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This review may contain spoilers
THEME-DIGGING WITH A SMALL BASKET
In my reviews, I normally dig for a variety of topics & elaborate upon the ones that in my opinion deserve special attention. At the end, I add a short list of glitches & flaws detected throughout the series. Unfortunately, this drama is not very innovative as regards the selection of topics, so I can enlist them within one breath: love, friendship, war, sacrifice, impact of family trauma or misplaced ambitions. Neither is its analysis of these topics deep enough to deserve a separate paragraph for each.
There is a Greek proverb: “When they say there will be many cherries, bring a small basket.” For the first time in my drama-binging experience, I have caught myself not taking any notes while watching, because the only components worth remembering were a few detached scenes easy to enlist here: the herb contest, the beginnings of Cui+Dong & Hong+Yu romances, the Pei+Wei cooperation, the flower replanting & the house furnishing. The music was emotional, well-tuned & decent but not exceptionally innovative. I liked the acting but could not imagine why the actors had chosen to cooperate over a clearly violence-promoting script. Now I will like them less than I used to. This is a natural defence response.
That is basically all as regards the fair side. The ‘Glitches & Flaws’ chapter will sadly cover the rest of my review text.
GLITCHES & FLAWS
The greatest flaw of this drama is sheer
GLORIFICATION OF VIOLENCE.
Let it be an extended subchapter of this critique.
Shortly before “Love of Nirvana,” in 2023-2024, some C-dramas were screened that persistently focused on the acquiescence of a heroine to violence executed by a male on her: “Lost You Forever” & “Till the End of the Moon.” Lackadaisically, both series received a lot of fascination from the public. This acknowledgement was, in my opinion, the result of a hasty projection of some viewers’ love & trust towards their idols onto the deficient world-view behind the character building. While these earlier dramas, especially “Lost You Forever,” were morally murky but at least intellectually inviting, “Love of Nirvana” lacks that basis of psychological or cultural research, intricacy, even coherence.
The question arises again: What was the intention behind this proliferation of works insisting that the anticipated response to torture is love? To find niche audience who feels this way already, waiting for someone to address them? Or to promote such an unusual way of feeling among general audience?
I regret to state that, in my opinion, neither Wei Zhao deserves Jiang Ci’s love, nor Jiang Ci deserves Wei Zhao’s love.
Why is Wei Zhao unlovable?
Because the hurt he kept inflicting on the heroine was not merely a reaction to her action. As regards the quality, it was sadistic torture. As regards the quantity, it was administered beyond any justifiable volume. As regards the frequency, it exceeded by far any explicable measure. Because being a hero of a nation does not imply exemption from morality; quite the contrary, Machiavellian attitude is highly corruptogenic. Last but not least, this strategist’s deficiency in wisdom becomes visible at times. He tends to risk other’s lives to no avail. He misses opportunities to settle the accounts with the king face to face. He hastily assumes that Teng Rui must be the person they were looking for, as if only one man in the world had scars on his back. He fears that others may see his own characteristic scar on the hand, but he will not wear gloves – he prefers to eradicate witnesses instead. Behold a grown-up man, a general & spy, wielding double identity, who normally would be burdened with a double set of tasks, obligations & responsibilities, yet who is now sitting on a tree, day & night, pelting pieces of sugar to tease an unsophisticated girl.
Why is Jiang Ci unlovable?
Because she brings disaster after disaster after disaster with her actions. At the beginning we may still try to justify her for being inexperienced, even when she stubbornly provokes an assassin to administer more & more violence to her. But even when the experience arrives, she remains unaltered. As long as Wei Zhao keeps losing allies due to Jiang Ci’s imprudent & impudent actions, we may regard her as a tragic involuntary vehicle of misfortune due to her immaturity. But from the day she witnesses the He couple’s sacrifice & even tries her hand at interpreting this situation, without any attempt at self-reflection, no room is left for moral allowance anymore. Even when she realises that Wei Zhang is secretly trying to liberate the state of Yueluo & when she acknowledges the validity of his effort, as well as the risk & the need for discretion, she keeps imposing her own narrow-minded goals & antiproductive methods. At times she knows where to go & how to help people with her knowledge of natural medicine. At other times she irresponsibly keeps returning from safe hiding places, enters battlefields that ask for more than her rudimentary survival skills, participates in disputes beyond her comprehension, exposes herself & thus becomes a ready-to-take hostage. It does happen in many C-dramas, but those heroines are rarely regarded as mature leads, as long as they indulge in such behaviour. Jiang Ci remains irredeemable in this respect, still we are expected to admire her.
Just as Wei Zhao’s identity as a hero should be assessed independently from his identity as a sadist, so Jiang Ci’s identity as a healer should be assessed independently from her identity as a short-sighted jinx.
FROM VICTIM TO LOVER
What psychological mechanism could by any chance justify Jiang Ci’s readiness to fall in love with Wei Zhao?
A natural response to unearned violence & torture is either
1) fear/anger, which leads to abhorrence, or
2) disgust, which leads to contempt.
Both are natural, evolutionary defence responses that signal danger and the violation of boundaries.
In both cases, the results postpone any chance of admiration, as long as they prevail. Disgust is stronger than fear/anger in blocking any positive emotions: it excludes a possibility of love altogether.
As a person, I am blessed with a disposition that switches on rapid intense disgust as a reaction to violence & never switches off the resulting contempt. Therefore, it is impossible for me ever to fall in love with an oppressor. I recognise torture as filth & filth is impossible to cherish. However, some psychology research sources state that in most people the process of fading away of a natural response to violence is possible, though it requires time. The fading away can be triggered by the culprit’s manipulative techniques.
Key psychological and biological mechanisms include:
1) Trauma bonding: when the culprit alternates violence & displays of affection, remorse or rewards to induce surges of dopamine, oxytocin & cortisol in the victim’s body.
2) Adaptive survival mechanisms: the victim’s freezing into submissiveness, automatic suppression of disgust or fear/anger to minimise the risk of further attacks. This is the basis for the so-called Stockholm syndrome.
3) Cognitive dissonance & gaslighting: due to the culprit’s manipulation, the victim’s perception of reality gets distorted; blame gets diverted towards oneself & rationalisation of the abuse takes place to wipe away the initial fear/anger or disgust.
4) Desensitisation: due to prolonged exposure, the victim’s body & mind involuntarily reduce their emotional & physiological responses to threat, pain & encroachment on personal boundaries.
Other glitches & flaws of this drama result entirely from inconsistencies in the actions of the remaining characters, which are psychologically difficult to explain, esp. the sudden surge of gullibility in the wise shifu Yan Shuang Qiao, the unnecessary self-sacrifice of prince Xie Chun, the unwise & untimely rebellion of Rong Yu Die, the childish stubbornness & heart-blindness of the experienced Pei Yan, the Second Princess Dong’s withdrawal from the fight for her love (though she had just proven to be courageous enough to help Jiang Ci elope), the unnaturally swift effusion of energy & self-reliance in A Yan, right after her suicidal attempt, etc. The objectification of men (typical of so many C-dramas) is also visible here, because the male (plus some female) characters seem to be revolving around Jiang Ci’s needs & expectations more than around serious national issues or their own affairs.
Because MDL does not provide a separate scale called “Ethical value,” I use the existing “Rewatch value” to subtract points for any anti-ethical potential. After all, (re-)watching should be reserved for works that make us grow into better persons.
I would like to recommend some other authors’ reviews, because many details I intended to enumerate here had already been covered by them, so there was no point in my repeating them here. Please kindly refer to the reviews by:
- TrippleR7
- Khin Maung
- JoaneJ
- Sirenas (I usually do not support reviews when the watching was dropped, but this one has extracted a lot of essence from the first 5 episodes).
Also – if you would like to broaden your research to the source novel, please consider referring to:
- Deirdre19
APPEAL
Apart from the omnipresent & hardly justifiable violence that permeates many C-dramas, often at the cost of the quality of the action, causality, characterisation & other vital components, I would like to repeat – here as well – my permanent appeal to encourage the preservation of actor’s & actresses’ natural countenances, in times when the misleading demand for surgical or chemical interference is still being incited worldwide.
Written by a nationless spirit confined in the decaying Mid-Europe.
There is a Greek proverb: “When they say there will be many cherries, bring a small basket.” For the first time in my drama-binging experience, I have caught myself not taking any notes while watching, because the only components worth remembering were a few detached scenes easy to enlist here: the herb contest, the beginnings of Cui+Dong & Hong+Yu romances, the Pei+Wei cooperation, the flower replanting & the house furnishing. The music was emotional, well-tuned & decent but not exceptionally innovative. I liked the acting but could not imagine why the actors had chosen to cooperate over a clearly violence-promoting script. Now I will like them less than I used to. This is a natural defence response.
That is basically all as regards the fair side. The ‘Glitches & Flaws’ chapter will sadly cover the rest of my review text.
GLITCHES & FLAWS
The greatest flaw of this drama is sheer
GLORIFICATION OF VIOLENCE.
Let it be an extended subchapter of this critique.
Shortly before “Love of Nirvana,” in 2023-2024, some C-dramas were screened that persistently focused on the acquiescence of a heroine to violence executed by a male on her: “Lost You Forever” & “Till the End of the Moon.” Lackadaisically, both series received a lot of fascination from the public. This acknowledgement was, in my opinion, the result of a hasty projection of some viewers’ love & trust towards their idols onto the deficient world-view behind the character building. While these earlier dramas, especially “Lost You Forever,” were morally murky but at least intellectually inviting, “Love of Nirvana” lacks that basis of psychological or cultural research, intricacy, even coherence.
The question arises again: What was the intention behind this proliferation of works insisting that the anticipated response to torture is love? To find niche audience who feels this way already, waiting for someone to address them? Or to promote such an unusual way of feeling among general audience?
I regret to state that, in my opinion, neither Wei Zhao deserves Jiang Ci’s love, nor Jiang Ci deserves Wei Zhao’s love.
Why is Wei Zhao unlovable?
Because the hurt he kept inflicting on the heroine was not merely a reaction to her action. As regards the quality, it was sadistic torture. As regards the quantity, it was administered beyond any justifiable volume. As regards the frequency, it exceeded by far any explicable measure. Because being a hero of a nation does not imply exemption from morality; quite the contrary, Machiavellian attitude is highly corruptogenic. Last but not least, this strategist’s deficiency in wisdom becomes visible at times. He tends to risk other’s lives to no avail. He misses opportunities to settle the accounts with the king face to face. He hastily assumes that Teng Rui must be the person they were looking for, as if only one man in the world had scars on his back. He fears that others may see his own characteristic scar on the hand, but he will not wear gloves – he prefers to eradicate witnesses instead. Behold a grown-up man, a general & spy, wielding double identity, who normally would be burdened with a double set of tasks, obligations & responsibilities, yet who is now sitting on a tree, day & night, pelting pieces of sugar to tease an unsophisticated girl.
Why is Jiang Ci unlovable?
Because she brings disaster after disaster after disaster with her actions. At the beginning we may still try to justify her for being inexperienced, even when she stubbornly provokes an assassin to administer more & more violence to her. But even when the experience arrives, she remains unaltered. As long as Wei Zhao keeps losing allies due to Jiang Ci’s imprudent & impudent actions, we may regard her as a tragic involuntary vehicle of misfortune due to her immaturity. But from the day she witnesses the He couple’s sacrifice & even tries her hand at interpreting this situation, without any attempt at self-reflection, no room is left for moral allowance anymore. Even when she realises that Wei Zhang is secretly trying to liberate the state of Yueluo & when she acknowledges the validity of his effort, as well as the risk & the need for discretion, she keeps imposing her own narrow-minded goals & antiproductive methods. At times she knows where to go & how to help people with her knowledge of natural medicine. At other times she irresponsibly keeps returning from safe hiding places, enters battlefields that ask for more than her rudimentary survival skills, participates in disputes beyond her comprehension, exposes herself & thus becomes a ready-to-take hostage. It does happen in many C-dramas, but those heroines are rarely regarded as mature leads, as long as they indulge in such behaviour. Jiang Ci remains irredeemable in this respect, still we are expected to admire her.
Just as Wei Zhao’s identity as a hero should be assessed independently from his identity as a sadist, so Jiang Ci’s identity as a healer should be assessed independently from her identity as a short-sighted jinx.
FROM VICTIM TO LOVER
What psychological mechanism could by any chance justify Jiang Ci’s readiness to fall in love with Wei Zhao?
A natural response to unearned violence & torture is either
1) fear/anger, which leads to abhorrence, or
2) disgust, which leads to contempt.
Both are natural, evolutionary defence responses that signal danger and the violation of boundaries.
In both cases, the results postpone any chance of admiration, as long as they prevail. Disgust is stronger than fear/anger in blocking any positive emotions: it excludes a possibility of love altogether.
As a person, I am blessed with a disposition that switches on rapid intense disgust as a reaction to violence & never switches off the resulting contempt. Therefore, it is impossible for me ever to fall in love with an oppressor. I recognise torture as filth & filth is impossible to cherish. However, some psychology research sources state that in most people the process of fading away of a natural response to violence is possible, though it requires time. The fading away can be triggered by the culprit’s manipulative techniques.
Key psychological and biological mechanisms include:
1) Trauma bonding: when the culprit alternates violence & displays of affection, remorse or rewards to induce surges of dopamine, oxytocin & cortisol in the victim’s body.
2) Adaptive survival mechanisms: the victim’s freezing into submissiveness, automatic suppression of disgust or fear/anger to minimise the risk of further attacks. This is the basis for the so-called Stockholm syndrome.
3) Cognitive dissonance & gaslighting: due to the culprit’s manipulation, the victim’s perception of reality gets distorted; blame gets diverted towards oneself & rationalisation of the abuse takes place to wipe away the initial fear/anger or disgust.
4) Desensitisation: due to prolonged exposure, the victim’s body & mind involuntarily reduce their emotional & physiological responses to threat, pain & encroachment on personal boundaries.
Other glitches & flaws of this drama result entirely from inconsistencies in the actions of the remaining characters, which are psychologically difficult to explain, esp. the sudden surge of gullibility in the wise shifu Yan Shuang Qiao, the unnecessary self-sacrifice of prince Xie Chun, the unwise & untimely rebellion of Rong Yu Die, the childish stubbornness & heart-blindness of the experienced Pei Yan, the Second Princess Dong’s withdrawal from the fight for her love (though she had just proven to be courageous enough to help Jiang Ci elope), the unnaturally swift effusion of energy & self-reliance in A Yan, right after her suicidal attempt, etc. The objectification of men (typical of so many C-dramas) is also visible here, because the male (plus some female) characters seem to be revolving around Jiang Ci’s needs & expectations more than around serious national issues or their own affairs.
Because MDL does not provide a separate scale called “Ethical value,” I use the existing “Rewatch value” to subtract points for any anti-ethical potential. After all, (re-)watching should be reserved for works that make us grow into better persons.
I would like to recommend some other authors’ reviews, because many details I intended to enumerate here had already been covered by them, so there was no point in my repeating them here. Please kindly refer to the reviews by:
- TrippleR7
- Khin Maung
- JoaneJ
- Sirenas (I usually do not support reviews when the watching was dropped, but this one has extracted a lot of essence from the first 5 episodes).
Also – if you would like to broaden your research to the source novel, please consider referring to:
- Deirdre19
APPEAL
Apart from the omnipresent & hardly justifiable violence that permeates many C-dramas, often at the cost of the quality of the action, causality, characterisation & other vital components, I would like to repeat – here as well – my permanent appeal to encourage the preservation of actor’s & actresses’ natural countenances, in times when the misleading demand for surgical or chemical interference is still being incited worldwide.
Written by a nationless spirit confined in the decaying Mid-Europe.
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