Aramintai

I don't think mama Jin can do anything to Uk atm. If he wanted to, he could have smashed through the whole Jinyowon and forced the vault door to open if he wanted to. But he's being courteous to her for FL's sake.
But that doesn't mean mama Jin's not plotting anything. After all, she's still an obsessive delulu mother who can't give up on her long dead daughter. Maybe she changed her stance now to try to cozy up to him or something.

They also seem to have dumbed him down intellectually somewhat, he was way smarter and quicker to catch on in part 1.

They're not doing any service to Park Jin at all. Guy's been doing nothing since episode 1. I want him back in Songrim where he belongs.

So-i may not be a good person, but she is consistently entertaining to watch. I don't want her to die, she has potential to make amends.

I disagree, Uk is being unnecessary rude to FL, she's not doing anything to deserve his frequent cold and cruel verbiage. And it seems he knows it himself, but just can't help himself, because he can't calmly handle her or his feelings. Only his actions speak his true intentions, see it happen all the time since episode 1.
If he doesn't change his attitude, sooner or later he's gonna cross the line and FL may run away from him or do some other dumb shit that'll get her in trouble, unless of course she remembers finally that she's Naksu.

I don't think so. Uk finally started suspecting something in today's episode. I think nothing's gonna happen between them until he gets to the bottom of it now.
The rest is obvious, but main question is when? In the last episode? With four more filler ones? It starts getting stale atm.

I mentioned side stories because I know writers said it themselves. But I was expecting at least the main plot to be on the same level of quality as part 1, so far I'm not seeing it. Main actors are carrying it right now, they're good, but that's about it.
And I hate wasting time on even single season series if they're bad, let alone 10 seasons. I generally avoid such formats like the plague, don't care how good they are. It's good that media has mostly moved away from this kind of format in favor of "fewer episodes, movie like quality".

That's not correct. Making even more episodes with such a meandering plot, full of filler, is not gonna make it any better.
The problem is that nothing of real interest has happend for too long, even when we're halfway there already. FL is still clueless since episode 1, villains still be plotting, other characters still can't put 2+2 together and just loaf around.
People want Naksu to finally remember herself, action, revenge on the villains and happy ending as a conclusion. I'm afraid they gonna continue marinating the audience for the rest of the episodes and cram all the anticlimactic reveals, action and some rushed ending into the last episode as usual.

Probably gonna cram everything into the last episode like it usually happens in kdramas, many of them have pacing problems in the end.

I gotta agree with the other viewers here - too many filler scenes, nothing interesting is going on for prolonged lengths of time, unpredictability of the plot is non-existent compared to part 1. Part 2 is mainly side stories indeed, I guess.

Especially egregious filler are Park Jin's scenes - guy does nothing but loaf around and cook black matter. Stopped being funny fast. He should marry maidservant Kim, move in with Uk and Naksu as one big family, regain his purpose in life by returning to Songrim as its leader and let Dang Gu get married off into Jin clan, he's not a leader material anyway.

What villains are plotting can be seen from miles away now, but aside from master Lee nobody seems to really care as usual. Jin Mu still got it, but the bitch Queen is not the brightest tool in the shed compared to the late shaman and just goes around spilling the beans to people like Uk like a total dumbass. The only interesting thing out of this episode is that apparently Jin vault initally was built as a prison to hold a fire bird (that caused the real drought?) and force Jin clan to perform the rain ritual again so that more f*cking ice stones'd drop into their greedy hands. Whatever, we all know they gonna get what they deserve this time.

The only intrigue left is WHEN THE ACTUAL EF Naksu will finally remember herself and unquestionably prove to Uk that it's her own memories. Everyone is waiting just for this it seems. Them going around in circles cluelessly hurting each other is becoming annoyingly boring, tbh.

The rest is of mild interest - will So-i and Yul survive the blood worm plot, will CP finally swallow his jealousy and pettiness and get out from under Jin Mu's boot, etc.

Turned into a boring snoozefest in the end. Glad it's over, another one into the bin.

Hopefully this one is better than disastrous Love Is for Suckers with similar looking plot.

Kingdom was the best, it was very fresh and Joseon hats very especially epic. Too bad there's no season 3.
My favorite scene there was in season 2 when the old general turned into a zombie but as a final epic "f*ck you" managed to bite the main villain and basically screwed all of his grand plans, I laughed so hard at that scene.
I also loved that high ranking officials, prince included, were all able swordsmen, ready to defend the country, not some lazy showoffs with no actual warfare skills like it usually is in saeguks.

AoS all the way - it's fun, fresh and relaxing to watch. Something to excitedly dive into every weekend and have a feel good afterglow for the next week.
I'm really tired of kdramas about corrupt chaebols/politicians/government officials and endless power struggles. I get that it's "the tongue ever turns to the aching tooth" and that this shit is very real irl in SK, but TV air is just oversaturated with these types of dramas. So I got bored of RR pretty quickly and dropped it, didn't care about the ridiculous manga style premise neither.

Korea was always struggling throughout history because everyone wanted a piece of it - Mongols, Chinese, Japanese. It was always under someone's boot or fending off the attackers. But in saeguks it's like none of these external problems exist and everything is fine internally, but some disgruntled minister or concubine just gotta invent some stuff to bitch about and invents nefarious plots out of boredom.
That's why I'm not a fan of saeguks, they're usually all the same. The only ones that I liked were Kingdom (because they threw zombies into the mix) and Mr. Queen (isekai fantasy basically). Alchemy of Souls is also great, but it's pure fantasy in a fantastical world.

Watch episode 2 again, when he talks to mama Jin. He said: "She has a new body now, so her memory is gone".

Childhood connection, yea, can't forget about that one 🙄. As well as amnesia and unnecessary time skip, preferrably by going to US.
It's very rare to see a kdrama without those cliche tired tropes. But those that manage that are usually fresh.

Why basically every saeguk has to have third wheeling SML? Most of them also end up sacrificing themselves for FL.
And of course there just gotta be some moustache twirling minister for a villain, instead of some rival country. Because of course no external problems exist and the court invents internal ones out of boredom - basically every saeguk's premise.
This drama doesn't seem to be breaking any of those tired cliches.

🙏

Yea, I may even reconsider my part 1 score depending on how they wrap up part 2. My main gripe with part 1 was pacing and fake Bu-Yeon plot wasting too much time. But after I binge rewatched it I found that pacing was actually ok and it seems that all that "Bu-Yeon" lead up is really bearing fruit in part 2.