This show is a quiet, sincere masterpiece well-deserving of the love audiences have shown it.
I didn't know if I was going to like this show when I started watching it, in fact I was fairly skeptical of the whole "forbidden love" angle.
But what I thought was going to be the biggest hurdle the show would have to overcome, in fact turned out to be its greatest strength.
Rather than being titillating and reveling in the taboo, this story is slow and introspective. Instead of focusing on romance, it prioritises exploring the inner lives of the characters, their complicated circumstances, emotions, and relationships.
We see the characters on their own almost as much as we see them interacting with one another, and when they are together found family and loving people by choice are very strongly thematised.
Paradoxically, this makes the show almost devastatingly romantic and touching. It doesn't make any grand, general statements, it simply explores, in great detail, the relationship between two people who are absolutely indispensable to one another and why that connection turns romantic. How, for these two specific people, a love like this can and does work.
Another completely unexpected highlight of the series is its understated humour which not only balances perfectly with the more serious tone the story strikes overall, but which is also often so clever or unexpected it made me laugh out loud several times.

Add to that the spectacular performances from the entire cast, excellent writing, beautiful and highly effective cinematography and editing, and a simple yet lovely soundtrack and it's clear why this series is so cherished by its viewers.
It's not entirely without its flaws, for example I would have loved to see Qian experience more character development in regards to his extreme protectiveness over his sister and how, intentionally or not, this ties into general misogynistic patterns of behaviour. Some of the gang sub-plots could also have been more fleshed out.
On the whole though these issues aren't nearly enough to diminish my high opinion of this show and certainly won't dissuade me from recommending it to others.
If you like slow, thoughtful, highly character-driven slice-of-life stories which, in their own way, highlight how in the end what it all comes down to is love, love, and love again, then this one is for you.
If you enjoy stories that explore the shifting and often blurry lines between different kinds of love, or that ask what it *really* means to form a family with someone, then this one is most definitely for you.