Ashes of Love

Toxic dumpster-fire of a love story that needs to be burnt with pure glass fire

STORY AND CHARACTERS
The show just wasn't that great. The story dragged on for 60 episodes with unnecessarily long story arcs that could've been cut down to one or two episodes. It took fifteen episodes to reveal who Jin Mi was. The girl had no character development. Her one talent was to inadvertently get the two most eligible bachelors to pine after her. This is such a stupid trope because it is completely undeserved.

One of the creepiest things was everyone going along with Jinmi getting engaged to Runyu. She was a child in a woman's body who didn't know the difference between friendship and romantic love. Everyone knew she was a moron but they still went along with her agreeing to the engagement, even though they should have known she had no idea what she was agreeing to. The fact that the flower realm raised her to be a blissful idiot was extremely shortsighted too. Jinmi was supposed to be protected from any future heartbreak, but she was given no tools to be able to protect herself from it. Everything and everyone was stupid.

The mortal arc unnecessarily dragged on for 10+ episodes. The whole point of it should have been to move the character development forward and to show that no matter how much Jin Mi and Xu Feng were separated, they would always find their way back to each other. Everything else was irrelevant. We didn't need to see the drama inside the mortal lives of immortals who were going back to being immortal in just a few episodes.

The chemistry between Jinmi and Xufeng was very stale. Watching them together was as exciting as watching the paint dry. Jinmi was pretty, but she wasn't particularly bright and there was nothing special about her. She didn't even know what gender she was at the beginning. Their kisses resembled toddlers pecking each other on the lips. Everything was dry and passionless.

After the mortal arc, the only thing left to look forward to was the emperor and empress getting their comeuppance. But the cringe didn't end there. The biggest problem with the writing was that good characters did very awful things, nobody held them accountable, and the story never addressed their bad behavior. We were supposed to just ignore it and continue cheering for team Jinmi/Xufeng. A perfect example was Xufeng getting into Jinmi's pants. I didn't fault them for falling in love. But I found it reprehensible that Xufeng did not wait for Jinmi to break her engagement with Runyu before sleeping with her. She was still a moron. But he reached a whole new level of awfulness for treating his brother that way. By doing this, Xufeng showed that he was just as immoral, callous, selfish, and entitled as his crappy parents.

On the other hand, the writers went out of their way to demonize Runyu and to portray him as a villain. All of the characters who sided with Runyu and complained about how awful the heaven was suddenly decided to abandon him after he deposed the emperor. The writers never explained why. Characters just randomly decided that they wanted to go a different way. This made them look very cowardly and cynical. Meanwhile, everyone kept cheering for Xufeng, who was written as the golden boy who could do no wrong.. He also seemed to forget that he was a prince with responsibilities. Chasing after Jinmi was all he cared about.

In episode 45, Jinmi finally realized that she was in love with Xufeng. But, really, who cares at this point? I was honestly fed up with their bs. They did Runyu dirty repeatedly and nobody held either of them accountable. Instead, everyone judged Runyu and held him to some arbitrary moral standard when he did nothing wrong. Jinmi ended up marrying him for no good reason, even though she was told she didn't have to. Runyu still kept holding on to her even after she ran off to find Xufeng. "But what about our marriage?" Seriously? I sympathized with Runyu a lot but him still trying to hold on to her knowing she was fully committed to his brother was an idiotic plot development. He should've let her go as soon as he found out she slept with Xufeng.

The drama has a terrible message. Deposing callous and self-serving tyrants is bad. But, acting without honor and a sense of duty is ok. Also, blind favoritism, betraying family members, abandoning friends, and breaking promises is acceptable and even encouraged. By episode 47, I was done. I knew that Jinmi and Xufeng were going to end up together, but I couldn't fathom why. His family killed her family and she stabbed him in the back for thinking he killed her father. They crossed the point of no return so many times. Their relationship was based on betraying those closest to them, abandoning their duties, and having no faith in each other. What kind of values are these and why were we supposed to root for them?

ACTING
The acting by the two main leads was mediocre. Xufeng always had a blank look when he was pouring his heart out to Jinmi. If he was telling her what he ate for breakfast that morning, we wouldn't know the difference. His expression conveyed no emotion of love, despair, confusion, or heartbreak. It was an awful performance, just like most of his acting throughout the drama. Yang Zi's portrayal of Jinmi wasn't good either. She had no personality.

Luo Yunxi delivered a solid and sympathetic performance as Runyu. He is very good at playing tragic characters. I thought his performance in this drama was better than in Till the End of the Moon. And Kathy Chow was fire as the Queen B---ch. RIP

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One of C-Drama masterpieces

If you hesitate watching this drama, don't anymore!
This drama is based on Heavy Sweetness, Ash-like Frost by Dian Xian. The storyline is well written, starting with a sense of lightness and some suspens to start plot. Deng Lun makes you fall in love with Xufeng, while Andy Yang makes you laugh and cry with Jinmi. All characters are complex enough but well defined to give the story more texture, such as relations between the 2 brothers who respected & loved each other, but grew to take different paths. You can't wait to know what will happen in next episode. Decors are magnificent and CGI will not disappoint you either. Be ready to smile, jump in your seat, cry (a lot), be angry, fall in love .... Ashes of Love will make you dive into its xianxia universe!
I have watched the drama 3 times already on Netflix and can't get over it. The chemistry between the 2 main characters melts your heart, and the second lead roles have nothing to envy to main roles.
It is a must watch ! You will not regret it. It is sublime !

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Overall, it was a very good series. I watched it with interest. But there were many mistakes, many lies and mistakes. There were so many contrasts with each other that the fantasy series was made as if everything was okay. A lot of lies and wrong things were included, some things were made as if they were forgotten, and when they were repeated, we asked why this was repeated. Imbalances between the powers were great. The gods remained lower than some immortals. They became their pawns. They lost to them and everything. Then why did you say God? I mean that the given features are not suitable. In one place, you see a person who knows everything, and in another, he is unaware. He doesn't know anything. His wisdom has been reset. Or he becomes weak while being strong. You wonder what to do while watching. However, I evaluated it as a whole. If I looked at these I would give 5-6 points. Since I didn't watch it, it became a 9-10 series for me. I felt the emotion. I felt the love thing. I felt revenge. I felt the lie. I felt the subterfuge. I felt the plot, the trap, the disloyalty, the unscrupulousness, the helplessness, the loneliness, the powerful, the powerless. I liked the actors very much. Yang Zi in particular was very successful. I love him very much. I like your game. I'm watching your series. I haven't come across any bad TV series. He has a talent, acting, light and aura that takes it all by itself. I hope to watch the next series as well. Deng Lun, Yuo Lun Xi, Chen Yu Ki were my favorites. The matches were good. I didn't like the Liu Ying and Mu Ci pairing. I found Chen Yu Qi to be very successful, but he had no matches with Zou Ting Wei. The female actor was more dominant and more successful. The actor was arrested. Either they did not agree on the game, or it was played as if the female player had the upper hand and said "follow me" or something. That woman was very, very good. I like it a lot. The other actors are also beautifully reflected in their characters, if I were to write them down, it would take up a lot of space. Like Dan Zhu, King GuCheng, Lao Hu, Lord pu chi. The examples are given very well. I like. I liked them all. I sampled. I liked how the story was thought out. As I said, there are many mistakes in the script while filming. Or things that were not taken into account, but I felt like I was in it while watching it. I got carried away. That's how I watched. I like. I would recommend it to everyone.

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Eternal Love, Perfect Casting, Great Chemistry

This is the First Chinese Historical Drama I have watched. But the best Chinese Historical Drama for me is "The Blooms at Ruyi Pavilion". Anyway, Yang Zi and Deng Lun have great chemistry. I hope they will have another drama in the future whether it is a historical drama or modern drama as long as they are the main lead couple. Prepare more tissue if you plan to watch this drama. What I don't like about this is, they didn't give Yang Zi and Deng Lun more sweet scenes. Although it was an happy ending, I was looking for more romantic scenes specially they really have a great chemistry. But still, I re-watched it for how many times already because of Yang zi and Deng Lun. I love seeing them together. Every time I re-watched it, I still cry on the sad scenes.
Xu Feng my Phoenix ❤️

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I have to admit that Ashes of Love was a bit slow in the beginning of the drama but as the drama progressed, I fell in love with this drama! The FL and ML had intense chemistry (so much that I am convinced that the love between them is real in real life)! As the ML fell in love with the FL, I fell in love with their love story. There were many heartwarming parts that makes your heart flutter and there were many heartbreaking scenes that made me bawl. This drama had a lot of amazing scenes that I will never forget and don't mind replaying over and over. All the actors and actresses worked very hard and they did a brilliant job portraying their characters! The songs in this drama were also amazing!

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NOT A WASTE OF TIME

I INITIALLY DONT WANT TO WATCH THIS DRAMA!!!

First, I am not really a fan of historical/costume dramas, be it k/j/cdrama. Specially cdramas because it's TOO LONG. Imagine watching a 50ep drama vs 16ep drama. I can watch 3dramas with that already.
Second, I'm still hung up with GOGO SQUID. I don't want to betray my TongYan/HanShangyan cp. I can't imagine them with other actors.

ALAS, quarantine x boredom hits hard and I need a drama to watch. It has been one of the recommendations. At first I wanted to watch the start middle and end part to see if it's really that good. But as I was watching the first eps I got really hooked. Why????
1. It's too humorous. There's so many funny parts. Slapsticks sometimes irk me but in this drama I really enjoyed it.
2. The acting! My YangZi, as one of my fave, of course nails the acting part. It's my first time to watch DengLun tho I remember him in Skate Into Love, he's so skinny there. But I also give him a big thumbs up. All in all 10/10 for acting
3. The story. Well obvs that a lot of the plot is recycled. I still remember the part where DengLun stab himself. Kinda reminds me of Naruto(because he said he'll bear all of the grievances of the past) lmao

I put 7 on the rewatch value cause of its length. I just can't imagine myself finishing it without skipping an episode but I DID🤯. I thought that it was a 65ep so when watching ep63 I was like, why does it looks like its ending now.
I'm so proud of myself tho for finishing it.

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A love story having ups and downs

I haven't watched many chinese dramas..but I have my fill of famous chinese dramas..and Ashes is one of them.

1. Story:
If I want to talk about the story then I would like to say it is one of the most beautiful story for any drama lover and nobody will regret watching it. Ofcourse it has a love triangle, 2 evil witches, side characters love story, playful side characters and what not to give you a wholesome package, where ML falls in love with FL and another lead started playing all sorts of games to make her his own but in the end First lead gets the girl.
BUT a major twist in this story is if you can connect to the characters in this story then you will feel that Second Lead deserves audience compassion, STILL he doesn't deserve the girl so NO there is no second lead syndrome in this series.
My heart went to Ran You (second lead) because he always suffered from the hatred of an evil bitch, he was manipulated into hating his own mother still he was looked down everytime beyond his good intentions. So if he started his own manipulative games we couldn't blame him. In his own hatred he started loving female lead but in his obsession of revenge he started using FL which was wrong on his part so he doesn't deserve FL which was good as shown in the part.
First ML though he had kissed FL after she was confirmed to be the fiancee of second lead but I do not think it was wrong because at that point of time both ML and FL started loving each other and both wanted to marry each other not the other way round.
Yeah he notiched FL after she dressed up but she already made her place in his heart due to her cute antics previously so love already started blooming earlier, so we cannot say that his love was bullshit.

Some scenes were dragging on my part but you cannot have a drama if somethings can't be draggy.

I am just disappointed from the ending part of the story.
It would have been way better if fox fairy, snake immortal would have made appearance in the end and moreover a little hug between the main characters or hand holding would have been nice. It was like ML is playing with his son and he forgot that he has a wife which was rubbish from my POV.

Overall it was worth watching, having an absolute rewatch value.

2. Cast:
Each and every person justified their character including villains.

3. Music:
Though only 3 songs were used repetitively but these songs were so good and fit the situation perfectly.

Overall it was worth watching..I have watched it 2 times already.

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A visual feast and a very compelling second-male lead

Visually and aesthetically, this drama is gorgeous. Every song, the costumes, the special effects - a feast for the senses. At first, I was a little intimidated by the length, but the story is very captivating from start to finish and focused (for the most part) on the main narrative (unlike other dramas that tend to veer off course and introduce too many secondary characters that act mostly as filler).

Don't be fooled into thinking this is a fluffy rom-com with fantasy elements because at the halfway mark, viewers are bombarded with emotionally impactful and often harrowing scenes that are tear-inducing. The entire cast is brilliant, though I have to mention Luo Yun Xi's performance as Night Immortal / Run Yu. He was SO impressive at depicting his characters' complex, multidimensional, and nuanced layers. In many ways, he is the star of the whole drama, despite his status as second male lead.

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I am happy to say that 3 days of minimum sleep i was able to finish this movie and neverfor once did i ever regret watching ashes of love. This drama gave me another peek to how love can be seen. People say money is the root of all evil and can buy love too , but through this drama i found out that love is a dungeon we all will someday fall into not knowing what lays in there and the moment your in you either happy or doomed. You face sorrow, pain, loss, and happiness in love but the person you facing it is all that matters. Love can make people lose their humanity, love can turn one's mind against each other, but still yet love is beautiful if you are with the right person..to me love is the root of all evil, cause it when you love someone you thrive to be a better person for them and that's when money making comes in.
To those of you wanting to watch this drama pls do you would never regret it. Sorry for my long review, just emotional
Ps: used to think no asian historical drama could beat kdrama but cdrama made me proud.????

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Amazing, epic, fantasy, love story from China

Chinese dramas tend to be quite long & I haven't found one that has held my interest long enough to complete one... until now. The synopsis appealed to me as I've always had an interest in Gods, Goddesses, fantasy & the like but I was slightly concerned about the love aspect & the length of the series.
The three main characters of Jinmi, Xufeng & Runyu are pretty likeable from the beginning and the settings are out of this world (literally most of the time); the production value for scenery and costumes are immense. Yes, 63 episodes is a bit long and whilst watching I felt the human story arc could have been shorter (or turned into a series of its own) but by the finale, I was wishing it would continue for much longer. The series really lies upon Yang Zi's shoulders, as the main protagonist for such a long series her role is vital for its success. Her portrayal of Jinmi is quite extraordinary in my opinion & whilst I prefer the Jinmi of the beginning more so than the end, the character development is beneficial for the storyline & shows the versatility of this actress. Runyu's character arc is definitely the most interesting & well-rounded but also the saddest. The acting from most of the cast is pretty much perfect & I love some of the support characters very much but I must say that Deng Lun & Luo Yun Xi (especially in the later episodes) display some of the best pure, emotional acting I've seen from actors in a long time!
It is serious with love, life & death being major themes but their are lighter moments & even proper laugh out loud ones, especially in the begininng. The ending didn't feel as 'wow' as I was hoping for; it actually felt a bit anti-climactic to me after the epic battle & heartbreak preceding it. Also, I was disappointed that we didn't get to find out what happened to Mr Puchi and Fox Fairy but hopefully, the sequel can shed some light on that 🤞🏻

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Wow! What a drama. Where to start? How about the beginning. I started this drama almost a year ago but I did not like it so I stopped then came back to it because I wanted to watch something while waiting for Love of a Thousand Years to upload. I loved the beginning of this drama when I was already at the saddest part. I hated Jin Mi character in the very beginning but learned to love that because of the climax of this story. Now let's go over my review for this drama.

Story: I loved the story, it was amazing. Though in the beginning I was hooked by the chemistry of the main characters I had to overlook that (for the very first time since I've been watching C-dramas). I liked how every character had a story and each different and sadder than the other. I almost stopped watching this drama but Run Yu's (Leo Luo) character and story made me keep on watching. It finished this drama faster than any other drama because I was expecting a good ending for Run Yu. I already knew the made leads were going to have a great ending so I began to skip their scenes because it was just too unbearable. All in all, a great plot.

Acting: This I have a lot to say but I will keep it short and simple. RUN YU( Leo Luo) WON MY HEART. A lot of people will talk about the two main leads chemistry (which was great), but not for me. I always look at chemistry first while watching a drama then if it is not great I look at the story, then it is still not great, I drop it give it another chance later. This drama was not the case. Even though the leads had great chemistry for me it felt weird. Run Yu story was what made this drama what it is today, I feel a little irritated that the actor did not get a lot of recognition for such a role. He pulled that role better than anyone else would. He was soo lovable, pitiable, cute, and nice. I hated how he did not end up well. Many people say he should not have been so obsessive about the female lead but his bankruptcy of love and all he had to go through in the hand of the empress made his obsession understandable. For the first time, I had the second lead syndrome. Leo Luo is amazing and is the only reason I give this drama this kind of rating if not it would have been lower. All the other actors/actresses pulled their roles very well. I especially liked Yan You, water immortal and Kang lu Run Yu's assistant. Who stood by him from the beginning to the end. It's a pity they did not end up together.

Music: I did not pay much attention to the music but I liked how it wasn't too off.

Rewatch Value: I rated this one very low because Run Yu's end scene broke me into ashes. I couldn't stand how everyone else's got what they needed/deserved but not him. I wished the writer would have made him realize Kang Lu. But still, I can not rewatch this it's too heartbreaking for me.

Conclusion: It was a predictable drama(especially for the main leads) but Run Yu's story gave this drama it's realistic view while the mains leads gave its beauty. It's left for you to decide why you want to watch this drama. Even though I got sick of the main lead chemistry, I have to say they did a great job. One last thing, while watching this drama (if you decide to do so) please understand my boy Run Yu before hating on him. Hats off to LEO LUO(Luo Yin Xi) for pulling off his amazing role. I'll be on my way to check out his other dramas. I hope u liked my review and have a great day.

LEO LUO WO AI NIE

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