a big dumpster fire

To keep it short: this drama is a dumpster fire.

To keep it long, this drama has a very interesting premise - an anti-hero who was destined to become evil by a continuous cycle of abuse, betrayal, and abandonment falls in love with a heroine trying to prevent him from becoming evil. This had a lot of potential to be a great drama until the story became completely incoherent.

STORY AND CHARACTERS
The drama had disjoined plot and characters, nothing made sense, none of the characters told the truth, plot holes everywhere, and the values were completely skewed. A good guy was portrayed as a villain. Villains were portrayed as good guys. Tantai Jin was treated very poorly throughout the entire story by mostly everyone just because of whom he was destined to become and not because of what he did. He got no apology and no vindication. None of his good deeds got recognized and his "true love" never realized what kind sacrifices he had to make to save the world. There is no hope in this drama and nothing to look forward to.

The story started out strong with Susu and Tantai Jin meeting and immediately building a bond. They had a lot of cute interactions where they went shopping, she saved him from angry birds, they watched fireworks and played in the snow. This should have been the only story arc for the duration of the show. She figures out why he was evil because he had a hard life, so she shows him compassion and kindness, they fall in love, and he doesn't become evil. THE END. Instead, the show dragged on for multiple storylines adding no value to the main plot. The entire dream arc should have been reduced to flashbacks.

The story and characters were so completely incoherent, that it felt like the writers had no idea what they were doing. Everyone insisted that Tantai Jin was evil, but he was not written as an inherently evil person. About half-way through the show it became apparent that he was arbitrarily delt the villain card without actually deserving it. He was born "special", to a life of suffering and without love threads which would have enabled him to find love. But, he eventually grew love threads and fell in love, which should have derailed his destiny of becoming the devil god. But it was never addressed anywhere in the story. Inherently evil characters eventually slip up and do evil things. TJ never harmed an animal, never killed an innocent, never started a war, never betrayed anyone. He did not have an evil bone in his body, no pun intended. So, why was he still destined to become the devil god if he already changed his predetermined fate by finding love? Nobody knows, including the writers, who likely did not even understand their own characters. A lot of money was spent on the production and not enough on the writing.

Susu had an inconsistent personality and no real character development. One moment she acted like a crazed fangirl around TJ, the next she went on a sanctimonious rant about how he could not be saved because he was "evil". She always assumed the worst about him just to be proven wrong later, but she still never learned to trust him. Susu's problem was that she was never able to separate the individual from the devil god. It was extremely frustrating to watch that brainless woman going behind TJ's back all the time, doing something stupid and then blaming him for reacting to it. Betrayal was the one thing that was triggering to him. Yet, Susu kept repeatedly doing questionable things that made him feel betrayed and abandoned. It was absolutely cringe-worthy to watch this dumpster-fire of a romance imploding on itself because it was so self-sabotaging. Susu never had any trust in TJ, although he never gave her any reason to mistrust him. She always jumped to the worst conclusions and hurt him more often than she made him happy. While TJ went out of his way to avoid becoming the devil god and tried to do only good, none of his efforts were ever appreciated. Everyone always judged him without trying to figure out what actually went on. The only time when Susu finally understood him was in the very last episode when she became a goddess and was able to look into his heart. But, in my opinion, it was already too late for her. She had numerous opportunities to have his back and and to give him a chance. Instead, she always listened to rumors, superstitions, and speculations that often did not make any sense and accused him of a crime because he was a convenient scapegoat. There was no point even killing him at the end because he never allowed the devil god to control him.

One of the most infuriating things about Susu was her holier-than-thou personality. She saw herself as a good person. She was written as a good person, but she did some very reprehensible things. When she became Ye Xiwu, she found out that Xiwu was an awful person. Xiwu made TJ kneel in the snow. Any decent person would have ended that immediately, but Susu did not. She actually allowed TJ to kneel for days in the cold spying on him and having mental rants about how he "deserved" it. She also whipped him. Any sane and good person would have thrown the whip on the floor and said "I'm not doing it", but she was either not very bright or just decided to go with it. And, she whipped him. I seriously could not believe she did it. Not to mention that later on she drugged his food and drove nails into his heart. What in the actual hell....

Everything was awful. What are we supposed to derive from this story? Bullies don't get punished. Bad things will always happen to good people for no reason. No matter how far we go to sacrifice for others, they will never appreciate or even know about it. Again, what is the point?

On a different note, the blood spitting in every episode became very noticeable and looked disgusting. There didn't need to be so much blood coming out of people's mouths, especially in scenes where it wasn't necessary.

SET/COSTUMES/MAKE-UP
The set was beautiful, 'nuff set.

Taitan Jin's outfits were often ridiculous. The writers obviously wanted him to stand out. But, they made him stand out too much. Feathery outfits, flowing capes, and an over-powdered face full of make-up was a bit much. Susu sleeping in her head jewelry also looked stupid.

FINAL THOUGHTS
Usually, happy endings make me feel all warm and fuzzy. Sad endings make me feel bittersweet. This drama made me feel empty. More often than not I wanted to reach into the screen and drag Taitan Jin out of that mess. He was better than all of them and he deserved so much more. The writers broke every rule of writing. They wrote an "evil" character without actually making him evil. They wrote star-crossed lovers with only one person making any effort. Susu's original goal was to prevent TJ from turning into the devil god, but every action she took pushed TJ closer to the edge. She never even told him that she loved him in any meaningful way. This story was like the Pandora's box - it unleashed every single calamity on the world, except hope.

Leia Mais

Could be better

I just finished the drama and I have no idea what I just watched.

The premise was very interesting: two female spies infiltrated an enemy sect as potential brides to wreck havoc. "We must act as enemies!" they said. "So we can gain trust!" they said. And then it all fell apart. They did nothing except cozying up to the two males and then falling in love with them. There was no suspense, espionage, intrigue, betrayal, ANYTHING to fit into the promised plot. Weishan and Shangguan just spent time drinking tea and talking about what they should do, without actually doing anything.

And then there were long winded pointless side stories. Why should we care about Ziyu's mother? She was some chick his dad married who spent all her life pining after her lost love and ignoring her only son. Shangjue and Yuanzhi made a big deal about her being pregnant when marrying the dad, insinuating that the dad wasn't Ziyu's biological father, which would disqualify Ziyu from becoming the Sword Wielder. We were forced to watch a series of flashbacks of Ziyu's mom and Lady Wuji as if there was an actual point there. Was Lady Lan really Ziyu's mom? Or was it actually someone else...like Lady Wuji? That would've been such a cool plot twist. Ziyu was the secret son of the Gong family and Wufeng's super secret agent "Anonymous". SHOCK! But nope! Lady Lan was Ziyu's mother and Lady Wuji was just a nanny. Nothing to see here.

The drama was only 24 episodes, so I thought it would be action packed. Nope! The writers actually managed to make it mindbogglingly boring. The last 3 episodes dragged on and could've been made into one single episode. There were scenes of characters just standing around with snow falling in the background. I seriously couldn't wait for the story to end. I just did not care about any of the character or the plot. Too much screen time was given to secondary, less important characters and their irrelevant storylines, like Elder Yue and Yunque. Why was this important and why did we need to care? There were extended scenes of characters monologuing and telling us all about their plans, instead of showing us. The dialogues about poisons and fighting techniques were extremely convoluted and technical. I felt like I was reading a pseudo scientific thesis filled with confusing terminology that I did not understand.

For the entirety of the show, it was emphasized that Wufeng was the ultimate villain. So why was Ziyu's brother, who was killed off at the beginning, brought back as the bad guy AFTER Wufeng was already defeated? There was just too much plot entanglement and surprise twists that led to nowhere. Less is more.

The writers could have done a better job at Ziyu's character development. He started off as an immature and care-free guy who was forced into the position of the sword wielder. After becoming the sword wielder, he continued acting like an immature and clueless hot-head. The three trials made him grow up and improve his skills. But we didn't see the actual character growth. He just suddenly became mature in one episode.

I did like that Shangjue and Yuanzhi were not the actual villains, but more like competition for Ziyu. Shangjue was right for questioning and challenging Ziyu because Ziyu was an immature kid who did not deserve the position of the sword wielder. I am glad that Ziyu actually earned it at the end.

The finale was plain stupid. Shangjue watched Shangguan leave after she told him he was pregnant with his baby. Ziyu let Weishan go visit her family without any security escort. It appeared that Weishan was ambushed at the family home, so her fate was unknown. The last scene was Ziyu painstakingly waiting for Weishan to come back looking all sad. We heard the gate opening and him looking at it with an unreadable expression. Did Weishan come back? Or was it someone else? Did Weishan and her twin do a switcheroo? What was happening? If there was a sequel, this ending would make sense. But, we don't know if a sequel will follow, so the ending was completely nonsensical. It's ok to make sad endings. But an ending should have a logical conclusion. This was not an ending at all, but an end season cliffhanger.

Overall, the drama had very good visuals and fight scenes. The acting wasn't bad either. But the story progression, pacing, and the finale were disappointing.

Leia Mais

Good drama

At first, I dropped this drama after a few episodes because I detest female characters who are purposely written as clumsy, whinny, and clueless. It's not endearing but really annoying. But after hearing good things about it, I decided to give it another chance and watched it till the end.

This drama has amazing character development. It starts off as kind of comedic but later becomes quite dark and emotional. The main characters go through a transformation. She becomes more mature. He gains feelings and empathy. They are star-crossed lovers and this drama really went out of its way to show the type of love that endures. They fought for each other, made sacrifices, had faith in each other and at the end stayed true to who they were. They also made each other better. She matured from a clumsy airhead to a thoughtful person. He developed feelings and was able to form relationships and appreciate others.

The ending felt rushed. One moment she was waiting for him to come back to life, the next moment he was standing behind her "I am baaaack!", they kissed, the end.

The story tended to drag sometimes but it didn't affect the plot too much.

The acting was fantastic, especially by Dylan Wang. The way he conveyed emotion after Orchid died was heart breaking.

Overall, the show has some really good acting, good music, really emotional scenes, and a very touching love story. Recommend!

Leia Mais

So good!

This is easily one of the best c-dramas of 2023. It does not use the same lame tropes so many other dramas fall victim to. There are no unnecessary plotlines or characters, no continuous cycle of misunderstanding and miscommunication. The drama has meaningful character development, romantic chemistry, and one of the most wholesome and healthy relationships I've ever seen.

There were, of course, some problems. Li Tongguang's (LT) was a terribly written character. His continuous obsession with Ruyi was extremely frustrating . The writers went out of their way to keep him incompetent until the very last episode. His immaturity caused a lot of people to die unnecessarily. After the emperor was killed, it was pretty unbelievable that the first thing he chose to do as the new regent was to poison Ruyi and force her to marry him, just for her to be rescued by Yuanzhou in the same episode, and for Yuanzhou to tell LT for the 100000000th time that he was a creep and a coward. This was especially frustrating because it happened after LT had really good scenes with Princess Yang Ying making it seem like he was getting over his infantile obsession with Ruyi. The show also fixated too much on the Ruyi and Yuanzhou's love story. Yes, we all loved them. They became a couple early and it was refreshing to see them having mutual understanding, respect and love, without falling back on jealousy and miscommunication. But, the writers should've given more screen time to other couples too. I really wanted to see more romantic chemistry between LT and Princess Yang Ying.

Princess Yang Ying was one of my favorite characters who went through the most intense character development. She started as a meek and weak girl just to grow into a strong person taking charge of her life. There was no character regression from better to worse. Everything that happened to her was on point and only contributed to her character growth.

The romance between Ruyi and Yuanzhou was unbelievably wholesome. Yuanzhou was written as every girl's dream man - tall and handsome, strong, kind and attentive, loving and understanding, not obsessive or overly-jealous, intelligent, a friend, a leader, a fighter and protector. The guy was perfect. He let Ruyi handle her business but also protected her when she needed protecting. And, Ruyi didn't magically turn into a damsel-in-destress as soon as a man entered her life.

The message of the show was incredibly meaningful - friendship, loyalty, country, love, and staying true to yourself. I was also impressed by how the characters went out of their way to stress the importance of having respect for women and often said things that we as audience were feeling when someone *ahem* Li Tongguang *ahem* acted like a mentally deranged creep.

I have to say something about the ending. A lot of people hated it, but I thought it was ok. I don't think the main couple died. Some people interpret the ending as symbolic or metaphorical or just Chu Yue's dream. I can't agree. We never saw anyone actually dying, but a lot of suggestive scenes that someone supposedly died. For characters who successfully faked their death throughout the show, they faked it again to be able to walk away and to start a family in seclusion, just like Yuanzhou wanted from the very beginning. And, Ruyi followed him because she couldn't imagine life without him. If it was Yang Ying in the last scene, the death scenario would've made more sense because she was very close with Ruyi and Yuanzhou. Chu Yue - not so much. When Chu Yue saw the boy, she immediately imagined Yu Shisan because that was her last memory of him. Instead, it was someone else who was named after Yu Shisan bearing Yuanzhou's last name. Yuanzhou named his son in honor of his best friend who died. The only red flag was the boy wearing white and riding a white horse, white traditionally being the color of mourning in China. But the idea that death came to reunite Chu Yue with her friends in the afterlife, most of whom she didn't even have a chance to develop a relationship with, looking like Ruyi's and Yuanzhou's son who was never even born, is some crazy mental gymnastics I am not willing to entertain.

The acting was good. I loved Alen Fang's portrayal of Yu Shisan, who was so goofy and adorable. This was such a pleasant surprise after my disappointment with his performance in the Long Ballad. And, of course, Liu Yuning will forever be my favorite.

Leia Mais

Disappointing

The story started out great until about episode 17. The humor gave me endless laughs, the adventures of the main characters were fun to watch, and ML and FL had a lot of chemistry. The villains were compelling and gave us plenty of reasons to hate them. Then, the story went off the rails and started introducing new plotlines and characters who didn't need to be there. I normally don't like love triangles because they usually follow the same tropes and deviate from the plot. This show was no exception. Bai Xiaosheng (BX) was a fun and neutral character who should've stayed neutral. Suddenly, we had to watch multiple episodes involving a love triangle between BX, Tianyao and Yanhui because Tianyao and Yanhui had some tension in their relationship. There were better ways to get it resolved and to get Tianyao gain back Yanhui's trust, instead of sticking BX between them for several episodes. In the second half and towards the end, BX mostly disappeared from the plot making the entire love triangle angst completely pointless.

Even the chemistry between Tianyao and Yanhui became stale in the second half. They had no physical or even romantic chemistry although they were married. They kind of regressed from being a dynamic due to an old boring couple. When Tianyao protected her from any threat, she looked at him in surprise like he wasn't supposed to do it. Ya'll are married. Why are you surprised? Thankfully, or not, they finally shared a very chaste kiss in episode 38 after being married for how long? Pretty damn long,

An endless slew of minor characters and their stories, too many flash-backs, and fillers made the story progression very slow. An entire episode was dedicated to some weird demon capturing Tianyao so she could marry him just to be defeated and never seen again. We did not need to watch short lived romances between minor characters, who all died an episode later, or flashbacks from Yanhui's childhood in the Taoist sect. It was all boring and irrelevant. We also did not need to see Suying's sad romance with the general. There was nothing redeeming about her. She was a reprehensible person, so there was no point trying to make her even a little bit sympathetic.

The end boss was incredibly boring. He was a cookier cutter villain without any motivation or personality. He did bad things because villains do bad things, not because he had a compelling reason to be bad. Taoists were much more interesting and complex.

There were problems with the acting too. Zhou Ye was really cute as Yanhui who was lively, dynamic, and funny. Neo Hou was the opposite. This is the first drama I watched with him and I was completely unimpressed with his acting. He spent a huge amount of the time standing around and staring - forlorn staring, sad staring, observant staring, romantic staring, staring, staring, and more staring. In many scenes involving multiple characters, he just stood around and stared like a place holder. It seemed like the actor either needed more lines or the dialogue needed to be sped up. After some time, the constant staring became very noticeable. Tianyao was the main character with the plot revolving around him, but he looked like Yanhui's side kick most of the time.

Overall, I enjoyed the first half of the show because it was funny and engaging. Unfortunately, the story that started out as an interesting tale of redemption, forgiveness, and new beginnings turned into a constipated mess of stale plotlines and a crusade against a cliche villain. I am actually very disappointed with the way it turned out because it had such a great start.

Leia Mais

Ugh

The long ballad was indeed very long and very stale. If you are looking for an epic love story with a lot of romantic chemistry, an interesting plot, and meaningful character development, you won't find it here.

The story started out strong. FL and ML met each other under interesting circumstances – playing football. Shortly thereafter, FL lost her family to a revolt and was forced to flee her home. Unfortunately, the story kind of got lost within itself after that.

Changge was like the perfect Joan of Arc warrior princess. As a young woman from a privileged background, she was great at everything, including sports, sword fighting, and military strategy. The fact that she was perfect was her one major flaw. There was no room for growth. I enjoy strong female characters, but Changge's flawlessness and acting superior with mostly everyone made her overbearing. She couldn’t be beaten, making her extremely one dimensional. It was not convincing that all of her superb skills were the result of her uncle training her as a child.

While the drama started out strong, the story later took a strange turn and lost all focus. At the beginning, Changge swore revenge against those who instigated the revolt and killed her parents, but she ended up moving around different places and doing things completely unrelated to her original goal. The fact that nobody could figure out that she was a woman was pretty comical. All it took was for her to wear men’s clothes for everyone to suddenly become blind to the fact that she had a bump on her chest and round hips. What's worse, later in the show the revenge plot was completely abandoned and now we had a brand new end boss completely unrelated to Changge.

Yueyan ended up to be my favorite character because she went through the most intense character development and overcame all the difficulties on her own. Her and Hao Du was also my favorite couple because there was so much contrast between them - he was cold and calculating and she was timid and soft. The show did a good job at showing his growing feelings for Yueyan and his inner struggle trying to deal with them.

Half-way through the show, a slew of minor characters started appearing out of nowhere and served no purpose other than existing for Changge and her interests. Then, everything got really stupid. People kept insisting that women couldn't lead, women couldn't participate in politics, women were fragile, but there was this 14 y/o princess Tujia running around signing treaties and fraternizing with grown men without anyone saying anything. She'er was the leader of the wolf division and a good fighter, but he spent a big chunk of the show crying for mommy and being absolutely useless. Many decisions were stupid and made no sense. The crown prince's friend was a traitor and participated in Changge's abduction, but for some reason that was never addressed. Sun got arrested for killing him and no explanation was given. The fact that a member of the royal family got kidnapped wasn't even mentioned. And this type of nonsense continued until the very end. Nobody communicated anything. The show also didn't do a very good job at juggling between different character arcs. Characters would disappear for several episodes at a time making us kind of forget about them.

Explanations for certain plot lines were mediocre. It was never clearly explained why the revolt happened, why Changge's mom wrote the letter, to whom, and what was in it, or why the uncle killed her dad. The only take-away was that the emperor uncle didn't kill the mom.

The romance was underwhelming. It wasn't only because Changge and Sun had no romantic chemistry, but also because watching them together was like watching two dudes interact. They were just hanging out. The one kiss they shared was blurred out and we were forced to watch birds. I don't care that the writers intended it, it looked stupid.

The acting was very mediocre. Although she is very beautiful, Dilraba does not strike me as a very good actress, and, Leo Wu needs to work on his acting skills. I haven't seen him in anything other than Love like the Galaxy and the Long Ballad, and I wasn't impressed with his portrayal of stoic brooding characters. Zhao Lusi and Liu Yuning stole the show for me.

Bottom line, the drama was too long, the plot was too convoluted, and the romance was too stale.

Leia Mais

Laughably bad

I watched this drama exclusively for Moon Sang Min because I loved Under the Queen's Umbrella. This was just terrible.

None of the characters had any b*lls to speak up and tell the truth. Lee Do Han didn't have the courage to tell his brother that he was gay and that the marriage was a sham. Na Ah Jung didn't have the courage to tell her "fiance" that she liked his brother and to Ji Han that the marriage was fake. Lee Ji Han didn't have the courage to tell his brother that he liked his fiance. But, Ji Han still had the audacity to get on his moral high horse and get upset at Ah Jung and Do Han for supposedly keeping things from him after sneaking around with Ah Jung behind everyone's back.

Secondary characters were meaningless and boring. None of the older siblings got their comeuppance for continuously scheming against their younger brothers. Dead mom's husband didn't get punished for causing her death. Ji Han's "first love" was the most pointless and non-confrontational love rival ever. Nobody's actions had any consequences and nothing really mattered. The three main characters made some very strange moral choices and were never called out on anything. Zero thought was put into creating a meaningful story and character development.

The acting was mediocre. Moon Sang Min did a decent job. But, Jeon Jong Seo was terrible. She had one resting b*tch face in most scenes like the drama was a chore for her. Her and Moon Sang Min had no chemistry. Overall, the show was a complete waste of time with zero entertainment value.

Leia Mais

So good

There aren't enough words to describe how I feel about this drama. It tells a story of a mother's love for her children while navigating through betrayal, a struggle for power between the family members, murder, and political intrigue. Not a single character was out of place. Not a single plotline was unnecessary. All the characters got their proper screen time and development. The villains were written for us to hate and the protagonists were written for us to love and root for. This is undeniably one of the best Asian dramas I have ever seen.

The show treats each relationship between the queen with her sons with tender love and care showing that each prince is unique and has a special relationship with his mother. The queen loves them in spite of all their shortcomings and unusual personality traits and makes them feel loved and accepted. I particularly appreciated this take because in Joseon certain lifestyles would have absolutely been condemned, regardless of how much a mother loved her children.

Even other princes, who were not the queen's children, got character development showing their own personal trauma and relationships with their own mothers. The queen was so loving and compassionate that she was able to connect with every single character, even the ones who at first were against her, through her love and compassion and good deeds. And, the acting was phenomenal.

Overall, the show has a very well written plot, amazing character development, and extremely likable characters we can actually related to.

Leia Mais

No Ta chi

The story was very unique. It had some LGBT elements that had to be handled with a certain level of care and awareness. Unfortunately, at least in my opinion, the writers decided to go down the safe, less gay, route without realizing that the ending completely destroyed the plot.

** SPOILERS **

The drama was about Bong Hwan (BH), a 21st century man, traveling back in time and waking up in a body of a princess soon to be a queen. It was filled with very funny and clever moments that kept me very entertained. But, after episodes 14-15, the plot kind of became stale. The scenes were not as funny anymore but annoying. I eyerolled at the scene where the queen threw a temper tantrum over Lady Choi eating all the yogurt. However, this wasn't the biggest problem with the show. The biggest problem was the ending.

The story was about BH's relationship and subsequent love story with the king. Nowhere in the drama did the writers elude that BH and So Yong (SY) ever fought for control of the body, or that sometimes it was BH and sometimes it was SY who was in control. It was always BH. This was even confirmed in the queen's last conversation with Byung In telling him that "she" did not know where So Yong was or whether she was even alive.

The king, Cheoljong, fell in love with BH in SY's body. BH's unorthodox behavior, unpredictability, straight forwardness, lack of manners was what was attractive. If the king wanted a meek and polite young lady, he would've stayed in love with Hwa Jin.

Everything the king did - writing the queen's dictionary filled with new words that BH introduced to him, writing a journal about new fighting and exercise techniques that BH taught him, reforming the country, was because of his relationship with BH, not SY. SY by herself was a very minor character and appeared in only a few flashbacks. Even SY's ideas about women's rights were BH's ideas and not hers.

And, what do we get at the end? BH goes back home without even saying "good-bye" to anyone. The king ended up with SY, who was not the person he fell in love with. But, that's ok, so long as SY looked exactly like the person he loved, we were supposed to accept it. What a terrible, horrible, no good message.

I am not sure why the writers did not go down the incarnation route where SY and BH were the same person living in different eras, and, at the end have SY and BH's souls and personalities merge as one in SY's body. There was already a premise for that with the queen's identity crisis "her" being a man in a woman's body and having a romantic/sexual relationship with the king.

It was also strange how the king did not pick up on the fact that after BH left, his wife became a completely different person who could no longer cook and had an entirely different personality. Or, that SY ended up lying to the king about who she was and did exactly what Hwa Jin did. But we are supposed to ignore it.

Shin Hye Sun is an actress from god. She did an amazing job portraying BH and SY as completely different people, they even spoke differently. SY was soft spoken. BH was coarse and aggressive. It was rather strange to assume that the king, who was head over hills in love with BH, did not see that his wife was different, considering that the differences in SY's personalities after the suicide incident were consistently addressed in the show. We did get a scene where the king somewhat realized that he lost something, but that scene looked like an afterthought rather than a serious and tragic realization that something important was lost.

Even Byung In, whom I hated, became a sympathetic character at the end because he actually confronted BH about SY and was the only one whose love was authentic. The writers made it look like it didn't matter to the king who he was married to so long as that person looked a certain way.

I honestly thought that BH would return to the king in one way or another, but the ending left me completely flabbergasted. Nobody ended up with the person they actually loved and the king's relationship with the queen was based on a lie. The attempt to paint SY to be more like BH because she started cursing was a lousy cop out. What made BH different was his boldness, a sense of justice, and ability to form close relationships with servants and nobility alike. SY just capitalized on it and ripped rewards from everything BH accomplished, without achieving anything on her own. What a stupid way to destroy an awesome story.

The rewatch value is like in the Game of Thrones. Everything is awesome until it all falls apart at the end.

Leia Mais

Needed more plot

My main complaint with the show is that it reached its logical conclusion in episode 12. This is when ML and FL were already a couple and the mystery behind the kidnapping was resolved. The rest of the episodes were just filler without a plot. When there is no conflict and nothing to resolve, the story becomes stale. There wasn't even that much conflict with the older brother. He just kind of became irrelevant after the kidnapping mystery was resolved. The animosity between the brothers also looked forced because of the lack of plot development. When Young Joon told Mi So that his brother was a "bastard" and there were issues with their childhood friends, it implied that there might've been past bulling or some other conflict which had nothing to do with the kidnapping. But, it was just the kidnapping. To make matters worse, the issue between the brothers was forced on them by their parents who lied about the kidnapping for their own good, which was a pretty stupid plot device because it did not justify all the animosity. And, after it was resolved, everyone acted like nothing happened for the last 4 episodes, which was especially disappointing because the kidnapping and resulting trauma were an important plot point central to ML's and FL's character development and the writers made it completely superficial and unimportant at the end.

The resolution to the plotline of Mi So wanting to find herself felt like a cop out. At the beginning, she wanted to leave the company to find a husband. Then, that plotline was abandoned just to resurface at the end where Mi So realized she wanted to continue being Young Joon's secretary because she loved him. And, she remained his secretary after marrying him. This was rather a strange choice for a wife of a CEO to have the same position as his office employees, instead of holding a higher position for which she was actually qualified.

One of the things I liked was that FL had enough sense to pick up on the nuisances about ML's behavior to discern that there was a lot more to the kidnapping story than what she was told. I loved that she did not just blindly believe everything she was told and started having a crush on the older brother, which would've resulted in a very stupid love triangle. She suspected from the very beginning that Young Joon was the one who was kidnapped, which led her to the truth. In return, Young Joon transformed from a self-centered person to a thoughtful and caring boyfriend and employer. The main couple also had very nice chemistry and some very steamy scenes.

Other than that, there wasn't much else going on. The side characters were not interesting enough to carry the plot. I ended up skipping most of scenes in episodes 13-16 and just watched the ones with the main couple to get to the end faster.

Leia Mais

Not sure what it was

I'm not sure why this show has such high ratings. The story had no direction and the characters were unlikable. FL was spineless, whiny, had no motivation, and made incomprehensible choices over and over. ML just keept following her and trusting her after she repeatedly disappointed him and broke his heart, cuz reasons.

The first half was funny and even interesting. By episode 15, it became a directionless mess. Nobody communicated anything. Characters didn't stand up for themselves or their convictions. Qianqian just ran around doing random crap without any clear motivation. She obviously liked Han Shuo, but she tried to set him up with someone else. And then, everyone was suddenly in love with her. Pei Heng showed up 20 times to "save" her, without her actually needing saving, and repeatedly got his ass kicked by Han Shuo. Chuchu became a villain for no reason and started doing absolutely obnoxious schit. It's ok for shows to be funny and have a simple plot. Not everything has to be deep. But, this was just painful. Thank god the show only had 24 episodes.

I did like the ending. It was very sweet, reminded me of Fushigi Yugi.

Leia Mais

Waste of time

I really really really was looking forward to this drama solely for Lee Jun Ho because I loved him in the Red Sleeve. But, the show was so utterly underwhelming and frustrating.

This is a cliche rom-com where a rich guy falls for a working class employee. It would've been interesting if the writers treated the characters like adults, instead of high school students, and gave them mature interactions and meaningful conversations. Instead, the drama was filled with overused tropes in the most inappropriate moments and teenage bickering. They are standing in the rain. He is dealing with his trauma and she is dealing with hers. Instead of getting them to have an adult conversation about their problems and develop a bond, we get a trope where she trips and falls and he catches her. And this happens in every episode. They go on a business trip, get stranded on a ship, and spend a night in a cabin. He sends her on some stupid arrand, she gets lost in the woods in bad weather, he heroically rescues her at night riding a helicopter. This type of nonsense was completely overused in dramas like Hana Yori Dango and it was already pretty stupid back then. In mature adult romance where characters are thirty, these tropes should not exist because they completely cheapen the plot and make characters look immature.

It also seemed like the writers didn't quite know how to develop ML. The show started out with a sophisticated and rich bad-boy skydiving in a suit and landing on a helicopter pad James Bond style. Later, we find out that he was nothing more than a nepotism baby with no social awareness, no competence, no charisma and existed solely to pine after FL. Even his feud with his sister was forced because he didn't do anything other than chase after FL. He finished his MBA at the beginning of the show, which could've been a nice plot device for him to start serious work in the hotel to pave way for him to eventually become the owner, while competing with his sister for control of the company. No, he was a director in name only and didn't really do anything or showed any particular interest in work. Even his employees had to spell it out for him that he needed to gain power and support in order to succeed, instead of spending too much time pining after FL.

Some story arcs were laughably ridiculous, like the one with the Arab prince who started acting like a total simp for Sarang and competing for her with Gu Won. There was no reason for it other than manufacturing tension. Even in a fictional story, this is utterly asinine. And the arc with the flight attendant friend wasn't interesting enough for me to care about because she was a pretty minor character.

Overall, the show felt like a high school drama filled with overused cliches, rather than mature adult romance. Characters had no motivation and there was no real plot. Pass.

Leia Mais

Good acting and production overshadowed by a messy plot

This show had tremendous potential. The premise was very interesting and seemed to be a coming of age/revenge story of a young man getting married, finding love, becoming mature and responsible, and finding his calling in life. Unfortunately, that wasn't the actual plot. I don't know what the plot was.

The romance was ok. It only took Jiusi and Yuru 28 episodes to kiss and consummate their marriage. Other than that, they had affectionate and cute interactions with almost no sexual chemistry. But, when they kissed, they made out on screen and it was hot. This makes me totally confused about the logic behind Chinese censorship.

The revenge plot was a big deal at the beginning. But, then it completely fizzled out into nothing. The evil magistrate, who killed Jiusi's family, got stabbed to death by a girl. So, what was the point of that storyline at all? I guess halfway thorough the show, the writers decided to switch the direction from revenge to political intrigue.

The whole drama could've been completed in 25 episodes. After the rebels were defeated and the new emperor took the throne, the story should've reached its logical conclusion, but the writers dragged it for another 10+ episodes to meet the maximum allowable threshold of 40 episodes. On top of that, the drama had long draggy conversational scenes about nothing. I didn't care about everything a character was feeling at a particular moment. I zoned out through most of the conversations or fast-forwarded through half of them.

I ended up skipping the last 10 episodes and just watched episode 40.

The music was good, the acting was great. But all the positive things were completely overshadowed by a totally incoherent plot.

Leia Mais

It's ok for a low budget flick

A low budget show is low budget with only 10 very short episodes. It's a shame that this wasn't a full length drama because there was enough plot to write a nicely developed story and characters.

The acting was decent. Na In Woo is still a bit inconsistent. His acting is good in some dramas but stiff in others. Here, he was good.

The plot was mostly straight forward, except for some side stories that went nowhere because of the short length. The writers tried to stick a lot of material into a very short drama without giving any of the new characters and storylines any development. It felt rushed and awkward.

Rewatch value? None. It's a good show to kill time for a few hours and forget about afterwards.

Leia Mais