Writers have the right to give their message, but I haven't seen anyone contest this, the contestation takes place within the scope of the quality of the form of that message, in this case, the narrative and all its arcs. I've seen some say that series imitate life: fortunately the world has rules, norms, laws that regulate conduct. But we aren't talking about current times, but about the Tang Dynasty (618-907 AD), a period that marks the creation of the Tang Code, still active in today's China. It was the apogee of the rigor of the law, even more so for the powerful who frequently betrayed the emperors. I open quotation marks:
"The Tang Code (Chinese: 唐律; pinyin: Tang lǜ) was a penal code that was established and used during the Tang Dynasty in China. Supplemented by civil statutes and regulations, it became the basis for later dynastic codes, not only in China, but in other parts of East Asia. The Code synthesized legalist and Confucian interpretations of law. Created in 624 CE and modified in 627 and 637 CE, it was promulgated in 652 CE with 502 articles in 12 sections and enriched with a commentary. (the Tánglǜ shūyì 唐律疏議) in 653. Considered one of the greatest achievements of traditional Chinese law, the Tang Code is also the oldest Chinese code to be transmitted to the present in its complete form."
As we can observe, we didn't see the laws being applied to anyone in KMLM, neither the poor nor the rich. The writers chose to manipulate facts in favor of the absurd, disproportionately punishing the righteous (rich and poor) and sending the message that crime pays (for rich and poor). If the world were like the world of KMLM, we would be a generalized anarchy, kinda Mad Max world. KMLM doesn't present the moral of the story, but a story without morals...nor ethics...nor logic.
What gives value to a work, whatever it may be? What made Molière and Victor Hugo reach our days as heralds of theater and literature? What makes Bach and Mozart still revered today? Why have Greek tragedies been alive for more than 2,000 years? There are aesthetic criteria combined with technical criteria that add value to a work, its historical importance, originality, its significance for society.
There are those who don't like Mozart, but that doesn't change his value to humanity. There are those who give KMLM a 10 and that also won't change its status as a series that had everything it needed to be a hit and sank into a mediocre narrative, abandoning sacred and consecrated technical criteria in works that make humanity proud. Below are some of these technical criteria:
1 Abuse of clichés (I'll mention just a few of the completely predictable facts):
●The repeated death of ML (and resurrections...)
●Use of incense/poisons for all types of narrative manipulation.
●Reappearance of LM as "savior of the homeland" (Two scenes. MJH's image becomes smaller, even though he was crucial in defeating CP and facing the final battle)
●YQ's appearance in the battle, giving him credit for the victory. MJH becomes secondary in this context.
●Forced deaths of beloved characters (Big Guy and Qing Yan) 2 Lack of internal coherence:
●KMLM left poorly developed situations along the way, circumstances that were poorly named and not clarified, and corrupted the texture of the text. The narrative is not believable, which is why it is not convincing. In the imitation of life or ultra-reality, the text is fragile, it did not resist the continuity of the arc, it died along the way. We don't know what MJH and ML's revenge plan was, hatched over 10 years.
3 Absence of character characteristics:
●Key characters were disfigured beyond recognition
●MJH, ML, LM and even the Emperor lost the strong, typical, particular features, which should consolidate their meaning and significance in the sequence of the narration. This was not a twist, but the deliberate "death" of the character in its original conception.
4 Circular writing:
●The narrative went in circles, nothing new or surprising was added, the series invested in unimportant situations/characters. We didn't see new actions being chained towards a climax, nor the peripety of events, the sequence that would allow a good closure, not necessarily a HE.
5 Forgotten Characters:
●Master of Shadow: so essential to the plot, as soon as he appeared, he disappeared.
●Consort Yin simply disappeared. Initially she had a role in the CP plot.
6 Regarding aspects that transformed the drama into a melodrama (in general, melodrama exaggerates everything, is sentimental, aims to bring tears and exacerbate emotions):
A-The fading of the virile characteristics of MJH, a warrior prince, hero of his kingdom, reaches its limit when it transforms him into a passionate teenager, a man with a fragile emotional state (embodying the Master of Shadow required coldness and vigor), he was subject to paralyzing depressions, MJH became excessively emotional to the point of having several crying spells. We are made to feel sorry for him, when we would like to feel proud.
B-The scenes with ML's supposed corpse are not convincing. If you defend a realistic message, must consider that a body doesn't stay like a puppet, it stiffens, releases fluids, starts to stink in 2 days. And no one suspects... It's an unpleasant scene, hard to believe and melodramatic to the extreme.
C-LM and CP in prison. The scene uses the classic image of La Pietà to create an aesthetic atmosphere with the clear objective of softening our sense of ethics and justice, involving us in an emotional trap: it is an aberration, an unreasonable scene of support and compassion towards a criminal.
I believe I have addressed the basic errors of KMLM in the light of technical and aesthetic criteria: it has lost value as a serious work, but can please as a mere distraction.
