that belies the ostentatious luxury of the jewelry trade, the narrative is laden with an air of heaviness from start to finish. It is a character story about how one resilient woman fights her way to the top of the jewelry business during feudal China. The characters are well designed with Duanwu and Cui Shijiu as two women who have to fight for their place in a man's world; one who starts with nothing and the other with everything, to lose. Likewise the cynical and realistic Yan Zijing went to the school-of-hard-knocks while the righteous and idealistic Zhang Yiran clearly had an ivory tower education. Both Yan Zijing and Cui Shijiu are consumed by revenge and on opposite sides of a blood feud not of their own making but one's cause is just while the other's is not. I enjoyed watching how these characters, with at times common and at other times with opposing world views interact and react to the situations they are thrown into. Plot wise, the logic holes are evident from the start but for character driven stories, I am very forgiving for as long as the characters stay largely consistent and relatable. But once the characters start to unravel, the issues with the plot are amplified and the entire narrative becomes a mess.

I genuinely enjoyed and was engaged by the first arc of this drama. It is both fascinating and difficult to watch the stunning backdrop of the swashbuckling high seas and the exotic and dangerous Silk Road marred by the unmitigated oppression and cruelty of the ancient world, especially towards women and children. Zhao Lusi's Duanwu is spirited, tenacious and undaunted as she fails again and again until she succeeds. I could understand why Yan Zijing resonated better with her but could also see that she lacked the maturity to appreciate how Zhang Yiran's wisdom and knowledge of the law would aid her later on. These three main characters richly complement each other in their strengths and flaws to make a formidable team when they work together. I didn't mind the romance but I didn't need it and it went a bit abruptly from red flag master-servant to lovers. Nonetheless I was looking forward to it growing and had hoped to see them right past wrongs together. I did not expect it to take a wrong turn down the path of the worst noble idiot trope in recent memory, nor for it to last pretty much until the end of the drama. That is when The Story of Pearl Girl, turns into yet another period drama that starts strong and then inexplicably nosedives at the mid-point and never manages to recover.

After the convoy arc, a traumatized Duanwu re-emerges as Su Muzhe, a detached, gently sad and bland character who Disney princess cries almost every other episode. Lusi's vapid and weepy interpretation of the role lost me as much as her Duanwu engaged me. Duanwu would have gotten angry and demanded an explanation from Zijing or plotted revenge. I was baffled by the Su Muzhe who manages to coldly co-exists with him in the same city, moves on and focuses on business, vowing to live a good life nonetheless. This is so out of character it is almost impossible to reconcile Su Muzhe with Duanwu. I rooted for the feisty Duanwu of the first half who dares to love and dares to hate. The passive aggressive Su Muzhe who only dares to cry turns what could have been a terrific story into a crying shame. The narrative meanders into maudlin sub-plots about boring and poorly acted tragic side characters. Gratuitous crying scenes have diminishing impact, no matter how good the actor is at them. Long before the drama ended, I was bored by Su Muzhe's endless pity parties and stopped caring for her. Su Muzhe is not the kind of role that plays to Lusi's innate strengths and charisma. I hope she avoids taking on such characterisations in the future.

The other narrative mistake was to separate the three anchor characters at the same time so many of the early supporting roles are transitioned into new ones, forcing the audience reinvest in new characters all over again. Yue Yunxiu is a boring, flighty character that has no chemistry with Su Muzhe and fails to shore her up in the same way Kang Ju lifts up Yan Zjijing. The entire business partnership between the women lacks flair and pizazz; I can't imagine any joy in shopping for jewelry at an establishment run by such a dolorous pair. The narrative makes a lame attempt at comedy too late in the game and it is largely left to actors that lack Lusi's fantastic comedic timing. Even when the three friends join hands again, their dynamic is not the same and Duanwu never reemerges.

As for the romance, it stagnates even after they reunite and never blossoms into a full blown relationship. I would have liked to see them seize the day and live in the moment in a way that gives us something really worth crying over. Instead all we do is watch them mourn what could have been. It is incredibly unfair to Muzhe because Zijing refuses to move forward but yet can't set her free either. I wish they both chose differently but since they did not, the way their romance ends is fitting. I respected Zijing's choices especially in the end but I think Su Muzhe's victories were all hollow and I hoped she would find Duanwu again within herself but she never does. I enjoyed how Liu Yuning portrayed Yan Zijing's darkness and complexity but after the best first arc, he is too quickly whitewashed and sidelined. Even though the final arc is all about his justice, he doesn't get to do that much as the hidden villain is too obvious to the audience early on and most of the antagonists are so dumb they pretty much outed themselves.

Zhang Yiran is the best of friends and that rare character that does the right thing even when its the wrong thing for himself. While Duanwu didn't fit in to his world, he may eventually have been able to console Su Muzhe and I wish they had left that door open just a crack. As for Cui Shijiu, this character caught and held my interest from start to finish as a result of Xie Keyin's bold screen presence and her husky and earthy vocals. Her character is flawed, not that smart or especially well written but Xie Keyin embraced her flaws in such a relatable way and conveyed the role so compellingly that I cared about her and did not drop this drama because I wanted to know how her story ends. She and Zijing are both characters that choose revenge over love but only one of them lives to regret it.

The biggest issue with the storytelling is that it tries to incorporate too many themes and archaic ideas of what an independent and empowered woman is supposed to be. The writers bend the plot and characters in ways that don't make sense or is out of character in order to force certain themes and outcomes. This is not a good way to tell a story. Both Duanwu and Zijing's characters are thrown under the bus just to prove that a woman can make it on her own in business during feudal China. We watch allegedly smart villains kill off characters with no motive other than for dramatic impact and shock value. But what makes me really mad is that it is another scratch on the surface empowerment story written by misogynists with a thinly veiled and insidious message about the fate of women who dare to try to make it in a man's world. A true empowered woman would seize second chances and live well in the true and full sense and meaning of the term rather than to wander aimlessly as a shadow of their former selves.

This was a heavy journey from start to finish that does not end in satisfactory way and the ending contains some really questionable messages. There is no payoff for all the suffering, no one gets a great ending and promises to live well were not kept. In the name of both Madame Eight and Shrimpy, I dare not rate this more than 7/10. It is not a drama I recommend unless you are a die hard fan of either of the lead actors and are able to enjoy anything they are in.

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