OneAjhussi
France
This review may contain spoilers
A surprisingly good historical kdrama with a great Queen
1/ STORY : A Queen Lioness has to defend her cubs against an evil who hates her and her sons just because she needs to constrain and manipulate people to feel happy. A Drama with standard plot of palace struggle for power between a faction led by high ranking royals + officials against the Queen and the great princes using the rest of the harem and their princes. But a drama with a modern tone.
2/CHARACTERS:
- The Queen: She is a modern woman in Choseon era and a benevolent Queen. A caring mother with a strong personality and an ability to scheme and counter scheme to defend her sons and her people. Loved that character.
- Grand Prince Seong Nam + Chung Ha : I liked the two characters from hot headed GP to taking his brother's role and becoming a father and from rogue daughter to CPrincess and becoming a mother. A Cute little romance.
- Most of the princes are good kids who love and support each other despite their different moms instigating some against others. Fav: Prince Bogum, Prince Muan, Prince Hodong.
- Main villain: Awful person who causes deaths and tragedy just for the sake of manipulating people and having them in control.
- Second main villain: The guy looked funny and most of the time he was in a crossfire.
- Third villain : Kind of pitied her despite all her schemes she looked miserable.
- Son of villains : Annoying guy and cold blood murderer and conspirator
- The doctor : Sorry mate but you did bad.
2/ WHAT I LIKED:
- The pace : The drama has 16 eps but it is fast paced with a good development of the main story and sub plots that are funny and emotional especially between the Queen and her sons.
- The story has a lot of characters involved and their relations or connections are intricated. At some point it looks messy but the ending twists clarify the situation and unveil an unexpected but entertaining story.
- The drama tackling modern questions: gender identity, teenage pregnancy...
3/ WHAT I DID NOT LIKE:
- The demise of the bad guys is not really satisfactory. The death of the big villain is too lenient. After all the murders, attempt murders, conspiracy to murder... Her ending is still on her own terms.
- The cold blood murderer and conspirator got away with his bad deeds and crimes. Shame.
- The character GP Seong Nam takes a nose dive towards end. Probably the writer did not want him to overshadow the Queen and they gave him less screentime and less importance.
4/OST: A good sageuk one.
5/REWATCH VALUE: Valuable. But probably I won't rewatch it.
6/OVERALL: I binged watched this drama after it ended airing and enjoyed it. It is a good drama with a few flaws. An unclear plot at some point because of characterization, the lack of sense of danger as the good guys would always prevail, some repetitive elements, and the closure brought to the characters not always satisfactory for me.
Still this drama is one of the most entertaining historical Krama I watched since a while thanks to many good characters and their rivalry or their cute and kind, heartwarming interactions. I totally recommend it. 9/10
2/CHARACTERS:
- The Queen: She is a modern woman in Choseon era and a benevolent Queen. A caring mother with a strong personality and an ability to scheme and counter scheme to defend her sons and her people. Loved that character.
- Grand Prince Seong Nam + Chung Ha : I liked the two characters from hot headed GP to taking his brother's role and becoming a father and from rogue daughter to CPrincess and becoming a mother. A Cute little romance.
- Most of the princes are good kids who love and support each other despite their different moms instigating some against others. Fav: Prince Bogum, Prince Muan, Prince Hodong.
- Main villain: Awful person who causes deaths and tragedy just for the sake of manipulating people and having them in control.
- Second main villain: The guy looked funny and most of the time he was in a crossfire.
- Third villain : Kind of pitied her despite all her schemes she looked miserable.
- Son of villains : Annoying guy and cold blood murderer and conspirator
- The doctor : Sorry mate but you did bad.
2/ WHAT I LIKED:
- The pace : The drama has 16 eps but it is fast paced with a good development of the main story and sub plots that are funny and emotional especially between the Queen and her sons.
- The story has a lot of characters involved and their relations or connections are intricated. At some point it looks messy but the ending twists clarify the situation and unveil an unexpected but entertaining story.
- The drama tackling modern questions: gender identity, teenage pregnancy...
3/ WHAT I DID NOT LIKE:
- The demise of the bad guys is not really satisfactory. The death of the big villain is too lenient. After all the murders, attempt murders, conspiracy to murder... Her ending is still on her own terms.
- The cold blood murderer and conspirator got away with his bad deeds and crimes. Shame.
- The character GP Seong Nam takes a nose dive towards end. Probably the writer did not want him to overshadow the Queen and they gave him less screentime and less importance.
4/OST: A good sageuk one.
5/REWATCH VALUE: Valuable. But probably I won't rewatch it.
6/OVERALL: I binged watched this drama after it ended airing and enjoyed it. It is a good drama with a few flaws. An unclear plot at some point because of characterization, the lack of sense of danger as the good guys would always prevail, some repetitive elements, and the closure brought to the characters not always satisfactory for me.
Still this drama is one of the most entertaining historical Krama I watched since a while thanks to many good characters and their rivalry or their cute and kind, heartwarming interactions. I totally recommend it. 9/10
Was this review helpful to you?
