Carolina Teixeira

maybe my dislike for some of the actors made me like the drama less.

I had always put this drama aside because I really didn’t want to watch it. I’m not particularly fond of the actors who play the main leads. But because I love the whole concept so much — sects, assassins, dark themes — I decided to finally give it a chance after years.

And honestly, I actually liked the beginning. The FL’s acting was okay for me at first, but once the two of them started getting involved, I couldn’t really understand her anymore. Her acting felt exactly the same as it had been since the first episode. It didn’t feel like she was actually falling in love with him.

The ML annoyed me at several points too, but I understood his character arc and how he matured throughout the story.

I’m definitely one of those fans who preferred Gong Shangjue and Gong Yuanzhi. Their relationship with Miss Qian was great too.

I really loved the secondary characters from the back mountain. I just wish they had given the Hua family’s story a little more screen time.

One criticism that a lot of people had, and that I completely agree with, is that I wanted to see much more of Wufeng. We basically only got one episode showing their assassins, and I became extremely interested in them. The fights were so short that we barely got to see how skilled they actually were.

They could also have shown more of how the sect worked internally — how people progressed from Chi to Mei, why some of the assassins had their heads shaved as punishment, etc. There was so much potential there. In the end, they just didn’t explore the sect that I found the most interesting.

Of course, the Gong family was also really interesting, but they spent practically 24 episodes building up to the reveal of the family’s big secret. That whole plot involving the brother also felt pretty pointless to me.

Anyway, I think the world and atmosphere they created had so much more potential than what they actually explored. If there were another season, I would definitely watch it, but I don’t think I’ll rewatch this one.

P.S. I skipped quite a lot of scenes involving Gong Ziyi’s sister and her crazy obsession with the bodyguard. I found those scenes so embarrassing that I couldn’t bring myself to watch them — from the dialogue to the acting. I skipped some scenes involving the main leads too.

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