This review may contain spoilers
Well written and well produced drama...
Episode 1-2: Was heartwarming. My favorite scenes were the poison/medicine lessons with Fei Jie, martial arts training with Wu Zhu, farewell with Fan Xian's grandma. The first 2 episodes were powerful.Episodes 3-18: The emperor is frightening and cunning, mysterious and crazy. The whole kingdom is his chess board. Fan Sizhe and Wang Qinian were the comedic relief. I already know Teng Zijing will die based on the flow of the story. I am afraid for Qinian since he was the 3rd sidekick.
Fan Xian and Lin Waner have good chemistry. They have interesting love story. Forced engaged and now they are being forced to separate.
I really think Fan Xian's mom was from modern times as well. I think Wuzhu might be a non-human since he does not age and when he killed Lin Gong he has electricity.
Episode 19: Strong guts for Fan Xian not to bow or kneel before the emperor. And he acts casual around him. I was nervous the entire time.
Episode 20-21: The good thing about being a modern man is you have knowledge and open-mind to condition like Dabao's mental illness. That was why Fan Xian is patient to him. The revelation that Fan Xian being an heir to both Neiku and Investigator's Office is mind blowing.
Episode 26-27: Fan Xian being the center of everyone's attention. And being accused of plagiarising a poem. I find this nerve wracking. Ep 27 is my favorite so far. FX reciting over 100 poems to say 'in your face' to the villains is marvelous. FX looks like he has a possible photographic memory if he remembers that much poems from his memory of modern world.
Episode 28-30: Answered my question if FX mom came from the modern world as well. Still confusing though when she said she was unfrozen from the frozen world of ice age. Chen Pingping is a genius. His trap was flawless.
Episode 31-32: Teng Zijing's death really set precedent to FX's resolve. His principles cannot be bent. Episode 32- the poison division is too awesome for me. They're like the Tang Clan of murim world. They are invincible with martial arts.
Episode 37: Is like a scene in the manhwa "Heavenly Demon Can't Live A Normal Life" where the warriors of enemy country challenged FX to one on one fights.
Episode 41: Revealed FX's and his mom's true identity.
Beiqi arc was really good. It showed FX's analytic and intelligent mind. But that cliff hanger was too much. Lol
Final thoughts
-Well written drama. It's really good
-Story is epic
-Acting is brilliant
After watching Guardians of the Dafeng before this. I found similarities
Inspector Office = Guardians
Si Lili = Fu Xiang
Poetry
Chen Pingping = Lord Wei
Was this review helpful to you?
This review may contain spoilers
The first of trilogy
Don't read the book of Qian Yu Nian, it isn't as good as the drama. Zhang Ruo Yun is an excellent pick for Fan Xian, he's amazing for the role. He's intelligent, witty, smart, loyal, loves beautiful women. He's the master of poison, medical, strategics, fight, ambassador (man, he's good in argument and making deals) he has nothing that he is not good at, picture of a perfect gentleman and example of the best scholar in the whole kingdom. I love every characters; Fan Xian, Fei Jie, Fan RuoRuo, Fan Si Zhe, Chen PingPing, the emperor Qing, Gao Da, Wang QiNian, Feng Jie, Haitang DuoDuo, Si Lili, Yan BingYun, Yan XiaoYi, Shen Zhong just to name a few. Unfortunately, I don't really like Lin Wan'Er, she's the weakest character that seems like to hold Fan Xian back, and I don't think she's the perfect girl to be his bride/the love of his life. My personal opinion, Haitang Duoduo is more up to Fan Xian's standard although in the book they'd have an affair together but not end to marriage (Wtf..) my lovable character was Wang QiNian and Gao Da...I want them to have more air time. Fighting scene was close to real, we can see Fan Xian being thrown and hays/dust/dirt all over him, we can also see Zhang Ruo Yun got sun burned at rock forest (fight scene) which looked so real. I love it when he recited 1000 poems in front of people (iconic scene - won the title as a poetry God), poisoned Haitang Duoduo with love poison, he climbed on to of moving buggy to challenge every men in Qi's kingdom. Fan Xian shone when he representing his country to Northern Qi. laid strategy to one step ahead of Shen Zhong. Yan Bing Yun (Xiao Zhan) was a skinny lad...in the book he'll be a trusty right hand of Fan Xian but I don't know about the drama, he stabbed him at the end. I was like...wth??? Come on....I want a better ending than this. Looking forward for Season 2 soon (NTBA) and season 3 (NTBA) to finish up trilogy. Faster please....Was this review helpful to you?
Update: Having read up to chapter 55, the drama is not the same as the novel. The characters are the same but the plots are different.
Was this review helpful to you?
None of the cast I would say in this drama hasn’t give their best performance to bring out their characteristics.
The plot in the drama is well line up and it’s not confusing despite involving so many different cluster of plot.
Hope next two season would have same casts as the story line still keep me hung in air about what happen to each character.
Keep it up production team and cast.
Was this review helpful to you?
The Best Cdrama Ive ever seen and not even close to others
1. Story : God, the writer is freaking genius, in every episode, there would be always something to look forward to, amazing long term storytelling, exciting plot twist. One of the best MC in the entire Cdrama world. The timing of every genre is always right, Peak Story no question asked, Romance? even its subplot but damn the chemistry and they way they potraying it is always rewarding, action? not the best out there but hey maximizing it with scene and efforts, The comedy are one of the best too damn, theyalways slip one of the silliest joke and make it peak and im uncounciously laughing out loud.2. Acting: Im always looking for the weakling, hell there is none, everyone here embodied their character, and the way the production do is add another greatness about it too.
3. Music: This are one of the many reason that makes thsi drama stand above anything else, the varying ost, the way its always embodied every scene, classic,
4. Rewatch: The most rewatchable drama of all time, you would always enjoying it again every time
Conclusion: Im always sceptical about cdrama with high rating as most of the time is overated, so im holding back to watch some ,especiallythe one with a lot of episodes, this is one of them, but man this one is different, underated even, deserve an 9.5 - 9.8, the episode? 46 is not enough if im being honest, and by the time i watch this there are already S2, man how glad am i?
And finaly, damn what an ending, i would crazy to wait 5 years for concluding that
Was this review helpful to you?
Rewatch preparing for S2 EPIC Script!
One of my all-time favorite dramas. This is the best script ever!Everything is absolutely perfect except the lighting. There's a lot of olive tunes to the drama making the actors look not as pretty which is incredible because there are a ton of beautiful actors in here.
For those people that may not like this drama for whatever reason, may missed all the essence of Chinese language word play. There's so much comedy but all lost in translation. Even the names are clever. Sadly, I can only understand 80% of it. I so wish I can read the actual book but since I can't, the drama itself is perfect.
Some Fun Word plays:
Fan Jian - Fan Xian's Dad's name actually sounds like "being bitchy"
Chen Ping Ping - A very girly name for the master schemer
Nei Ku - Treasury sounds exactly like underwear
There are countless of these.
Unique on every level.
1. Political scheming isn't all that interesting to me but it's part of every costume drama you can't avoid. However, it is interesting here because all the characters are all multi-dimensional.
2. Characters. You can't find any weakness here. Well written characters along with perfect casting.
Mini Fan Xian - I could've used extra episode of him. He's so cute and expressive.
Fan Xian - Everybody loves Fan Xian. I am 100% biased here because the actor has been one of all-time favorites.
Wang Qi Nian - The side kick endless funny punch line delivery guy
Teng Zi Jing - The assassin in the beginning that formed such strong bromance
Fan Si Zhe - Did not know the actor is actually a standup comedian but I can see why
I literally loved almost every character big or small. Shows how brilliant the script writer is.
3. Level of literacy
There's a scene of Fan Xian reciting all the famous poems. (no I never got to that level in my Chinese) but it's amazing the actor reciting all those poems in one breath. People with high Chinese literacy will surely appreciate this.
Was this review helpful to you?
Quick review this gem
STORYThe story of this drama is amazing and I cannot stress out how hooked I was. The first few eps maybe not be appealing but TRUST ME, KEEP GOING. The story line is EXTREMELY UNPREDICTABLE.
ACTING AND CASTING
The main actor may not be attractive to many people but the story is all that matters and you will grow to love him. Everyone else did an amazing job at acting and I would not change a bit. I loveeeeee WU ZU SHU!
MUSIC
Sometimes I feel like there are random instrumental tracks that reminded me of Dora the Explorer. Although I didnt think that that track was suitable for the era of drama it doesn't make much of a difference.
REWATCH VALUE
I REWATCHED THIS DRAMA 20 TIMES ALREADY SO 1000000000/10
OVERLL
Overall this is my top favourite drama of all time. I feel bad for those who do not understand Chinese because you are missing out on the poems and language that cannot be translated into English subs.
Was this review helpful to you?
This review may contain spoilers
Must Watch!
The plot is thick. what make it different from other drama? the detail in each episode for "twist" in later episode. in short, the twist is well prepared!the scene is funny! i.e. the scene where he is holding chicken leg, putting chicken leg in a box, "aprosidiac scene", and many other scene.
the Male Lead is smart and "shameless".
season 1 story is mostly about politic, i guess season 2 story focus on "fantasy" part of this story (about divine temple). like "Ever Night" in season 1 (politic and revenge) and season 2 (divination of ever night)
recommended!
Was this review helpful to you?
This review may contain spoilers
One of the best C-drama i have ever watched, there wasn't a single boring plotline & i did not fast forward any scenes. Excellent acting from all the cast including the supporting role. My favourite is definetely the Fan family , they are the only ones who truly care & support each other whereas the rest has a hidden agenda beneath. I also admired Fei jie & despite his sloppy appearance he is a true leader , seeing how united his team was from the investigation bureau even without his presence,( his team go all out to protect Fan Xian when he is in trouble). There is a right balance of comedy, drama & suspense at end of each episode. The only bummer was the cliffhanger ending! I had to wait another 2 years , that is a torture for the fans. If you pay close attention, you will be able to figure out who is the big boss /ultimate villain in the end, i managed to guess it Was this review helpful to you?
Was this review helpful to you?
This review may contain spoilers
The drama starts to pick up at around episode 12. The first 10 episodes were slow with Fan Xian and Waner trying to find each other and cancel their engagement until they found out that they were actually engaged to each other. Then, the story starts to pick up with never-ending political intrigue mixed with comedy and drama.Fan Xian was a complicated character. He comes off as goofy and happy-go-lucky. In reality, he was calculating, manipulative, loyal, and has a strong sense of justice. His goal was to build a better world but outsmarting and getting ahead of the powerhouse that is trying to kill him proved to be harder than he thought. The story did a great job at building up the intrigue and political drama in a very interesting and clever way without being draggy. However, the plot didn't quite explain Fan Xian's visions, where they came from, and his origins. At the beginning it was a rebirth backwards story. But it seemed to be more of a time travel story with Xian's mother traveling back in time bringing future technology, but the writers never truly explained it.
The romance needed work. The first 10 episodes were spent on ML and FL trying to find each other. After they finally figured out that they were actually engaged to each other, the romance fizzled out and FL gradually disappeared. Honestly, Fan Xian had a lot more chemistry with every other woman he interacted with than Waner. The fighting "dance" with the saintress made me question where the writers were going with this and why Fan Xian was even in love with Waner.
One of the best things about this drama was the goofy soundtrack with silly background music during fighting sequences.
Was this review helpful to you?
Super brilliant drama
I know this drama had a high rating but i don't have any expectation. I don't usually watch political drama but this JoL is brilliant. I can't believe I'm finishing this drama. Super amazing plot and twist that make me crazy haha lol.I have watched other period cdrama but in this JoL I love how FX and the step mother can get along and support each other. And i like how the each character that has strength and power help FX.
FX brother so hilarious and FX sister i think she is strong and smart women too.
This drama has a unique story from the first episode. a story full of surprises, strategy and the unexpected. characters that will be remembered (at least, remembered with strong, clever and tactical characteristics).
I'm more shock with the ending, so Because of the curiosity I'm reading the last part of the novel. And now I know, how to breath in joy haha. I hope you enjoy this story too ^^
Was this review helpful to you?
