A cliched and irritating mess
Right off the bat, a stark age gap between the two leads. Keyi could well be the general's daughter. This isn't helped by how childish and naive she is. She doesn't know shit about the world, which, fair enough given her background and everything, but leads to some very iffy dynamic with her much older lover. Sometimes I feel like he's mentoring her, being a father figure she never had. Which is wholesome until you realised THEIR ACTUAL RELATIONSHIP.Because of the shit imposed on them by the schemes of various villains, there's some very uncomfortable stuff. Like the male lead treating her like absolute shit at the beginning, or trapping her in her room at some point to prevent her from running off. There's legitimate circumstantial reasons for this, but I'm not a fan of how controlling he is. (It only worsens the age dynamic.)
Seriously, if every romantic drama director wants to get their hands on the trendy jaded brooding man x bright optimistic woman troupe. They need to understand that optimistic =/= naive and quit it with the age gap.
Unlike most female leads who are at least shown to be clever and...uh..feisty, I guess, but not this time. Keyi doesn't blame her husband at all and never fights back. This is both baffling and annoying, as it makes her suffering essentially pointless. Writers, can you make your female lead an actual human being and not just a vessel for our frustration and catharsis?
Like...the premise is that Keyi is tasked (under threat) to steal her husband's token. So she needs to get close to him. A whole lot of episodes is just Keyi sucking up to the guy while he treats her like shit, including making her kneel in the rain until it stopped for no good reason. What. The. Fuck.
There is also a female spy character who is there All. The. Time. She screws up every mission she's given. (It's not really an issue with her, it's just that the male lead is all powerful until the plot needs him to get hurt, so if he's your target, you're gonna fail everytime.) Problem is, she is arrogant as hell and completely confident in herself. Loud, boastful, talkative, rude, even when she has to date accomplished nothing than kill a few civilians that she isn't even after.
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So far, okay!
They truly went only halfway with this and the story is redundant. I'll continue to watch because its occupying time until the next really good drama comes out. In other words I can tolerate it. But one thing that is driving me crazy is the voice of the lead actress, Miaoyi Zhang. Her acting is second rate, and her voice is like chalk on a chalkboard. She talks through her nose and can't deliver a line. She is lovely to look at, but someone needs to send her to speech classes to learn how to talk properly. The acting is okay. But because of the script and directing, it is hard to tell if it is the acting that is bad, or the directing.Was this review helpful to you?
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SKIP ALL LOVE TRIANGLE SCENES FOR A MORE ENJOYABLE WATCH TIME
Let's start off with the positives I feel like the trope of substitute bride was really well executed in this drama I loved the characters I was supposed to like and hated the characters I was supposed to dislike and that's a sign of basic writing abilities. I was invested in all the characters emotions and I was not bored watching the drama at all the story had me hooked from start to finish.Now for my two main complains, yes I agree with everyone that said the ending was rushed like as I was watching the last episode all I could think was that the drama just needed one more episode and that ending would have been perfect I don't know if Chinese dramaland is very strict about the number of episodes a show must have but yes ONE MORE episode was needed, second, I HATE the love triangle trope and what I wrote in my heading is what I truly feel and I'll go in depth when I talk about the characters but there is a way to do a love triangle correctly and this was not it.
Wen Ye and Shen Ke Yi - My god this drama needs to be the blueprint for how to do age gap relationships correctly, they had excellent kissing scenes and even when they weren't kissing the way they looked at each other?!?!?! CHEMISTRY if they didn't have such amazing chemistry I promise you the drama wouldn't have been nearly as watchable and overall I loved them as characters it was well executed
side note : the half up half down hairstyle did Dylan Kuo no favors and actually aged him but when he wore the hairstyle with all his hair gathered up and the two loose pieces in the front?!?!?!? Lord he never looked better.
Zhou Yu - this character needs to be a modern day study on how a love triangle can ruin a character's chances, just take same character but instead on having him fall in love with our female lead we make him a over protective male friend like that all his scenes becomes more enjoyable and I have less of a need to punch him there is truly nothing wrong with this character it's the trope that's his been forced into that ruins him for me.
ShuangZi - I'm not going to talk about how she got the only man who truly loved her killed for a man who pays her DUST or how it lowkey feels weird that the drama made the choice to have her ROMANICALLY pursue a man she met when he was a grown man and she was child rather I'm going to talk about the route we could have taken to make her character more interesting and tragic, instead of the love triangle bs instead make her story the one of someone torn choosing the man who saved her and who she idolizes and her love for her country but in the end she can't choose and dies at the hand of the man she looks up to BOOM instantly a better story, just a waste of the good character.
Wan Shi wei and Yunying : DEVASTATION I'M NOT OKAY HOW DARE YOU DO THIS TO ME WE COULD HAVE HAD IT ALL LIKE THIS IS TWISTED AND UNFAIR
Nan Bo and Tao - This is my safe space he is character I loved from jump and she's the character who stood ten toes down for our female lead so how am I not supposed to root for them in the end like just a feel good ship.
side note : Tao's actress is the cutest lady I've ever seen how is she to pretty I hope she gets leading roles in the future.
Fu Yi - .......... I don't wanna talk about it. [ silent heartbreak ]
side note : the way some of the scenes were shot and the score choices screamed soap opera to me and I'm obsessed.
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The worst series I've ever watched
I haven't watched such an ugly TV series lately. Maybe I've never watched it. I watched 15 episodes. All 15 of them are bad, worse than each other, meaningless, meaningless, impersonal, unfair, unfounded, insensitive, erroneous, wrong and inconsistent. So whatever you are looking for is in this series. There seems to be a story. From what I understand, the Prime Minister is saying that the prince whose daughter he was going to marry is dead, or he wants to have it killed himself. I didn't understand that. Then they say he died. Instead of his real daughter, he marries his daughter from his concubine to the dead prince. He wants his daughter to be buried with him, etc. The girl is running away. Then he meets the prince who is said to be dead. He is dressing his wound. It kind of saves. Then they realize that they are husband and wife, but the prince knows that the prime minister is against him, so he does not want the prime minister's daughter either. They also threaten the girl with her nanny. They say, "We'll kill your nanny and steal the prince's jade." Such events are developing. But it doesn't improve at all. First, the Prince says "I did not die in front of the king" and rips off the Prime Minister's hairpin, revealing his hair. This is kind of like a death sentence. He apologizes to the king, but the king doesn't even say what's going on, brother. The prince who did this walks away. Shouldn't the reason for this be asked? The prince supposedly has a crush on this prime minister and is looking for weaknesses in him. Drive the deficit. This time he wasn't letting the girl into his mansion. He felt sorry for his situation. He took it in. Even though the servants knew that she was a princess, they beat the princess at the instigation of the head maid. As if that wasn't enough. They locked it or something. They threatened. They committed all kinds of disgrace. The mansion has a butler. He has a lot of employees. Nobody knows or hears about it. The girl doesn't say either. It's as if he's accepting that his nanny will die. However, there are various aspects to this job. As a matter of fact, during the second fight, a servant gives the news, and she gives it so hard that you get swollen while watching it. Something like that. It's a complete disgrace. It takes courage to watch. This time our prince comes and beats the servants and drives them away, asking how you can beat the princess. However, except for the maid from the Shen mansion and the head maid. He gets the maid caned and sent to the Shen mansion. He says I will ask you about the head maid, take this away or something. Supposedly he will call to account. One episode later, you see this head maid wandering around. He defies the princess again. He is harassing. He's running out of words. This time they are interrogating him. He confesses everything. No one knows what happens to him after that. So why wasn't it done from the beginning? Then the stepmother who had these done appears. The Prime Minister supposedly does not interfere. But when he sees the result, he says oh good, kill him or something. They kill the girl's nanny. They are conspiring to kill the girl. They kidnap the girl. A festival for homes. The girl is already running away from the mansion on her own. We don't know why. Just like that. Something happens to him every time he escapes. No reason. Meaningless. Then they steal the jade from the hand of a traitor girl among the prince's soldiers. They give this to the prime minister's wife. It's unclear what they will do with it after stealing it. Supposedly they were going to use it against the prince. It's important for the prince, but I don't understand what it's important for them. They will probably save themselves with that jade. Will it ever be asked how you can save yourself with the jade you stole? As a matter of fact, their thefts never stopped. The prince went and raided the prime minister's house with the princess girl. He found the jade. He caned the Prime Minister's wife. They scolded the Prime Minister and returned home. If you could do this, why haven't you done it yet? Now they got the stick, but they continue to screw up. Nothing happens. Prince or king brother, this prime minister stole my jade. They kidnapped my wife. They beat me. They did it like this, there was no telling or punishing anything. Paso evil continues. They continue to watch. But there is no connection, no proper justification, reason, justification or logic in the events. The editing sucks. I mean, I don't know if it's because of the scriptwriter or if the director didn't convey it. It's a flawed series from start to finish. As I said, the prime minister, who did nothing, this time cooperates with the rebels of the opposing state and aims to kill the prince. So it helps. It supports. Likewise, his wife finds an acquaintance from the palace and makes a plan to inform the king that her stepdaughter, whom she married, is supposedly selling candy on the streets. The king and the queen mother are the subjects of this plan together. It's so simple. So what if he sold candy? A king asks what these candies are. Where did you buy it. Sir, our cook made it and we eat it. It was someone who made it, and that someone learned it from the current princess, who used to make and sell these candies on the streets. What's wrong with that. Who's this? Prince Jin's wife. Find him immediately, bring him in and arrest him, completely shut down the house of the prime minister who lied to us, and do what is necessary, says the king. For no reason. I couldn't make any sense of it. So this girl is being arrested for selling candy on the street? When the prince hears this, he wants to save the princess, they say stop, don't do it, it will backfire. Justice will be served, just wait. The princess is arrested, but nothing is done to the prime minister's mansion. From where? Again, for no reason. Because the series is wrong. Wrong.Was this review helpful to you?
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Ew
A real 20yr age gap between the two lead?. I hope they stop casting younger female actress with old male actors. Dude is old enough to be her dad in real life. How cringe and awkward. Person casting the actors needs to do a better job too. Sadly, the drama could of done better but that age gap must of caused a lot of viewers to turn away.Was this review helpful to you?
