✒♥️ The Cutest Jailhouse Romance Ever ☘ °8.9° °Adorable°
Ah, bad boys. I've never understood the attraction. Just because it's not my poison doesn't mean that it's not a /thing/. We all have our crosses to bear. LBF&D is a high fantasy romance. High fantasy is a genre in which the whole world is new & fantastical. Almost everything in this world is magical in some way.
Not only is the universe in which this show takes place a fantasy, but the concept that a good girl can reform the bad guy is also a fantasy. Beyond the fact that it's a fantasy, it is also disrespecting oneself. You. Deserve. Better. Enjoy a story that's based on that idea here, but don't go chasing after /that/ magic sword. You'll only end up piercing yourself.
The premise is adorable. Imagine the most powerful being who has ever existed on earth. His enemies manage to lock him up, but they were not powerful enough to kill him. While they were resealing the weakening roof of his prison, a fairy falls in there! What's /she/ doing here? (She was chasing after her crush). Somehow, in that deep pit, the little orchid fairy and the big, bad felon were subjected to a frightful spell. Now, he /feels/. He feels everything that /she/ feels. And she's an emotional little cutie. He's experiencing everything (emotionally and physically) that she is. Now, killing him is easy - all that someone needs to do is kill her and HE dies.
“Boo’-can-aw!” Balderdash! No one is more powerful than he! This will not control him!
Dylan Wang is Dongfang “Qing” Cang. Qing will get retribution against his tormentors, wake up his 100,000 soldiers, and wipe out his foes. He will burn the world down!... As soon as he can break this curse and shake loose from this simple-headed orchid 🌱 fairy. Until then, he'll have to keep an eye on her. He must keep her safe BY ALL MEANS, and since she's a delicate orchid, she needs all kinds of special care. ("I can do everything in this world," he says. As for raising a plant, how difficult can it be for me?) Little Orchid assumes he has a crush on her and tells him: "There's plenty of fish in the sea. Why don't you go find someone else?"
So, we have the arrogant, very angry, “evil” overlord being controlled by an innocent (who thinks he needs her help 🙄 - What can /she/ do? She's even afraid of the dark!). He'll have to protect her to stay alive, and keep her from harm to keep himself from being harmed. Among odd couples, this is an odd couple. She thinks she's in love with someone else (Chang Heng), and she's trying to get promoted in the Heavenly Realm so that she can be closer to the object of her affection. Her early successes aren't her's at all, though. Qing is helping her from the shadows while she's oblivious. It's silly but not idiotic. It's fun yet still beautiful, and though it's lighthearted, the directors took their work seriously.
All the acting forwards the story. There's no under or overdoing it. She is cuter than the little white cub she finds in the forest, while his fervor for her touches our hearts. Dylan Wang (Meteor Garden-7.4, The Rational Life-7) is a nice looking guy, no doubt. But he's no Dwayne Johnson. So what makes him special? Qing is stereotypical as the condescending, aloof, perpetual bully, but that's because he was love-starved as a child and became emotionally stunted. Underneath that hard shell there's a cupcake. Mr Wang makes a nice romantic lead because he conveys love and (poorly suppressed) desire with intensity. Because of their occasional role reversals, he must act like a woman. He can play a girly-girl! He is fantastic. Later on, though he loves her, there's a point when he has to erase her memory, including her memory of him. We can see the hurt in his face. The eyes are what takes good acting to superb acting. He handles his eyes well.
The romance is a gem. Capital "R" good-girl-bad-boy Romance. It's a separate haven, like Arbiter Hall, tucked away from a world of war that springs up from hatred, revenge, and fear most of all. In ep13 there's a delightful kissing scene, being both fun and funny. His expression is probably overdone, but it packs the comedic punch. Although their lips locked a couple times prior to then, it's difficult to say what qualifies as a first kiss in the show. However, one could argue that the first truly romantic (mostly) mutual one isn't until ep26. The camera moves to show they are also holding hands. Flutters, for sure.
Qing's guard, Shang (Charles Lin from Romance with Blind Master & N Generations) looks like any guy walking in the neighborhoods of Philly: Italian, with a little bit of Irish in the mix. Esther Yu (My Journey to You, Love Game in Eastern Fantasy) is Orchid. She's cute. She plays a spoiled kid in Find Yourself-8.9, a show that I love. Her career seems to be taking off. The handsome-almost-pretty Zhang Ling He (Story of Kunning Palace, The Princess Royal-8.3) is Orchid's crush as the story opens, Chang Heng. Xu Hai Qiao (The Legend of Zhuohua, Marvelous Women) portrays Rong Hao, Chang's BFF and regular chess opponent. Hong Xiao White (Cat Legend, Rising with the Wind) nearly steals the show as Jie Li (When Orchid says her name it sounds like “Jelly” and it's darling).
Screenwriters, Cao Xiao Tian (The Glory) & Bai Jin Jin (Love Game in Eastern Fantasy) adapted original creator, Jiu Lu Fei Xiang's novel. She has several credits, including Back from the Brink & The Legend of Shen Li. The directing by Yi Zheng (Falling Into You) & Qian Jing Wu (The Silence of the Monster) is sheer competence with fresh elements, snappy cadence, and smooth segues. I've already watched this twice. In the second go-around connections, forecasting and ironic lines that aren't as perceptible upon the first watch popped out. It's a tidy work of art with a huge fun factor. Ep2, provides a metaphor: One guy /loses/ the handkerchief he treasured, as it was from his crush. Another man /finds/ the person he loves. The first guy was hesitant, and he lost, while the latter would define hesitation as weakness. He won.
LBF&D's dreamy fairyland is fanciful, magical, & delicate. Most Chinese features are 25 to 80 episodes long, which is lots of time to fill up. The effects budgets generally can't live up to Hollywood standards. Clunky special effects can break up the flow, but the excitement in this show is seamless. They get a lot of bang for their ¥uan💴, particularly with the action; most of the special effects in this are fantastic. The opening episode is quite pretty with impressive effects. There's a battlefield with 100,000 sealed soldiers who look like statues. Qing desperately wants to unseal them, which is a cool concept. The effect that impressed me most is when Chang Heng & Rong Hao take a break from chess and enter an antique pen & ink on faded parchment. They take a 2D boat ride on the River of Oblivion. They, themselves, become 2D. It's wonderful.
There are some minor flaws. Most transitions are excellent, but some are a little bit choppy, or awkward. They pick on an orphan again. Asia is not kind to orphans, and one of the bad guys is an orphan. The pain of his early life's loneliness is part of what drives him. Some actions and motivations aren't sufficiently explained. There's one rescue where we must wonder how the rescuer even knew he was needed. When the two leads body switch, their power doesn't seem to switch fully, but we never get an adequate explanation for it. The ending is too brief. A ten-second wrap-up leaves the viewer feeling cheated. Why they DO dat?! My biggest head-scratcher was Qing failing to grab one of those paintings to take back home with him after their visit to the mortal realm. Thankfully, the flaws are minor and few.
The main theme is how we are led away by our desires. We see the progression: Pride. Self-righteousness - which goes hand-in-hand with self-delusion. Prejudice - which brings hate along for the ride. The Heavenly realm is not heavenly. Though they presume their superiority, they are backbiting, spiteful, and ruthless. Orchid is the only one who appears to have true kindness, along with Chang, a truly good guy.
One of the baddies is just a dupe for the real evil boss His motivations make no sense on one level. Many of us can see someone treading the wrong path and wonder what they're thinking. In this case, this person is drawn away by h/h own desires while lying to h/h self that this is for somebody else. People have a habit of creating big knives that end up in their own backs.
The nature of weakness and strength is another theme. "I am so weak, I have no skills. I'm just an orchid fairy; I can't do much," Orchid says over and over. "She is my biggest weakness," says he. She's more powerful than she realizes. When she stops the whinge and starts working on herself, she gets stronger. Who is the most powerful one in the show? We begin to wonder. Futility is also a theme. War and revenge are a never ending cycle that just foments misery.
All in all, LBF&D is a personal River of Oblivion and a constant flow of smiles. The art is magnificent, the acting, directing, and writing are excellent, and the romance is unforgettable. This is one bad boy who is reformed for good!
QUOTES 🗣️
I will never make my past mistakes again.
Love makes everyone a better version of themselves.
I never thought bringing up a plant could be so troublesome.
〰🖍 IMHO
🎬8,8 🖊️〰8.6 🎭8.5 💓8.7 🦋7.8 🌞7 🎨9.3⚡6.4 🎵/🔊8.5 😅5.5 😭6 😱5 🤢2.5 🤔5.7 🔚 8.5
Age 12 +/- It's practically a kid's show, but there are some scary moments and heartbreaking moments as well
Re-📺? 🔛
Recs:
Douluo Continent 9.4;
Handsome Siblings 8.7;
Ancient Love Poetry 8.6;
Love and Redemption 10
Overlord 8.4,
Under the Power 8.6,
The Rebel Princess 9.1,
The Sword and the Brocade 8.6 (in ancient Chinese opera style),
The Rise of Phoenixes 9
Not only is the universe in which this show takes place a fantasy, but the concept that a good girl can reform the bad guy is also a fantasy. Beyond the fact that it's a fantasy, it is also disrespecting oneself. You. Deserve. Better. Enjoy a story that's based on that idea here, but don't go chasing after /that/ magic sword. You'll only end up piercing yourself.
The premise is adorable. Imagine the most powerful being who has ever existed on earth. His enemies manage to lock him up, but they were not powerful enough to kill him. While they were resealing the weakening roof of his prison, a fairy falls in there! What's /she/ doing here? (She was chasing after her crush). Somehow, in that deep pit, the little orchid fairy and the big, bad felon were subjected to a frightful spell. Now, he /feels/. He feels everything that /she/ feels. And she's an emotional little cutie. He's experiencing everything (emotionally and physically) that she is. Now, killing him is easy - all that someone needs to do is kill her and HE dies.
“Boo’-can-aw!” Balderdash! No one is more powerful than he! This will not control him!
Dylan Wang is Dongfang “Qing” Cang. Qing will get retribution against his tormentors, wake up his 100,000 soldiers, and wipe out his foes. He will burn the world down!... As soon as he can break this curse and shake loose from this simple-headed orchid 🌱 fairy. Until then, he'll have to keep an eye on her. He must keep her safe BY ALL MEANS, and since she's a delicate orchid, she needs all kinds of special care. ("I can do everything in this world," he says. As for raising a plant, how difficult can it be for me?) Little Orchid assumes he has a crush on her and tells him: "There's plenty of fish in the sea. Why don't you go find someone else?"
So, we have the arrogant, very angry, “evil” overlord being controlled by an innocent (who thinks he needs her help 🙄 - What can /she/ do? She's even afraid of the dark!). He'll have to protect her to stay alive, and keep her from harm to keep himself from being harmed. Among odd couples, this is an odd couple. She thinks she's in love with someone else (Chang Heng), and she's trying to get promoted in the Heavenly Realm so that she can be closer to the object of her affection. Her early successes aren't her's at all, though. Qing is helping her from the shadows while she's oblivious. It's silly but not idiotic. It's fun yet still beautiful, and though it's lighthearted, the directors took their work seriously.
All the acting forwards the story. There's no under or overdoing it. She is cuter than the little white cub she finds in the forest, while his fervor for her touches our hearts. Dylan Wang (Meteor Garden-7.4, The Rational Life-7) is a nice looking guy, no doubt. But he's no Dwayne Johnson. So what makes him special? Qing is stereotypical as the condescending, aloof, perpetual bully, but that's because he was love-starved as a child and became emotionally stunted. Underneath that hard shell there's a cupcake. Mr Wang makes a nice romantic lead because he conveys love and (poorly suppressed) desire with intensity. Because of their occasional role reversals, he must act like a woman. He can play a girly-girl! He is fantastic. Later on, though he loves her, there's a point when he has to erase her memory, including her memory of him. We can see the hurt in his face. The eyes are what takes good acting to superb acting. He handles his eyes well.
The romance is a gem. Capital "R" good-girl-bad-boy Romance. It's a separate haven, like Arbiter Hall, tucked away from a world of war that springs up from hatred, revenge, and fear most of all. In ep13 there's a delightful kissing scene, being both fun and funny. His expression is probably overdone, but it packs the comedic punch. Although their lips locked a couple times prior to then, it's difficult to say what qualifies as a first kiss in the show. However, one could argue that the first truly romantic (mostly) mutual one isn't until ep26. The camera moves to show they are also holding hands. Flutters, for sure.
Qing's guard, Shang (Charles Lin from Romance with Blind Master & N Generations) looks like any guy walking in the neighborhoods of Philly: Italian, with a little bit of Irish in the mix. Esther Yu (My Journey to You, Love Game in Eastern Fantasy) is Orchid. She's cute. She plays a spoiled kid in Find Yourself-8.9, a show that I love. Her career seems to be taking off. The handsome-almost-pretty Zhang Ling He (Story of Kunning Palace, The Princess Royal-8.3) is Orchid's crush as the story opens, Chang Heng. Xu Hai Qiao (The Legend of Zhuohua, Marvelous Women) portrays Rong Hao, Chang's BFF and regular chess opponent. Hong Xiao White (Cat Legend, Rising with the Wind) nearly steals the show as Jie Li (When Orchid says her name it sounds like “Jelly” and it's darling).
Screenwriters, Cao Xiao Tian (The Glory) & Bai Jin Jin (Love Game in Eastern Fantasy) adapted original creator, Jiu Lu Fei Xiang's novel. She has several credits, including Back from the Brink & The Legend of Shen Li. The directing by Yi Zheng (Falling Into You) & Qian Jing Wu (The Silence of the Monster) is sheer competence with fresh elements, snappy cadence, and smooth segues. I've already watched this twice. In the second go-around connections, forecasting and ironic lines that aren't as perceptible upon the first watch popped out. It's a tidy work of art with a huge fun factor. Ep2, provides a metaphor: One guy /loses/ the handkerchief he treasured, as it was from his crush. Another man /finds/ the person he loves. The first guy was hesitant, and he lost, while the latter would define hesitation as weakness. He won.
LBF&D's dreamy fairyland is fanciful, magical, & delicate. Most Chinese features are 25 to 80 episodes long, which is lots of time to fill up. The effects budgets generally can't live up to Hollywood standards. Clunky special effects can break up the flow, but the excitement in this show is seamless. They get a lot of bang for their ¥uan💴, particularly with the action; most of the special effects in this are fantastic. The opening episode is quite pretty with impressive effects. There's a battlefield with 100,000 sealed soldiers who look like statues. Qing desperately wants to unseal them, which is a cool concept. The effect that impressed me most is when Chang Heng & Rong Hao take a break from chess and enter an antique pen & ink on faded parchment. They take a 2D boat ride on the River of Oblivion. They, themselves, become 2D. It's wonderful.
There are some minor flaws. Most transitions are excellent, but some are a little bit choppy, or awkward. They pick on an orphan again. Asia is not kind to orphans, and one of the bad guys is an orphan. The pain of his early life's loneliness is part of what drives him. Some actions and motivations aren't sufficiently explained. There's one rescue where we must wonder how the rescuer even knew he was needed. When the two leads body switch, their power doesn't seem to switch fully, but we never get an adequate explanation for it. The ending is too brief. A ten-second wrap-up leaves the viewer feeling cheated. Why they DO dat?! My biggest head-scratcher was Qing failing to grab one of those paintings to take back home with him after their visit to the mortal realm. Thankfully, the flaws are minor and few.
The main theme is how we are led away by our desires. We see the progression: Pride. Self-righteousness - which goes hand-in-hand with self-delusion. Prejudice - which brings hate along for the ride. The Heavenly realm is not heavenly. Though they presume their superiority, they are backbiting, spiteful, and ruthless. Orchid is the only one who appears to have true kindness, along with Chang, a truly good guy.
One of the baddies is just a dupe for the real evil boss His motivations make no sense on one level. Many of us can see someone treading the wrong path and wonder what they're thinking. In this case, this person is drawn away by h/h own desires while lying to h/h self that this is for somebody else. People have a habit of creating big knives that end up in their own backs.
The nature of weakness and strength is another theme. "I am so weak, I have no skills. I'm just an orchid fairy; I can't do much," Orchid says over and over. "She is my biggest weakness," says he. She's more powerful than she realizes. When she stops the whinge and starts working on herself, she gets stronger. Who is the most powerful one in the show? We begin to wonder. Futility is also a theme. War and revenge are a never ending cycle that just foments misery.
All in all, LBF&D is a personal River of Oblivion and a constant flow of smiles. The art is magnificent, the acting, directing, and writing are excellent, and the romance is unforgettable. This is one bad boy who is reformed for good!
QUOTES 🗣️
I will never make my past mistakes again.
Love makes everyone a better version of themselves.
I never thought bringing up a plant could be so troublesome.
〰🖍 IMHO
🎬8,8 🖊️〰8.6 🎭8.5 💓8.7 🦋7.8 🌞7 🎨9.3⚡6.4 🎵/🔊8.5 😅5.5 😭6 😱5 🤢2.5 🤔5.7 🔚 8.5
Age 12 +/- It's practically a kid's show, but there are some scary moments and heartbreaking moments as well
Re-📺? 🔛
Recs:
Douluo Continent 9.4;
Handsome Siblings 8.7;
Ancient Love Poetry 8.6;
Love and Redemption 10
Overlord 8.4,
Under the Power 8.6,
The Rebel Princess 9.1,
The Sword and the Brocade 8.6 (in ancient Chinese opera style),
The Rise of Phoenixes 9
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