→ costume dramas topping my charts ✧

Re-writing this after 3 years, and I can declare that I will never ever stop talking about this drama in my entire living existence in xianxia fandom. Everything about this drama was perfect to the point that it could doom my sanity till date. Even the shortest clips of ost can get me into trance.

An spy × target troupe, following, intriguing plots, dark cinematigraphy and well executed stunts. Every character is so twisted and interesting, the plot twists are definitely gonna keep you immersed into the show.

A palace drama following rebirth and revenge of an young empress, who has her fate entangled with 3 men. Yes, a reverse harem.

I don't what I should label this one as. Basically follows story of an young princess who likes to lead a life of freedom. But certain events forces her give up on her 'princess' label.

She embarks on her path for revenge, and ends learning new things, understanding political circumstances, growing up into a responsible hierarchy, worthy of her title.

Qian Shan Cha Ke novel adapted drama.

One difference that set The Glory better rating than The Double on the basis of story from me, is probably the fact that unlike Xue Fangfei who pretty much relief on the male lead to take her revenge in certain situations, Zhang Hanyan was more independent. She definitely wasn't able to take all the revenge by herself, but atleast, she wasn't someone who forgot her grudge of being used as pawn by the male lead, just because they were on same side later. That was something I liked about her character.

And then, just as I mentioned, as for the general set up, we are all familiar with QSCK's style, women struggle, female centric, family melodramas, politics involved to certain extent, villain who are greedy for power.

Qian Shan Cha Ke ( I feel like this is a label I should put up at the very first place considering, how her novels easily get the dramas in my plat to watch list)

• strong cunning blackbellied female lead

• fanhandling male lead (giggles)

• The QSCK trademark of politics and 'power struggle' in the family, studded with hateful second female lead, typical household battles.

3 different lives, 3 different identity, 1 love.

Well, I actually dropped this in ep 28-29 around, but ended up continuing after few days because of lots of yt shorts. It was a good watch

Xianxia ain't xianxia without :

• Main leads with tragic pasts (aka morally grey characters)

• Daily doses of blood spitting to save your day (their body surely has extraordinary speed of RBC production)
• Random outbursts of hidden powers due to high stimulating GTBs (naah! stay seated guys! transmigrating into novels to slap GTBs is still not a thing yet)
• Misunderstandings could be your sweetest toxins ( Are you a HBP patient? Stock up your medicines, your urge to slap your 1400 cc brain into their tiny skulls could be detrimental to your health)

A drama so well made in its genre that no one has managed to rank higher in my list

My escape haven, the drama that catered to my delusions about a female centric drama.

• Loved how absolutely smooth the entire growth of the women going against the conventional thoughts of society felt. Tho, it felt quite smooth compared to what I expected, it was still oddly satisfying.
• Women supporting each other, encouraging each other like a family, then again, women breaking out of orthodox and following their passion are always my soft spot ✨
• The non-existence of family melodrama was a plus point! (ofc, if I am ignoring a certain arc, where the family member did not really feel family, but more like an outsider)

Tho, I cannot deny, how unrealistically calm and composed FL was in every situation and could solve big problems with just minute help from her loved ones or people around her, it was still something that could calm my nerves. I guess we do need this perfect journey, perfect character, and perfect relations dramas once a while!

What is this trash even doing in my topping the charts list? well, this was my very first minidrama, and I gotta say, despite how morally handicapped it was, it gave me a reason to remember the existence of cdramas during its drought phase of 2024.