AleksandraSucur

He was just testing what would be her reaction, how she'll handle the matter. He isn't stupid to take a concubine chosen by his mother, thus offending his nasty uncle and all the ministers who proposed other girls and whom he refused with the excuse of "being in love with his wife" and "doesn't want to disrespect her".
And she handled the task spotlessly: allarming his granny, who - in turn - isn't stupid like his mother and immediately understood the mess this thing would create. Not only with the ministers... ML's position as a ruler of that Wei country is extremely precarious, granny is the only person who tries to solidify his position: his uncle is after the rulership, ministers are after the greater influence over him, even his mother's intention to place ZCY, who is basically "her person", into his harem is instrumental in terms of influence over him, the FL and even her mother-in-law, who was against this arrangement even before. Granny accepted Qiao's marriage proposal not only for political-territorial gains, potential pacification of highly instable situation, full of hatred and revengefulness, but because only such an internally isolated person wouldn't mess with her grandson's (internal power) interests and may even be of some help in terms of external power conflicts

Once he finds out who really scratched the box (green tea cousin, obviously), I hope he slaps himself -and twice - in front of her. Although I've liked a lot her first slap (he more than deserved!), I don't want her to hurt her hands while punishing this guy when he acts as a suspicious, obsessed and unreasonable d*ck.
LYN can truly play this type roles, these scenes looked so real.
And Deng Ke is a great director, excellent pacing, great scenes and camerawork 👌

I've read few of your comments here today, so I've checked it out of curiousity and... devoured all 11 eps in one go: you were right, it's really good, well structured, paced, interesting subplots etc.
The characters are convincing, especially the ML and the chief eunuch, FL is acting even better than in Heroes (I've liked a lot)... nice!

yup. Actually, smth felt off with the father's character even before and I can't tell exactly what, either how it is written, or performed or directed, dunno, we just didn't pay much attention on him before...

Last few eps were overly melodramatic + the political background plot was so badly and/or nonsensically narrated... In particular the scenes with the "evil eunuch" or the father's reminiscence of his relationship with this godfather were too bland, superficial/stereotypized and naive to be min. credible.
The angst I've liked at the beginning is also turning into a wishy-wash, and now without that great actress who played her mother, I truly fear for the hold of the next10 eps...
Pity

Kang is the person who can tell SDJ who is who in that photo, in particular he can tell the identity of the boy in Yeo's arm. The boy is him, SDJ, his dress in the pic is the same Mme Pi kept in the box. This info is more than sufficient, all the rest doesn't matter, it is just him who needs to know his original identity and his biological parents

Kang knows the man holding him as a kid is Eunnam's bio father (surnamed Yeo). This is the info SDJ just got (as well as we did) in the last ep.
Being a friend of Yeo, Kang logically must know the identity of the kid in the pic

Seo Dongju is the most perfect male character I've ever seen: hot, handsome, intelligent +photographic memory, ambitious in a positive way, efficient, always polite, skilled fighter, survivor, excellent social and communication skills, director of the department, an employee on which the company (or at least the chairman) depends, loyal and trustworthy, romantic as far as to learn to play a violine just to propose to his beloved, good brother of a good nun, good friend, his bestie is a girl, who is overtly a music instruments shop owner and covertly a great hacker who helps him to overtake many billions of won, he easily makes friends with other people who become incredibly loyal and useful for him, he remains gallant and protective towards his girlfriend even after her totally unexpected betrayal and crazy behaviour, he is mentally balanced even when he suffers an amnesia and notwithstanding his whole life, his origins and upbringing are a complete mess... and you add all the things I've missed...
Well, the actor actually delievered this perfect man, but such a perfect intelligent and efficient man would not waste time pointlessly gazing at a photo of him as a kid with a bunch of adults he has no idea what connects them to him, but would probably immediately go and ask about it to dr. Kang's father who sent that pic to Ildo.
A good drama always relies on a good, credible story and this "who's my father?" derailment from a power conflict was unnecessary, making even this character less coherent, imho.

Their residence is not that opulent, they've struggled to arrange a banquet for students from their province. There are no particular valuables in the residence, the only valuable painting was given to FL's father by Pei Dafu (according to FL's father, as a bribe for making PD's distant relative pass the imperial exam but that may not be true), the concubine can't collect 300 silver taels to pay the guy from Danzhou for setup against FL and so on...
Her father may have been a member of Zouhang Gang and he may have even taken part in smuggling the silver through the underground pass connecting the two residences, but he is not sufficiently skilled/equiped to manage its laundring once Pei Dafu was convicted, he is just a scholar. Cunning, yes, but powerless

And talking about the money, I think MDL should add "Investigation" and "Mystery" to the genres, because that main plotline generates all other subplots keeping the story constantly suspensful and interesting.

More they complicate the plot, more I think about simple things, like... the stolen money. Where's the silver, who exactly is managing its laundring?
Her father may be a great pretender, may be cunning, may have hidden he was Pei's "adopted son" but I can't see him as someone capable of hiding such a huge amount of money and having already leaked (2 years ago) part of it to The Danzhou Chamber of Commerce. Besides, "a man over 40" who contacted it may not necessarily be from that Yilin province: seizing 11 officials only because they originate from that province was a bad idea (no wonder it was proposed by FL's mother, whose brain is deranged by deep resentment and vendetta thoughts).

after all the crimes she had done, the official statement lied "she protected the emperor" and was buried with glory...
But the rest of this drama wasn't spectacular either

I agree, this character fits her (a lot) better than all those I've seen her in before

So far, the dialogues are well-written, main characters are interesting, each in his/her own shady way, and the two leads look well casted for their roles, espc. the ML - to my surprise - looks way more credible as cold-faced and shrewed type of person than many other, more famous, actors...

In these 4 eps I only noticed smth is off with the direction of certain scenes, eg. the false Taoist master and aftermath was messy and didn't provide sufficient explanation for the behaviour of FL's father, the dialogue between FL and her assassin friend wasn't shot well, the insert of two anonimous girls playing happily with fireworks in the middle of that scene was totally unnecessary and added to the mess... FL and her friend certainly haven't had a happy memory of their childhood...
But overall, it's fine, I'll continue watching...

she was assaulted, but the rape didn't happen because she killed with her hairpin both the assailant and his wife who told him to sell her to the brothel. That cruel couple made her develop all her cunning and protective tricks and tools

yup, I don't get it either... Besides now if you search for "The Glory", MDL erased the link with it

Thank you, I've never seen this nice video, so suitable for the carousel instrumentals. Yes, oldie but goldie, I've forgotten about it.
Hope you had a beautiful, colourful Women's day, too ❤️

I've just seen ep 27 trailer... and will continue giggling till it airs tomorrow... Can't wait, lol

Yes, you may be right, younger people may not have seen all of these patterns, still not stuffed with romance, but I've also noticed some older viewers here on MLD sincerily enjoying them...
As for K-drama, I haven't seen so many K-romance drama, but I've definitely enjoyed their costume and/or fantasy comedies (Mr. Queen, Knight Flower, Goblin), crime (Narco-Saints, Money Heist...) thrillers (Flower of Evil) etc. Love K-sense of humour, shrilling weirdness and Tarantino-like situations they create so credibly...

I've also noticed most MDL users/raters tend to disregard C-comedies and originality. I think most of them simply enjoy stereotypical plots and tropes. With K-dramas, it's the opposite somehow. K-drama is supposed to be original, weird, ironic or oddly funny to be appreciated.
I don't know if they were the same persons, but if they are, it's such a paradox