Juelin
United States
Moon Lovers: Scarlet Heart Ryeo
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Tragic, memorable, and sometimes frustrating
Watching this drama for the first time in 2024 made me appreciate how far k-dramas have come in terms of production, costumes, and picture quality in the last several years. I won't judge harshly based on those factors because this show is obviously dated, but, ugly costumes with atrocious color combinations and poor set design are truly noticeable. This is not to mention that a palace, that is supposed to be bustling with activity, looks like a ghost town. There are no maids, eunuchs, or guards anywhere in the courtyard. For such a large production, this is rather odd."Moon Lovers" is very well rounded in terms of pacing, storytelling, and character development. The plot is engaging and the pacing is consistent from start to finish. One thing I like is that it does not fixate on one relationship over another. We don't have to sit through a dozen of episodes of Wang Wook and Hue Soo's failed romance while other princes are patiently waiting their turn. Soo's relationship with each prince is uniquely developed from the beginning of the story. So, before the Wang Wook romance arc ends, the writers already give us plenty of meaningful scenes with Wang So and his growing feelings for her. The icing on the cake is Lee Joon Gi's masterful use of facial expressions showing Wang So hopelessly falling in love with her.
Wang So is probably one of the most tragic and misunderstood protagonists in a k-drama. Mysterious and brooding, he looks like he stepped right out of the Phantom of the Opera wearing a mask to cover a face scar. But, under the mask, he is an extremely complex character. The drama relays that complexity rather well through his contentious relationship with his mother, Queen Yoo, giving us a glimpse into his tragic past full of abuse and abandonment, and the man he has become - still a confused and heartbroken kid longing for his mother's love. The most tragic thing about him is that he does not do anything wrong but is forced to make difficult decisions. But despite all that, he is always judged harshly by everyone he cares about and who eventually leave him. I don't really understand the point of writing such a tragic character. Tragedy is ok, but Wang So has no hope and nothing to look forward to. He is always alone from the very beginning until the end. Even an opportunity to raise his daughter is unfairly taken away from him.
I liked Hae Soo at the beginning. But, as soon as the drama starts turning into a Shakespearean tragedy, I became extremely disappointed in her. On one hand, she is kind, intelligent, thoughtful, and ridiculously courageous. On the other hand, she is naive, shallow, and judgmental. She accepts So's choice to seek the throne, but never understands the reality of being a king and the responsibilities that come with it. Instead of trusting him with his decisions, she keeps holding on to the unattainable and childish dream of being able to be together if they love each other while judging him for being harsh against the people who seek to harm him. The most tragic and unforgivable thing she does is making no effort to explain to So that her love for Wook was a thing of the past making their last face-to-face encounter filled with resentment and heartbreak.
Some plotlines are poorly thought out and very illogical. Wang So is not stupid, but his complete lack of insight when he rips up King Moo's last decree and leaves it on the floor as evidence is mind boggling. And then there is Prince Yo getting thrown off a cliff then returning in one piece. The writers needed something to move the plot forward, but this type of nonsensical writing makes smart characters look stupid.
The romance is very different from anything I've seen in a k-drama. This is not a typical star crossed lovers or a tragic romance story. The plot takes a rather realistic view of relationships. We all experience bad timing, missed opportunities, and inability to cope with each other's character flaws. This drama paints a harsh picture of what happens when couples go through all that. No matter how much we want it, love is not always enough. Lack of trust, miscommunication, and resentment all play a big part in the main couple's separation leading to loneliness and a lot of regret.
The ending, although tragic, is somewhat open-ended. She says "if we met in another world, at another time, we would have been great together". He says "if you and I are not from the same world, I will find you." These phrases alone are enough to foreshadow a future reunion. But, until there is a sequel, all we can do is resort to writing fanfiction and pretending they have a happy ending 1000 years later.
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There is no glory at the end
One of the best things about this drama is acting. The cast is nothing short of perfection making the story a lot more memorable and impactful. I really cannot praise them enough. And, while everyone deserves an A+, I feel like the supporting cast outshine the leads only because the villains are much more dynamic than the main characters.One thing I like about Part 2 is that the villains are written to be so fundamentally irredeemable, they become destructive and often self-sabotage. These so-called "friends" ultimately become each other's worst enemy making their individual endings very satisfying. The storytelling and pacing continue to be smooth without filler arcs and incoherent content. I like that writers did not concoct unnecessary plot devices to create more drama. Everything is very well balanced.
While, for the most part, the story is well written, the ending becomes too contrived with unnecessary twists blurring the lines between good and evil. The good guys become murderers and the villain become victims. But, we are still supposed to be sympathetic to the "good guys" because the villains deserved it. I guess the writers wanted to convey that the world is not fair and at the end even people who seemingly can do no wrong are capable of heinous acts. But to me it makes the good guys no different from the villains, which is very disappointing because I rather liked how the writers portrayed certain characters to be exemplary in contrast to monsters like Park Yeon Jin.
I did not love the ending because it felt like Joo Yeo Jung's revenge story was thrown together last minute. The plot reached its logical conclusion with Dongeun finally getting her revenge. I was ready for the drama to end only to be forced to watch Yeo Jung's revenge arc, which at that point wasn't that interesting. It is not because his story wasn't compelling, but because it was not properly developed early enough and was only written as a tiny side arc in comparison to Dongeun's grand revenge. The ending did not really feel like a happy ending where the main characters get their revenge and move on with their lives. Now that their roles switched and Dongeun became Yeo Jung's "executioner", they got stuck in an endless loop of revenge with the last scene showing them entering the prison with Yeo Jung father's murderer. It made me feel bad for the characters because they deserved better than this.
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One step forward, three steps backwards
This drama should serve as a cautionary tale for women to choose wisely in a marriage. It tells a story of empowerment, healing, and new beginnings. Lin Shuang gives up her brilliant career to be a housewife and a mother just to find out a few years later that her husband is unfaithful. Instead of sulking in depression, she picks herself up and pursues self-improvement for the sake of herself and her daughter.The plot moves between different storylines of friendship, marriage, workplace, parenthood in a very realistic way. Lin Shuang achieves through trial and error overcoming multiple roadblocks all the while having to deal with her soon to be ex-husband's dirty schemes. She is kind and likable, hard to anger, and tends to avoid confrontation, which makes her an easy target for manipulation, especially by her overbearing in-laws. But, while I enjoy a good tale of female empowerment, Lin Shuang's character is just too good. She lets a lot of things slide for the sake of dignity, which is unsustainable and quite often hard to stomach. The breaking point is when she checks Wei Ming's parents into a nice hotel after they abducted her daughter to use as a bargaining chip in the divorce proceeding.
The pacing starts to drag as soon as the drama introduces secondary and tertiary characters nobody cares about. I couldn't care less about Jiang Xi mom's cancer or a continuous marathon of her brother's failures. I am here to watch a woman brave through a divorce, not filler characters being ridiculous. Another issue is that Lin Shuang has to deal with too many roadblocks. It's a drama, not someone's life story. For every step forward, she always takes three steps backwards, which makes the drama tedious to watch.
Lastly, the story reaches its logical conclusion at around episode 28 when the divorce is finalized. Everything moving forward is Wei Ming's new set of matrimonial problems with the next missus and Lin Shuang's incredibly slow and uninteresting romance with Gu Xu. The romantic development with Gu Xu should've been part of the story much earlier. After the divorce, it felt like the writers tried to scramble the plot because they forgot something.
Overall, this is a good slice-of-life drama with likable characters and semi-decent pacing. I recommend having a fast-forward button on stand-by.
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A pleasant surprise
After watching several fantasy k-dramas that were totally disappointing, this was a pleasant surprise. At first, the story centers around lighthearted ghost stories. Then, the plot makes a connection between the supernatural and police corruption involving a 20 year old hit and run accident and focuses on uncovering the mystery behind the accident and a string of murders surrounding it.The story moves at a very good pace. There is a nice balance between comedy, horror, and romance. Some ghosts are very scary and have compelling stories. The main couple has cute and funny moments without both acting like infantile nincompoops. Their chemistry is excellent making them convincing as a couple. There are a lot of genuine interactions involving kissing, flirting, and touching resulting in very believable romance.
I liked that the side characters had their own stories giving them some depth, however, they were also the weakest point of the drama. While I appreciate that the writers gave Baek Nam Goo and Go Seong Ho backstories and made them more than just goofy sidekicks, their arcs took an obnoxious amount of screentime slowing down the plot and dragging the story for more episodes than necessary. The main plot reached its conclusion in episode 14 when the good guys won. That's when the story should've ended. But, because of the side arcs, we had to sit through two more episodes of boring secondary plotlines watching Baek's wife being sad and Seong Ho's ridiculous ghost romance with Bom's friend. Moreover, the writers had to invent more plot with the netherworld to make it seem like the story was still ongoing.
But, I would still recommend this drama because the pacing is mostly good for about 14 episodes, the plot is engaging, and there is plenty of romantic chemistry.
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A slice of happiness with zombies
This is not a zombie apocalypse drama but a slice of life story showing how people deal with each other in the midst of chaos. Influenced by the events of Covid-19, the drama somewhat delves into the problems society faces when having to deal with an unknown deadly disease, the balance between safety and individual liberties, and people's own fears.The show starts off with a virus putting people into a zombie-like state making them crave blood. The first two episodes are about the spread of the disease until the plot switches to the main characters getting quarantined in a massive apartment building with no access to the outside world. The story mostly focuses on the best and the worst of human nature showing various residents dealing with their own problems and human-made happenings around the building. This reminded me of the movie "Clue" where a group of strangers got stuck together trying to solve murder-mystery.
If you are looking for passionate romance, you won't find it here. Although, the two main characters eventually kiss and become a couple, the romance is very subtle and focuses more on how Yoon Sae Bom and Jung Yi Hyun treat and protect each other without the use of cheesy romantic cliches. There are no tropey moments of staring and forlorn glances. The characters are very mature. They are not afraid to be alone and have physical contact without awkwardness.
The biggest problem with the drama is pacing which slows down somewhere in the middle. This is not so much about the plot, but the setting never changing. Characters run around various locations around the building and do the same things in every episode. This makes the show a bit tedious to watch.
The best thing about the drama is Park Hyung Sik. He truly shines as a serious character proving that he can play something other than stereotypical semi-comedic heroes. Here, he is a badass cop and a total stud. I want to see more of him playing generals, kings, and other males in positions of authority.
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Like a big sneeze waiting to happen but never happening
This drama had its good moments but a draggy plot and poor writing made it a lot less entertaining and a whole lot frustrating. The bossam part wasn't even the story but rather a mechanism for the main couple to meet.The romance started great with a promise of a touching love story, but it completely fell flat. Even though Ba Woo and Hwa In didn't start their relationship on a positive note, they were never truly enemies. They bickered, cried, supported each other and had some of the most touching moments. I liked how their romance was portrayed as a love story between two mature people trying to survive. Unfortunately, in the second half, all of the emotion and angst completely disappeared leading to a very vanilla relationship completely devoid of passion. They basically became an old married couple who barely touched. And there wasn't a single kissing scene.
Poor editing was the drama's biggest flaw. It had 20 very long hour+ episodes that felt like they would never end. The political intrigue plotline was interesting and the villain was compelling enough to keep me engaged. But, then the writers started introducing filler characters and plotlines. There was a little bit of a mother-in-law from hell who wasn't quite evil, and baby momma drama that only served as a plot device to move the story forward. None of this was necessary, because the writers already had enough material to work with instead of creating new plotlines that were not particularly interesting.
In the last few episodes, everyone started doing stupid things leading to people getting hurt, killed, or captured. Dae Yeop was a terribly written character. I cannot stress enough how much I hate the rejected lover trope. His unrequited love for Hwa In dragged on for the entirety of the show. He just wouldn't move on and kept carrying the torch for a woman who will never love him. On top of that, he single handedly got himself killed because the writers decided the show needed a last minute emotional response from the audience. But it wasn't a heroic death fighting in a battle or sacrificing to save a loved one, but the dumbest death possible that should've never happened.
The ending was disappointing. The political intrigue culminated in a rebellion which ended before it started. The happy couple reunited and lived happily ever after. The end.
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Zombies in Joseon part 2
The story continues with a kingdom being on a brink of collapse in the midst of a political struggle and a bloody war between people and monsters. The plot is well balanced between corruption and war without overwhelming us with too much with court politics.Season 2 also introduces a more well-rounded villain, the queen, who doesn't simply exist to usurp power. Being the daughter of a ruthless official, she takes the level of cruelty to a whole new level. But, although she commits countless atrocities, some of her motivations add depth to her character, unlike her father who was a stereotypical power-hungry villain.
The story is still well paced full of intrigue and interesting characters, but the ending leaves a huge cliffhanger with no promise of a season 3. Lee Chang gives up the throne in favor of an infant with no royal blood. While the infant grows up in the palace to be the future king, Lee Chang sets off on a quest to track the resurrection flower and everyone who distributes it. That seems like a nonsensical decision completely undermining everything he's done so far. But, there is a method to his madness. A kingdom must have a king. A kingdom with a history of a zombie apocalypse must have someone to ensure the dead stay dead. This decision culminates his complete character development where he becomes a selfless hero putting the national interests first rather than his personal ambition. As the show approaches the end, he comes across an eerie shack full of monsters and finds a mysterious woman there. Meanwhile, in the palace, a eunuch witnesses a worm crawling under the young king's skin towards his brain. This is where the story ends with no plot resolution and a brand new character we don't know enough to care about.
I normally don't watch zombie shows because of the gore. But here, it was manageable for me because the amount of gore was enough to be convincing without being overwhelming. The drama was so well executed, it kept me engaged from start to finish. But, the ending was disappointing because there is no season 3!
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Zombies in Joseon
This was certainly different from other Korean dramas, a mesh of a political thriller and a horror zombie apocalypse.The crown prince, Lee Chang, is the central figure trying to escape from the court corruption in the midst of a zombie apocalypse. He starts out as a pampered but a well meaning prince who goes through a massive character development becoming a hero trying to save a dying nation. The story is well paced with a good amount of twists. Every character has a unique role without anyone being unnecessary. I liked that the writing did not focus on backstories and instead showed Lee Chang struggling against the zombie plague to help his people and at the same time repelling a corrupt minister trying to usurp the throne. The plot stays true to the genre, an action horror thriller, without turning it into a draggy melodrama.
The villain, a ruthless power hungry official, is a bit cookie cutter without a personality or any motivation other than power. But, the action packed and well paced plot more than made up for it.
Overall, if you don't mind gore and like zombie movies and political intrigue, this is it.
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Short and sweet
This was a cute and sweet drama that would have benefited from having more episodes. The story was largely undeveloped and moved too fast.Even though I liked the chemistry between the romantic characters, there wasn't enough time to properly develop any of their relationships. I wanted to see how the king actually came up with the writing system, the romance, and the friendship between Dan Bi and the queen. The queen was portrayed as a lonely young woman who just wanted to connect with someone, so she intended Dan Bi to become her friend by making her the king's concubine. This was an odd choice, but there was meaning behind it. The writers also teased us with romantic-ish relationship between the queen and Park Yeon, but it was largely unexplored. The gender bender trope lasted for longer than I wanted just to be explained at the end that the king always knew that Dan Bi was a woman. Hence, him rapidly falling in love with her without questioning his own sexuality was justified.
One interesting thing was that many characters in the past looked like the characters in the present, but I didn't feel like there was much explanation given as to why.
Overall, this is a cute piece of fluff with a happy ending, that doesn't offer much depth because of the short length.
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Lets play a game of pick-a-plot
This is the first time I watched a drama where a plot felt like a combination of several dramas glued together, as if a bunch of different people wrote it without communicating with each other. There were several parallel storylines with characters that often crossed paths, but their stories were completely independent of each other. You will miss nothing if you skip entire scenes and focus on the characters you like. So, to save yourself time and sanity, start a game of pick-a-plot and make friends with the fast-forward button.Li Qian was a valiant and brave soldier. Baoning was a spoiled princess. But the difference in their status did not prevent them from building a loving relationship based on trust and communication until, towards the end, they regressed into complete knuckleheads who refused to communicate, jumped to conclusions, and threw asinine accusations. In the last 5 episodes, Baoning's character drastically changed from a spunky young woman to a calculating persona resembling Wang Xuan from The Rebel Princess. This change showcased Ju Jing Yi's ability to play more serious roles. But, it wasn't necessarily good for the story, because it happened without any actual character development showing Baoning's transition from a care-free princess to a mature woman with experience dealing with scheming villains.
The first 12 episodes were very engaging showing Baoning and Li Qian's blossoming romance. But then, the plot suddenly got hijacked by secondary characters and became a continuous onslaught of love rivals' deranged schemes to break up the happy couple. A love obsessed and jealous villain is one of the worst, most uninspired, uninteresting tropes to manufacture conflict. The writers threw in every cliche and rehashed idea instead of writing an actual story. Zhao Xiao was a nobleman with a bright political future. But, every single action he took was to get into Baoning's pants. And, Miaorong's slimy schemes resulted in the same predictable outcome again and again. The writers did not even try to create compelling villains, but love-obsessed psychos who just wouldn't get the message that the object of their affection couldn't care less.
More often than not, I ended up throwing my hands in the air and screaming "FFS!!" When I did not suffer from second-hand embarrassment, I pressed on the fast-forward button. The drama is a convoluted mess of jealous lover tropes, scattered plot, and a marketing scheme for the supporting cast.
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When everything is stupid
Watching this show was truly a chore. All of the characters were unlikable with no real motivation or common sense. The show used every cliche, trope, stereotype under the sun - dorky FL, a jealous side chick, misunderstandings, withholding information, separating for no reason, mother-in-law from hell, accusations without any evidence. Everything was stupid.I am glad I watched Ju Jing Yi's work in backwards chronological order starting with In Blossom. Otherwise, I'd stop on this show. Yunxi was a carbon copy of Fu Rong from The Blooms at Ruyi Pavilion, the same clueless turd who became bffs with a man with questionable motivations and identity. She completely trusted him and was blissfully unaware of his feelings for her while being married to someone else. I cringed when silly Ningjing had to explain to her that running around with a man who wasn't her husband was problematic. Moreover, Yunxi was portrayed as kind and intelligent. Apparently, feeding one person diarrhea poison and threatening another with bad marriage was considered "kind". Just no.
Most of the secondary characters were either forgettable or annoying. Ningjing and Tang Li were unbearable together. They bickered constantly for no reason whatsoever because the writers decided that two adults acting like toddlers was funny. Ningjing was only tolerable when she was in the company of other people. Telling Yunxi that running around with Qishao was no bueno was probably the highlight of her character development.
The plot was a directionless mess. Most of it consisted of forced tension based on the characters' complete lack of common sense. All this nonsensical drama could've been easily avoided if everyone did the obvious, like telling the truth. Watching characters consistently making stupid decisions caused me nothing but second-hand embarrassment. Their actions ranged from withholding important information because reasons, bringing jealous side chicks into a married couple's home, refusing to be rescued, and so on. Feiye never seemed to know where his wife was. They kept separating for nonsensical reasons again and again because we needed more tension. "How did we end up like this?" You literally did not. All you needed was to talk to each other. None of their angst was justified because the problems were laughably superficial. It's like the drama was written by high school students. Stupid tropes everywhere.
You won't be missing much if you skip most scenes in the last 15 episodes. The show was just so damn boring. Most conversations were filled with fluff and should've been cut by half to get the point across. If there was urgency to do anything, the characters ended up not doing it and talked about their feelings instead. Nothing made sense and everything was stupid.
Romantic chemistry between ML and FL was passable, even though romance was not the main focus of the story. This brings us to the incomprehensible Chinese censorship. Mature romantic chemistry between a married couple that goes beyond grade school antics is problematic, but Long Feiye's naked a** is totally fine. Is anyone else confused? I know I am.
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How many husbands do you have?
The drama followed an old face swap/identity switch formula with a slice of revenge. Jiuling was a princess who assumed the identity of her deceased friend to plan revenge against her emperor uncle for the death her emperor father. Along the way, she met four men to whom she was either engaged or married. I actually enjoyed that the drama did not take the harem trope too seriously and constantly made fun of it. The question "how many husbands do you have?" led to hilarious back and forths.The face-swap explanation was pretty lolsy - a super secret non-surgically invasive technique performed by a physician in ancient China. Gotta love Chinese tropes.
Jiuling was portrayed as a mature young woman, a mix between the heroines from the Story of Ming Lan, the Double, Rebel Princess. It was very refreshing to see a more mature heroine, rather than the typical infantile stereotype.
I normally don't like harem or reverse harem formula because of all the extra drama and love triangles/rectangles. What I appreciated about this story was that Jiuling had entirely different relationships with all four men. From the very beginning, it was obvious that Zhu Zan will be her one and only love interest. Chengyu will be like a younger brother, Yunzhao will be her friend, and, Yunqi will be her enemy. The story did not have her flip flop between the four men making it confusing whom she will end up with.
I enjoyed her chemistry with Zhu Zan. Even though he didn't look like a typical hero because the actor also played villains, he had enough charm to hold his own and develop great chemistry with Jiuling through their spicy bantering.
One thing I didn't like was Yunqi's character development. The writers decided that nobody died in this show, although Yunqi was the one character who should've died. He went from having obsessive romantic feelings for Jiuling, which lasted for way too long, to going full psycho by kidnapping and locking her up. Then, he suddenly had an epiphany and started helping her. Considering his complete mental breakdown, him trying to be a good guy at the end was pretty unbelievable.
Overall, the drama was very enjoyable, the romance had plenty of chemistry, and the story was well paced.
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Love When the Stars Fall
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A great take on old tropes
The drama takes a stab at the rehashed switcheroo brides trope but still manages to give a refreshing take on xianxia. One sister, born under a lucky sign, gets to marry a heavenly prince, another one born under an unlucky sign gets to marry a demon prince. On the day of their wedding, they get switched and hilarity ensues as the drama develops two parallel love stories.One thing that I really liked was a focus on sisterhood, family, and women working to uplift each other, instead of sisters and friends competing for men, money, and power. Although, the drama also rehashes a jealous side chick trope, it's very minor and pretty forgettable. I really liked the chemistry between each couple, as they got to know each other, develop bonds which led to love. I liked that the story blurred some lines between good and evil and allowed some characters with a questionable moral compass a chance to grow and make good choices. Chaofeng started out an an anti-hero, not entirely bad but someone with questionable morality. Through his growing love for Qingkui and exposure to her purity and goodness, he developed a conscience. Youqin gaining back his feelings allowed him to realize that protecting the heavenly realm wasn't just an arbitrary duty but a desire to protect family.
The plot was mostly interesting, but some arcs were better than others. I thought the shards arc was too long and kind of boring. My biggest criticism, after the shards arc both Youqin and Chaofeng were reduced to house husbands. Youqin spent most of his time waiting for Yetan to come home from school. It seemed like attaining the perfect celestial body was the pinnacle of his development and he had nothing else to do, although he was the most powerful being in all the realms. Chaofeng was told to look for work now that he had a wife. Twirling store signs pretty much undermined his position as a badass prince from the void. The writers could've come up with something better for immortal beings with ultimate cosmic power than this.
The acting was very good. Chen Xingxu showed his versatility where he didn't just portray a stony faced Empyrean Xuanshang, but a lover, a materialist, a pyromaniac, and a romantic. The character came to life as soon as he gained his feelings. Everyone else was just as good.
Some people were not happy with the ending, but I thought it was fitting for the xianxia genre leaving off the story on a positive and hopeful note. To me, that was a good ending.
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Not bad, but could be better
The drama definitely would've done a lot better with some plot and episode trimming. There were too many side characters with minor story arcs that were irrelevant fillers. I couldn't care less about every auntie's personal problems. That didn't add anything and only deviated from the story and dragged the plot.In the last ten episodes, it became apparent that the writers completely ran out of ideas and just wrote whatever to finish the 40 episodes. The spy/envoy arc had nothing to do with the main plot. It felt like a filler and was completely uninteresting. The main story was about the FL saving her family from poverty and bringing the male relatives back and ML dealing with the royal family drama. The envoy arc had nothing to do with either.
FL also felt a little too perfect. There was no character development to show achievement through trial and error. At the beginning, she was a teenager from a privileged family who never had to struggle with anything and didn't have good relations with any of her family members. After the exile, she magically got her act together and had all the answers without having to overcome or learn anything. Even the mishaps were not due to her mistakes but mistakes of her aunties. Everything that she achieved was completely undeserved because she never had to struggle. She went from zero to hero overnight.
The acting was mostly ok. Hu Yitian's had his usual frozen face that took away from his chemistry with FL. But, he got better later on and started showing a little bit of emotion. Zhang Jing Yi was ok, but unconvincing as a historical character. It felt like a modern woman playing dress-up.
The chemistry was ok, but FL's Mary Sue personality made secondary couples a lot more interesting. Shen Huan and Shaoyao were a lot more fun because there was actual character growth and the couple looked like they really couldn't wait to be together while ML and FL just hanged out without taking any steps to move their relationship forward.
Overall, I enjoyed the show. Hu Yitian's is definitely an eye candy and the fighting scenes were entertaining.
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The drama starts to pick up at around episode 12. The first 10 episodes were slow with Fan Xian and Waner trying to find each other and cancel their engagement until they found out that they were actually engaged to each other. Then, the story starts to pick up with never-ending political intrigue mixed with comedy and drama.Fan Xian was a complicated character. He comes off as goofy and happy-go-lucky. In reality, he was calculating, manipulative, loyal, and has a strong sense of justice. His goal was to build a better world but outsmarting and getting ahead of the powerhouse that is trying to kill him proved to be harder than he thought. The story did a great job at building up the intrigue and political drama in a very interesting and clever way without being draggy. However, the plot didn't quite explain Fan Xian's visions, where they came from, and his origins. At the beginning it was a rebirth backwards story. But it seemed to be more of a time travel story with Xian's mother traveling back in time bringing future technology, but the writers never truly explained it.
The romance needed work. The first 10 episodes were spent on ML and FL trying to find each other. After they finally figured out that they were actually engaged to each other, the romance fizzled out and FL gradually disappeared. Honestly, Fan Xian had a lot more chemistry with every other woman he interacted with than Waner. The fighting "dance" with the saintress made me question where the writers were going with this and why Fan Xian was even in love with Waner.
One of the best things about this drama was the goofy soundtrack with silly background music during fighting sequences.
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