Perfect Match

4 Daughters, 5 marriages and 6 celebrations - One Unforgettable Tale of Love and Chaos

When Madam Li arrives in the capital with her four unmarried daughters in tow. Her mission is clear: find each a worthy husband. But what follows is anything but predictable. From love at first sight to marriages born out of misunderstanding, mistaken identity, and sheer stubbornness, the story unfolds into five — yes, five — surprising unions. How does that math work out with only four daughters? I will let you figure that out yourself… though the answer may be more obvious than you think.

The romantic rollercoaster begins with the third daughter, Kang Ning, whose love story is by far the most tangled. Played with charm by Wang Xing Xue, her suitor Chai An falls for her instantly — but their path to love is riddled with sabotage. A bitter feud between their mothers, conniving friends in the name of “loyalty,” and a cascade of misunderstandings nearly wreck everything. Heartbroken, Kang Ning resolves to move on… or so she thinks.

Next is the eldest daughter — a widow — whose new marriage is anything but romantic. On her wedding night, the groom retreats to a separate bed, seemingly cold and uninterested. But as the story unfolds, we learn that he harbours a complicated secret: his true identity, hidden even from himself, and a blind adoptive mother who had her own reasons for hiding his real identity. When he finds out, he set out to seek justice in an unconventional move, nearly causing him his life.

The third match (yes, we are still counting) involves the spirited fourth daughter, who falls for a stern magistrate. But unfortunately, love is very much one-sided. On their wedding night, she finds herself unceremoniously shown the door. What follows is a marriage filled with tension, disappointment, and unexpected turns.

Then comes the fiery fifth daughter, who gets the shock of her life when her clever suitor swaps her into a different household entirely. Now stuck with a family she never intended to marry into — complete with complex dynamics and in-laws from a storyteller’s nightmare — she refuses to go quietly. She gives her new husband a taste of her fury, and perhaps, in the process, teaches the household a thing or two about love and resilience.

And what of the fifth marriage? Ah, now that is the twist. You will have to watch for yourself to discover who ties the knot and how. Trust me, it is worth the wait.

What makes this drama such a delight is its colourful portrayal of love in all its messy, hilarious, frustrating forms. Each suitor brings a different flavour — some sweet, some sour, some downright spicy — and the daughters respond with equal parts - wit, willpower, and womanly charm.

Funny, fast-paced, and full of heart, this series is a celebration of love's unpredictability and the chaos of family matchmaking.

And to top it off, the series features a gorgeous soundtrack, with both the opening and closing theme songs leaving a lasting impression. The closing theme, in particular, is hauntingly beautiful—its nostalgic Chinese folk melody lingers long after the final scene, evoking a deep sense of longing and timeless charm.

Although some of the sub-plots were somewhat cliche - the drama is hilarious, highly entertaining and definitely worth the watch.

Read More

Still fun after rewatching

I just rewatch this drama and why does it feel better than the first time? The chemistry between the sisters are so good. If you want good and healthy sisters/female relationships then this is for you. I watch for the sisters but also enjoy the romance as well. If you want a feel-good wholesome drama, pick this! After watching this drama, I always get the itch to watch more of these but there aren't any good ones like this. I really like the vibes of the couples. They have their own little troupes so I think almost everyone will find one they like. I wish the couples would get paired up again in the future. Especially the fifth daughter and her husband.

Read More

This was my first time watching a show with multiple leads. To my surprise, it didn't disappoint at all. As a little backing story: The Li family: a single mom and her five daughters come to Bianjing to find a suitable husband for her daughters. Then, the story of the Li sisters progresses. At first, I thought Li Kangning (3rd sister) (Lu Yuxiao) and Chai An (Wang Xingyue) were the leads of the drama, but when they got married, and suddenly straight after, Li Shouhua (1st sister) (Liu Xiening) got married to Du Yangxi (Chen Heyi) in place of Kangning, I was confused. When focus started shifting to Shouhua and Yangxi, things came clicking into place. There was going to be a section for each of the sisters. After the initial confusion, the story progressed as expected - the long trials of each of the sisters (except the second sister Li Fuhui (Wu Xuanyi) who is already married to Fan Lianghan (Huang Shengchi) in the beginning of the show began. This next section is going to be directly quoted from another review that I read, the words are not mine (except for the names in brackets):
1st couple – (Shouhua x Du Yangxi) The noble introverts
2nd couple – (Fuihui x Fan Lianghan) The chaotic duo
3rd couple – (Kangning x Chai An) The scheming masterminds
4th couple – (Haode x Shen Huizhao) The cold husband and cutie wife + amnesia plot
5th couple – (Leshan x Yang Xian) Enemies-to-lovers
Brother’s story – Childhood lovers
(1 2 3 4 5 in age order, brother is the twin of Kangning)
The fourth sister Li Haode (Ke Ying) and Shen Huizhao (Liang Yongqi) began with a rocky start, but slowly Huizhao warms up to Haode and they get their happy ending. A lot of stuff happens in between, by the way. Then, the fifth sister Li Leshan (Huangyang Tiantian) and Yang Xian (Winwin) get married by a plot planned by Yang Xian. Leshan was going to be married to someone else, but Yang Xian wanted her as his wife so switched the marriage sedan chairs. In the beginning, Leshan wasn't too pleased to say the least, but by the end of the drama, each couple had a satisfactory ending and even the surprise appearance of a brother suddenly spawned. All in all, I HIGHLY RECOMMEND this drama to anyone who hasn't watched it yet. (p.s. the whole main cast is visuals: but i think the most visual couple is either Kangning and Chai An or Shouhua and Yangxi hehe) (p.p.s. i think my favourite couple has to be either one of them too) (Ignore my rating for music, unless it's really good I just put a two for everything)

Read More

Exaggerated marriages

Generally speaking, I liked the series and watched it. I liked it. But that doesn't mean the series was perfect, it was wonderful. It wasn't. It was very lame and had some shortcomings. It's a story but not a whole. It's fragmented. If you count the five daughters and the adopted one, there are six and then there's a son. It's like seven. I think the marriages of all five daughters were considered separately. They focused on them by also working on certain events. I can say that we watched different things by jumping from branch to branch. It had some funny aspects. It was also thought-provoking. There was action. There was love. There was affection. There was family unity. There was loyalty. There was struggle. There was seeking justice, fighting for justice, chasing criminals, judging. The royal family was also involved. There were such multifaceted things. The second daughter of the house wasn't emphasized much, she had few roles, she was rarely seen in the events. Her husband was seen more. She was a comedy element. She was the clown of the series. Our third daughter is supposedly the first lead but she also appeared less, her husband was the tough guy. They handled the subject of our fourth daughter well. Although their love was a bit problematic, their interest in each other was handled beautifully. I liked it. However, when our daughter married a judge, she became a symbol of justice. She became the wife of a knowledgeable judge. She surpassed her husband. She became the one who decides on cases. This was too much. It was absurd. Our fifth daughter was the craziest, most spoiled of them all. Her husband had her kidnapped. Therefore, it was a quarrelsome, fighting, pushing, shoving, dominant husband and wife relationship. Or rather, it wasn't. There was constant conflict. It was shown as if there was an external sign of love, but it wasn't. Only the man's love was expressed. The love of the woman's side was blurred. Our sixth daughter and the elder brother of the house got married when they were very young. But the interesting thing is that neither the mother nor the sisters recognized this brother, but the youngest girl did. She said, "This is my brother." If there are 6 children now and this child was around 10 years old when he fell into the river, our youngest daughter must have been 1-2 years old. How does he know his brother?
There were often things skipped in the series like this. I gave the series a 7.5 because of the disconnection and skipping from one place to another in the story, the disruption of integrity. I was even planning to give it a 7, but I watched it until the end and waited to watch it. So I said I liked it. That's why I gave it this grade. The series deserves these mistakes, if we look at these mistakes, the Yang family's son-in-law is beaten, his head is cracked, blood is coming. In the next scene, there is not even a mark on the same person. They shot the scene later, they forgot. There are such mistakes. Similarly, this son-in-law killed a person. He stole, attempted to kill, injured, committed fraud, blackmailed, committed adultery, there is no evil he has not done. Although this was known, this person was not tried even though there were two judges in the Li family. He was arrested but released. He was not sued. He sued, the Yang family's property was seized. Their lives were destroyed. In other words, such impossible things were done. They were fooled. I hope the scriptwriter reads it and doesn't do such things again.
The actors in the series were very good. I liked all of them. The mother of the Li family is an actress that I like very much and find funny. However, she exaggerated her role in the series, she acted in an exaggerated way in some scenes. I think her character is like that. She probably can't help herself and improvises. I watched her in other series and she was very very good. Please don't exaggerate her role too much, because that's who she is. There's no need to exaggerate.
For example, Wu Xian Yu played very clearly, there was no exaggeration at all. He flowed like water. He didn't look much but he suited his role very well. I liked him very much. I always think that Liu Xie Ning is being treated unfairly, why isn't he the first lead role? He always plays second roles. He gives a very good picture. He is beautiful. He also plays well. I wonder if he is lazy or insecure. Is he an introvert? I also wonder if he doesn't want to. He is much better than most of the actors who say he is. I liked Ke Ying. Huangyan Tian Tian is very young, he will be much better in the future. He gave an extremely good performance. Well done. They wasted Zhao Qing. Ling Mei Shi was very good. Wang Xing Yue is an actor on the rise. He was in the passive, heavy-handed role here. It would have been fine without him. Li Yu Xiao was the same, he was passive, it would have been fine without him. I really liked the other male actors. They were very good. If it weren't for these actors, this drama wouldn't have been watched as much.

Read More

Felt like a combination of short stories

This slice of life romantic comedy featured a strong widowed mother of 5 daughters and her journey to have them all wed to worthy men. We watch as the story takes us through each daughter and their tumultuous matches to find peaceful marriages.

With high production value, beautiful styling, excellent acting, and entertaining couples this show is a good way to pass the time. It provides great comedic timing at points and enjoyable chemistry between most of the pairs. What lowers the rating for this show for me however is the repetitive formulaic arc movement and disconnect between the couples especially in the second half of the show.

Broken into 4 main story arcs we watch the 4 unmarried daughters find husbands and experience newlywed life. Each arc and story starts in the same way with the daughter being smart and cunning while the men are rakish, cold, and domineering. This stands true for all 5 daughters. Each woman is depicted as kind, righteous, virtuous, and can outsmart anyone while the men are all rude, spoiled, and very flawed. Each daughter then spends her arc taming her man until they each become the same lovesick husband that bends to the women and improves himself. This repetition becomes fatiguing by the third arc and painful by the fourth. I found myself beginning to fast forward as we got further into the series for this reason. Each man was also progressively worse than the one before at the start of each arc.

This drama also failed to maintain the sister dynamic consistently through the end of the drama. While the beginning allowed them to share more of their struggles together due to being unmarried and living together we see toward the second half that the older three sisters just begin to fall away. While it makes sense to see them less due to new family ties it also failed to maintain the connection for the viewer because we essentially get no closure with the couples as we continue to move on to the next making this entire series feel more like a collection of short stories.

There was also very little thought put into the sixth adopted daughter's storyline with the series passing her off with just a few lines of dialogue. There are sections that are fun to watch but also long sections where it is very boring making this feel much longer than the 36 episodes it actually is. While I love this premise and will always adore strong women I think this would have benefited from either less daughters to marry off or varying up the tales each told. Instead of every daughter marrying the same difficult man and then spending her arc taming him and his family they could have focused more on the sisters dynamic by creating at least one marriage with less friction upon the bride entering. Overall not a bad story but I wouldn't watch it again. This heavily reminds me of New Life Begins, which I preferred over this drama, while also reminding me of The Sword and the Brocade with each family drama.

Read More

Worth the watch

A story with beautiful stories sewn within themselves. A story with familial love and relations. Above all, there was a story arc for each and every character. There was no main character or supporting character, and we each character was given their own time, speed and deserving story.

The storytelling was amazing. There were no loose ends. Entertaining and engaging, the story also involved the emotions of the people watching the show.

All in all, it was a very beautiful drama, and finishing the last episode was very emotional since it felt like my relation with them ended there.

Read More

Perfect Match? More Like a Romance Buffet , Six Mini-Dramas in One!

Perfect Match is like ordering one bubble tea and ending up with six flavours in the same cup.
Confusing? A little.
Entertaining? Absolutely. This drama feels like six mini-romances got together and decided to take turns stealing the spotlight. And guess what? It actually works!
What I loved is how each couple gets their moment, no messy love triangles or dramatic breakups every five minutes. You get to fully invest in one love story before hopping to the next. It’s like a rotating buffet of romance. Win-win.
The cast? Gorgeous. Like, where do they find these people? Some performances were top-tier, some felt like they were still warming up-but overall, it kept me watching. Even the ones who needed a little more seasoning still served enough flavour to stay on the plate.
The story is light, sweet, and full of those feel-good moments that make you grin like a goof. Sure, it’s not deep or groundbreaking, but it delivers exactly what it promises, a colourful mix of love stories, pretty faces, and enough fluff to float a pillow fort.
Would I rewatch it? Probably not the whole thing, but a few couple arcs, yes, please.
Perfect Match? More like Perfect Platter. Take a bite, pick your fave, and enjoy the ride.
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️☆ (4 out of 5 stars) Romantic, fun, and binge-worthy — just a bit of seasoning short of perfection!

Read More

It's worth watching

Hi everyone! I’m currently on episode 4 of this drama, and I’m really enjoying it so far. Let me share some thoughts about the characters and my impressions:
The 1st sister is a young widow and comes across as level-headed and wise. She’s the type who stays quiet but speaks up when it truly matters, and I admire her poise.
The 2nd sister’s husband is definitely a bit of a Butt pain (yes, I said it!). He does seem younger than his wife, which adds an interesting dynamic to their relationship.
The 3rd sister (who I personally think is the female lead) is incredibly smart and seems to be the glue holding the family together. She’s shaping up to be one of my favorite characters.
The 4th sister is young but fierce—a true warrior at heart. She doesn’t hesitate to stand up for her family, and I love her bravery.
The 5th sister has a simpler style and doesn’t dress in fancy clothes, but she seems a bit unwell. I’m curious to see how her story unfolds.
The 6th sister enjoys being pampered and brings a lighter, more playful energy to the group.
Now, let’s talk about the male lead! Wang Xing Yue is one of my favorite actors, especially in love stories, and I’m thrilled to see him in this drama. He’s already delivering a strong performance. The other male characters haven’t played a significant role yet, but I’m looking forward to seeing how they add to the story.

Overall, I’m loving this drama so far and hoping it stays as good until the end. Fingers crossed it doesn’t disappoint!

Read More

Initial Thought: Chinese Pride and Prejudice

When I first started watching it, my first thought was that it reminds me of Pride and Prejudice (x Sense and Sensibility).

While very different, it does have a seemingly similar vein. A mother trying to get her daughters married to suitable suitors, and often comes across as money-minded. I felt like the 3rd Sister's story reminded me a bit of Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy with their battle of wits, but I suppose in a way the 1st Sisters story was also a little bit like that.

It is a fun watch and I look forward to finishing the show.

I hope that one of the stories we get to see in the show is Qiong Nu's story and I hope the Li's find their long lost brother. I totally thought Qiong Nu was one of the Li Sisters, imagine my surprise!!

Read More

Story with strong FLs sabotaged by irredeemable men being presented as their romantic partners

I was very excited for this drama but have come out of it disappointed. However, I'm already seeing people blame the criticizers for "not understanding this is realism and in real life back then men were horrible." I LOVE historical chinese novels to the point I've machine translated hundreds of them (yes I'm addicted) and one of the prevailing themes is always how women's lives were horrible back then and the men largely neither prioritized nor saw women as their own people worthy of respect. They were meant to be obedient, sensible, virtuous, gentle, generous, and basically never show any dissatisfaction. Their lives were easily discarded or kept imprisoned or slaving away in the women's inner house, never living for themselves.

And so yes I UNDERSTAND that the men in this drama so far show the same tendencies and are rather realistic of their time, but that doesn't mean we, the viewers, have to like it for the romantic partners of our female leads. I know that there will likely be character growth for these men, but I don't really care. No amount of character growth will make me like the second sister's pathetic, cowardly, cheating husband who tormented her to the point she chewed her mouth bloody with pebbles to cope. No amount of character growth for that noble brother law of the emperor will make me like him simply by the virtue of the fact that he tried to seize a woman like she was property and make her his concubine, and had he succeeded he would have become a proponent of female slavery and martial rape. No amount of "misunderstanding" or reasoning will make me like the husband of the first sister who (spoiler from teaser) BEATS HIS WIFE TO THE POINT THERE'S BLOOD? There's no going back for me after they've already shown these parts of themselves. I don't believe in second chances for men who are like this. These are not "character flaws" you can come back from.

Maybe if the story was about them divorcing these so called "perfect matches" things would be different, but that's not how it's being presented.

The only one that I'm still on the fence for is the character played by Wang Xing Yue and that's because it does seem like there are some misunderstandings at play and it is true that he was "asked" to meddle in his cousin's affairs by his aunt and repeatedly by his cousin. It doesn't seem that he helped due to actually caring at first; the first time he helped it seemed he did it for the sake of the family's reputation and after that it was a matter of personal pride, competing with the third lady. That isn't enough of an excuse for me though; he knows how awful his cousin is and knows how he must be treating his wife for him to spiral like she does, but he still seemingly has no empathy for her. His advise is from the perspective of making things easier for his cousin, but never thinks of what his cousin's wife must be suffering. And yes, you can ask: why would he? The wife is no one to him. But that's where I think a lack of basic human empathy shines through and a lack of willingness to see the plight of women in this world. He is not an idiot, and he himself employs women in his business without having them resort to selling their bodies. He should know better.

Then there's the whole competing with the FL with their business. I get it. I get that his pride is wounded and that he's annoyed that the FL got one up on him by snatching his manager and painting. No one likes being tricked or taken advantage of. It also makes sense that he wouldn't just sit there and watch her steal his customers because that's his source of income. But again, I felt like there was a certain lack of empathy in how he employed methods. These are 5 girls and a widowed mother with barely any funds and nothing to rely on, trying to make a decent living. He knows this and he knows their difficulties, because he explains this to his mom when she's angry to calm her down. Yet he still was rather callous in how he dealt with them.
There's still room for hope in him toning down that arrogance and using some damn empathy, but what he's done has already left a sour taste in my mouth.

I don't expect men in historical dramas to be feminists. But it's a valid criticism when dealing with a drama centering around women, where the audience is largely modern day women. The writer isn't from the song dynasty, the writer is from the modern day era. The reason so many historical chinese novels get popular is because they promote modern values within the historical context and it's what makes the characters stand out. Some of the most popular fictional historical MLs are popular precisely because they are a breath of fresh air for their time. One of the reasons I loved Duke Su (past character of WXY) was because he supported women's wrongs lol! If I wanted to just watch shitty guys do shitty things, I would just go outside. When 3 of the MLs so far seem unbearable and the main one is precariously sitting on the fence, you know that the writer could have done a better job setting them up.

I am a big fan of Wang Xing Yue and was really looking forward to this drama so I'll give it a few more episodes, but yes as of now I'm rather disappointed. It sucks bc the chemistry between WXY and LYX is GREAT and they do have a lot of potential. I just can't get over this writing. I can maybe root for their pairing but every other pairing sucks big time.
The one positive thing I will say is that all the sisters are fantastic: strong, smart, brave, resourceful, hard working, survivors. They're working their asses off and they don't take mistreatment likely, but all the more reason why I think they deserve better. If you consider this drama as a story of 5 sisters doing whatever it takes to survive in a shitty world with shitty men surrounding them, sticking together and protecting each other, instead of a romance, then the drama might be worth your time.

Note: this review may be updated if I continue watching. For now, paused at ep 4.

Read More