Raymond Ardin

Um that is totally the wrong synopsis. This is another one of those web dramas with very short episodes (around 8 minutes). I believe it's based on the same original material (short stories) as Strange Tales of Tang Dynasty, but the main character is a young female coroner like in The Imperial Coroner. The other female lead is a detective with very strong martial arts. The male leads are the crown prince who is wandering undercover outside the palace, and his bodyguard, but so far they are just kind of "there" and don't really contribute much to the story at all. Maybe they will become more important later on. I'm quite enjoying it but I tend to like mystery dramas in general so maybe that's not saying much.

No, it's not a slur, even though it looks kinda similar to that other word. "Niggard" means someone who is stingy; the opposite of generous.

Is the sequel about the same or different main characters?

I wouldn't call it a great drama, but it's lighthearted and funny, though some characters can be annoying at times. Some familiar faces. ML was the 2nd ML (the dumb prince) from Fake Princess. FL was the ML's clingy sister from Legend of Fuyao. Pepper has a smile that looks exactly like that Douyin star who started acting, but it's not her. And of course the ML's father is in like every Chinese drama lol.

I agree, I think he looked older in Story of Ming Lan than he does here.

I don't know if the actress is actually like that in real life, but FL's character is SO CHARMING. I just love all her mannerisms and expressions. When she smiles, she exudes this quiet confidence with just a touch of mischief. I can't stop watching her.

Pretty bad movie. The lead actor is handsome but his acting is terrible. Plot is mediocre for a detective story, and worse than other movies based on the character Song Ci. I only watched it for Zhang Wei Na, who's smoking hot as always.

Wow, what a strange movie... one of the weirdest things I've ever seen.

I actually really like Xing Fei's acting here. It's very natural. She doesn't have that fake, cheesy grin that she has in her other dramas.

If you only compare the pictures, I guess I kinda see it. But having watched dramas by both actresses, I don't think they look alike at all.

The FL reminds me a lot of a younger version of Guan Xiaotong, both in terms of looks and acting.

I actually found the actress playing PXJ did a pretty good job of being adorable, at least later on. And it's very common, especially in historical dramas, for sheltered upper class girls to go crazy over a guy like that. I just found it hard to reconcile with the other side of her that they show in the rest of the drama.

What you said re: YT makes sense, and it's nice to hear a second opinion. I liked YT but it's hard to judge objectively when I'm a hot mess of hormones every time she appears on the screen. I'm sure (straight) girls have the same problem with actors like Yang Yang, Ceasar Wu, etc. LOL

I found the love interest thing uncomfortable too. Mainly because SWM looks to be in his 40's at least, and the actress playing YT is in her late 20's but looks even younger than that. In fact, only two years ago she played a 17-year-old character.

I wasn't that impressed with the lead actress (she's only good at being cute and nothing else), but I though the second female lead's acting was very good.

They are both very beautiful but I don't see the resemblance?

Is the original novel BL? Because the female characters are poorly and shallowly written compared to the male characters. It's kind of hard to believe that the super smart, talented, and sweet Xi Jun is the same crazy girl that kept trying to kill herself over a man she literally met once. Cherry/Ying Tao's character is also inconsistent. Sometimes she seems unnecessarily b*tchy, and at other times she's really normal and even sweet. It's almost like she's two different people too. Or am I just trying too hard to be unbiased and ended up overcompensating for the fact that I'm in love with the actress that plays her?

Oh the FL is the princess from Heart of Loyalty. No wonder she looked so familiar.

Where can we watch season 2?

- Ep19: In the classified records, she discovers that her father's collusion letter was forged, and Lei Zheng was the one who judged the case. Lei Zheng's body has the same mark as the assassins they ran into before.
- Ep20: In Lei Zheng's house, she finds a blackmail letter from Liang Feng (former Minister of War). They go to the suburbs to look for Liang Feng, but he has been killed by his adopted daughter to avenge her husband. In his house, they find lots of imitation calligraphy and a list of the scholars who wrote them. They deduce that Liang Feng collected the calligraphy in order to help Lei Zheng find someone to fake Su Ci's father's handwriting. Using the list, they find Li Mu's old house that burned down.
- Ep23: They lure out Li Mu, who is killed by assassins, but he had buried his confession letter and Lei Zheng's original letter that he copied.
- Ep24: They deduce that Prince Yun is the only person who can train so many assassins and make high ranking ministers like Lei Zheng work for him. Prince Qi said that the easiest place to poison the robe that killed the previous emperor would be the palace's laundry department. A eunuch tells them that the head of the department died mysteriously, and later someone dug up and burned her body. A bunch of maids working in the department also mysteriously fell ill and were sent out of the palace, without any records.
- Ep25: They find the maids and indeed they were poisoned, not sick. But the maids didn't die, so the late emperor must've taken a catalyst that sped up the poison's effect. They find the catalyst in the medical records, which was recommended to the former empress by Prince Yun's wife. They accidentally come across some Bailiang brocade and trace the source to the Xu family.
- Ep27: the palace maid that poisoned the laundry water, who has been hiding in the Xu family as a nanny, confesses that it was Prince Yun who made her do it.

There isn't a lot of romance, but it's there, and the sexual tension between the lead couple is absolutely electric whenever they are alone together.

Some thoughts:
- It's a really silly parody of the original series whereby after Ling'er's death, a heartbroken Li Xiaoyao goes back in time and manipulates all the main characters, including his younger self, into becoming employees at the Inn, away from danger. They almost never leave the inn throughout the entire drama.
- Everything is super ridiculous and hilarious, with lots of slapstick and the dialogue being jam-packed with all sorts of modern jokes and puns (most of which only Chinese speakers will understand). It's almost impossible to sub this drama properly because all the jokes require extensive explanations (and jokes are no longer funny if you have to explain them).
- Making fun of Yueru's flat chest (at least compared to the very curvy Ling'er) is a recurring theme. The Chinese words for chest, older brother, and misfortune are all pronounced the same ("xiōng"), which means lots of breast-related puns.
- The friendship/bond between the characters is really cute, sweet, and touching.
- Leo Wu looks a bit older than he did in Nirvana in Fire, even though both dramas came out in 2015. NIF was probably filmed earlier and had a much longer post production period, being a much higher quality drama.
- Although she still looks very cute, Ling'er's bangs don't flatter her face shape at all. They should've kept the same hairstyle as the original series.
- Whenever Long You speaks, I keep thinking it's Allen Ren because he has the exact same voice as Allen in all of his dramas (dubbed by the same voice actor, probably)!
- A'Nu has the sweetest voice ever! It almost brings tears to my eyes when I hear the ending song, which is sung by her. The singer/actress' stage name is Tong Hehe, by the way. Tong meaning "child," and He He as in a laugh. Fits her childish image, I guess.
- I probably won't be re-watching this ever, but it was fun while it lasted.