BearFightingFanBackAgain

lol, people are starting to do cosplay for this drama😂

But the FL isn’t set up as a coy woman. And the immaturity and youth are the point because she is much younger than the ML in the actual story too- 10 years younger. She’s also described as a rabbit. In fact, this pairing is marketed as a wolf/rabbit pairing suggesting that ML will be doing most of the romantic pursuit.

He’s really good as Yi Ying Ren in Legend of Hao Lan. It’s an older drama so the characters aren’t so binary which gives actors more room to play.

Kinda, but sometimes dramas may or may not have a different ending. In the book, they have 5 kids together before Xiao Huan passes away when the oldest is 18.

It’s a common and popular trope and the couple is marketed as a wolf/rabbit couple. But in defence of FL, she’s a (late) teen and that period of development can come with a sense of invincibility, self-centredness, and sometimes poor decision making skills even if someone is intelligent.

The performance was really wonderful. Expressions flowing like water. Every look is full of charm and ambition. Eyes skills like the old school dramas. Especially if you’ve seen other dramas featuring Queen Zhou’s historical prototype, her cameo was only 3 minutes long but it really had that flavour. 😩🙌

I said d*mn Peng Xiao Ran. An absolute acting skill level up😩😩😩👌
She ate that cameo up! In 3 minutes I understood why the emperor gave you a whole country😂 And I felt that you deserved it too. Sat on that throne with absolute “Thank you, baby” energy😭

A political motivation makes more sense tbh.

She looks good in Phoenix Stage! And some argue she’s even prettier in Tales of Dark River, which she’s shooting now.

The styling wasn’t very good for the FL in this drama. If you check out Goodbye My Princess, her first leading role, the styling was very good there. Phoenix Stage and Tales of Dark River also have good makeup/hair but they haven’t aired yet.

This doesn’t seem probable for Zhou Xu. Young Zhou Xu and the Emperor seem to care for each other, enough for her to rule in his stead.

She’s a cameo, so she won’t play many scenes. She plays the young version of the Empress Dowager and I think she probably shows up towards the end because there’s been no promo from her side other than the starting announcements for the show. If you saw her spy drama from last year, Unshakeable Faith, the actor who plays the emperor played the captain.

She plays the younger version of Zhou Yu, the Empress Dowager, in the past. No one knows when she will appear or for how long but here’s a fan edited video of some of her clips so far:
https://m.bilibili.com/video/BV14AsTeHEZo

I feel like maybe the character settings/tropes of this drama aren’t clear to all viewers and that’s causing frustration. The “suffering” of Shen Du is part of his setting and is the point. It is to charm viewers. Strong, beautiful, and miserable characters are quite popular, though his storyline doesn’t seem to be the extreme of this trope. The problem is that this tropes often uses the love interest as a tool to cause “suffering” which has the unfortunate effect of bringing animosity.
Another common trope at play is to make one part of the couple “cold, cruel, or bad” to the other at first (the reasoning or whether it’s for show doesn’t matter) then they fall in love, but they have to “pay” for their earlier behaviour. The standard is usually to make their feelings unrequited until the writer feels they have “earned” the love they seek. In some dramas this never happens but again, CLQ is not the extreme end of this trope either. Unfortunately this can also cause animosity if viewers feel the love has been earned before the screenwriter does.
In dramas with a romantic focus these two tropes often feed into each other.

The kiss scene is pretty textbook. She’s a bit caught off guard and overwhelmed in the beginning. It suits the situation- she has the feeling of being inexperienced.
Her reaction logically shouldn’t be on the same level as someone with 10 years more life experience than her. I also saw her being compared to a modern role… but where is an ancient girl going to learn to kiss? Some viewers were ready to tear her apart for having male peers. They’d probably have a rage stroke if they found out she kissed someone else😂
Plus I don’t know if the rules relaxed but it used to be that kisses with moving mouths had a risk of being cut due to censorship. That’s where the dead fish kisses evolved from. And they only occurred in shows where the directors didn’t have enough ingenuity.

Honestly, tiers don’t mean much anymore. It’s better to look at the team producing the drama. Their previous work can give some hint of their ability.

He’s a legendary red flag in Cdramaland. He’s basically a benchmark at this point.

Can some of y’all go touch some grass or at the very least take the "He-Man Womun Haters Club" rhetoric to a discussion? Opinions are fine, and it’s okay to dislike the FL, but the derogatory language and shaming is really starting to affect the atmosphere of this page.

Sorry it’s been a long time since I watched this so I don’t remember.

I think if they give her a western inspired updo or leave the hair mostly down with a little braiding/circlet/crown, the look will pull together. It’s the standard fairytale look for a powerful character in western fantasy (since the costuming seems to be western leaning) but that look doesn’t tend to have half updo hair. She will have an ageless and yet domineering air which seems to fit the character setting and the makeup can go lighter. I think the makeup today is good. Reba really doesn’t need dramatic makeup to set up the character. Her own temperament is quite queenly and she’s at the best age for playing a powerful and domineering character naturally. If they want to add Chinese elements, it can be done in the details with accessories/fabric choices / certain silhouettes and cuts but the team needs to understand what will translate so it fits together well.