Deirdre19

There is absolutely nothing to justify the sudden drop of the rating from 8.3 to 8.0. It seems like some malicious trolls are working hard again...

There were two independent poisoning attempts:
1) The one by the inept assassins that we keep seeing. They had a small red vial of the Sanxisan (Three Breaths) poison which they dropped and which the FL then replaced with her diarrhea powder. This is what she drank in the wine.
2) An unknown person poisoned the red snacks that we see at the beginning of the banquet and which Hua Liuli ate. We see this only later in a flashback when then mastermind complains that she apparently cannot be poisoned.

Well, if CZ was so important to them, why didn't they make any effort to give it a decent script, professional make-up and, most of all, an FL who can act?

Yeah, well, they don't seem to care much about badly written FLs or boys who can't act.
I see it happening also with some full-length dramas, that are actually good, but missing the idol boys, like Royal Rumours which suddenly dropped from 8.3 to 8.0 for no reason whatsoever (95% of the comments are positive).

Seems like they're relying solely on JT's bathing scene for promotion...
Even though these clips are worth seeing, it's a bit sad for everyone who's invested time and energy in this production.

I think it's one of the princes who is behind it all... maybe in collaboration with censor Zhu. As this has probably started even before the crown prince and the other princes were born (I suspect CP was poisoned as a child...) there must be someone older involved.

I really like Leo Luo, too. I saw a few scenes where he was on a horse and I could tell that he didn't look at ease which I found astonishing. As an ex-ballet dancer he should have the necessary balance and body control, but maybe there were some other reasons.

Yes, he did the riding himself, you can clearly see the face when he's galloping through the street. But in this one scene where the horse reared (I think it was 1st episode), I don't think it was him on the horse. The shot is taken at such an angle that the rider's face cannot be seen. Even for a proficient rider this would be a very challenging stunt to perform, so it seems reasonable to me that this was a stuntman.

Yeah, Wu Lei is quite good with the horse, it shows immediately. I've seen JT in several dramas, riding while holding a spear/sword in one hand and the reins in the other, he seems to know what he's doing. I'm a rider myself, so some details are very obvious to me.
Some of the worst fake riding that I've ever seen was in And the Winner is Love. They actually used fake horse-heads and the movement of the riders are completely out of sync with the sound of the hooves. That was so painful to watch...

It was definitely him on the galloping horse, the cut with the rearing horse was very cleverly done, because you don't see the face of the person on the horse. I had to reverse/repeat it several times to see that there was actually a cut, so I don't think that was the actor.
For me it's already a big plus that he always does these riding scenes - I've seen some really cringe-worthy fake riding in some other dramas

The Protector General (Hua Liuli's father) has just won an important battle and forced the neighbouring state Jinpo to surrender. The whole Hua family is fighting at the border and hold the power over the army.
When generals become very (too) powerful they can be a threat to the imperial family, as in previous dynasties the generals then removed the emperor to seize power. So the Emperor will be suspicious as soon as some general becomes too popular or powerful. This is the reason why Hua Liuli was sent back to the capital as a sign of loyalty to the Emperor (in the drama version she is considered a sort of "hostage").
Right now as the two states have entered peace negotiations, there seems to no longer any need for a powerful general and some officials are asking for him to be removed from power, which makes the situation very dangerous for the Hua family.
There is a Chinese saying that features quite prominently in the novel:
蜚鸟尽，良弓藏
When all the birds are gone, the trusted bow is no longer needed (my translation, Chinese speakers feel free to correct).
It means that the general has served his purpose and now that the purpose is gone, he can be dropped.
Hua Liuli was born weak, but got better and now pretends to still be weak to manipulate people. If she appears weak they will lower their guard and feel sorry for her.
As the children of the imperial family and a high-ranking general it is normal that they would have known each other since childhood. The who-is-who of important families was a popular pasttime before TV and internet.

Quite honestly, I think there are some trolls going around down-voting everything that doesn't have their idol-boys in it.

JT has perfect comedic timing, that's what makes Be My Princess so funny. There is a subtle irony in his acting that many casual viewers seem to have missed. Towards the end, every time he says "Princess" with that stiff face, it totally cracks me up!

This drama is a goldmine of quirky little details that might be easily missed. The acting for of all characters is pretty decent and the chemistry between the two leads is spot on.
Also, it so far managed to avoid quite a few of the usual c-drama tropes and for once there is a clever and reasonable FL. The story is interesting with a good pacing.
So based on this alone, it more than deserves the 8.3 rating.

That was a wonderful scene! Especially because what the Empress Dowager told him (to look out for the little things that could show a person's heart) exactly matched Hua Liuli's actions.
There are a lot of such subtleties in this drama, but not everybody seems to notice them.

It really depends on who the actors are. Anything with some pretty idol boys will easily go beyond 8 without being any good whereas some quite good dramas with "normal" actors will fall in the 7 range for no reason. There are also some dramas in the 6-range.

Hmh, we seem to have different ideas of what a robot acts like... 🤣

Oh, and yes, good choice, Jeremy, the dark red is definitely your colour!

I just love the way the script-writers are playing with the gender stereotypes in this drama. Here the FL gets to grill meat (usually the epitomy of blokish behaviour) while the ML has trouble chosing a pretty outfit to meet his girl 🤣
This is just wonderful, creative writing! I hope these guys will get to work on many big projects in the future!!

Quite honestly, if a drama is well produced, with good acting and a decent script, I really don't care whether it's BG or BL. True equality will be reached when BL or BG will no longer matter.
I guess one of the reasons that BL dramas are so popular is that C-drama scriptwriters just cannot seem write any decent female roles. Even if the character was ok in the underlying novel, they have to dumb down every single role take away any independent thinking or rationality until they all behave like five-year olds.