Jaden

I think the fact that Rin hasn't exhibited those traits at all makes it seem like he doesn't love San as much as Won. Sure he has a different personality and he has less power than Won, but at this point, to the audience, it's been mostly San loving Rin, and through some mild telepathy, she realizes he loves her too. Rin hasn't really done anything, so it's a bit weird.

I can't help feel bad for Won. It really is like a love triangle, except there are 2 arrows pointing at both Rin and San, but only 1 for Won.

only in drama does stalker become love interest

that is probably the only way it will end happily for most characters.

As someone who likes exactly what you describe, although I will admit this is one of the worst, most heartwrenching of them all, I can tell you that at least 50% of sageuks are lighthearted/funny, either by accident or intentional, or do not involve much betrayal/backstabbing because it was meant to focus solely on history (Six Flying Dragons comes to mind). You can probably find them by confirming they are not on my list haha. Be wary of most of the recent sageuks (past few months).

I'm sure the majority ships Rin, but if San really does end up with Rin, it would certainly not be a happy ending, especially given what has happened so far. Maybe the novel started differently, but based on the drama, Won and Rin's friendship and Rin's loyalty is too high + the fact that drama is really pushing for Won x San, so I can only see San ending up with Rin if something bad happens to Won, either he dies or is unable to be with San for whatever reason. This is actually very likely to happen considering how many enemies Won has. He's a pitiful main character and if he goes down, the drama probably will not end happily.

I'm so attached to the characters in this drama that I only wish everyone is happy in the end, but I can't see a world where that's possible with Rin x San. Rin should've told Won sooner that he liked San if this were to become a healthy rivalry.

Finally she's in a good drama, I thought her acting was bad but it fits really well in The King in Love

My favorite thing about this is the focus on friendship, even though it's a bit one-sided right now, most (great) historical drama have very little of that. Rivals, or even brothers, usually start betraying/fighting each other right from the start.

I tend to dislike dramas that have too many lighthearted moments and spend too much time to get me familiar/grow attached to the characters in that way, before focusing on the main plot and letting events unravel.

This seems to be the opposite extreme, not sure how I feel about this. Even the child story was to-the-point and intense for the most part. There's just no breathing room especially in the recent episodes.

prince with myung hye though, anyone?

finally a good ending that's actually good

I might be the same, I love watching historical drama and in fact enjoyed every one of the recommended historical drama: Rebel, Nirvana in fire, Empress Ki, Moon Lovers, General and I, etc.

Some of those have romance, some not so much so I don't think it's because of romance either.

After thinking about it, I think the main reason it feels boring is because of one thing it lacks compared the majority of historical drama or even drama in general. The story, at least in the beginning, is completely devoid of any emotional tension or angst, and while those are usually bad things, some people do watch drama for the intensity and dramatic effect that it creates.

There's also no feeling of revenge from the main characters and the story feels more like an epic adventure to establish a nation, which is very different from most historical drama where the scope is less on the nation and more on family/friends. Personally, I can't watch a historical drama if it doesn't have any notion of revenge, which seems to be the case here where characters are very mature and never think about taking revenge whenever something bad happens, instead they try to change the system or something. Keep in mind, I didn't finish the drama since I couldn't get into it.

Ironically this is one of the best historical drama because it tries to accurately depict the real events in history whereas most other historical drama usually take a small part of the history and blow it up.

This drama kept getting worse, didn't watch the original but seems like a lot of filler in the 2nd half. Also, the acting from Tian Tian and the teacher feel very off. At first it seemed fine but later on it feels like they are just inexperienced. The cast looks nice, but at some point that doesn't make up for the acting, this is coming from someone who never notices bad acting (correct me if I'm wrong..)

episode 1-3 is nothing compared to episode 4..

He could have been evil for a reason, this drama is exploring the possibility that he was partially controlled by political factions and supposedly had a dark past.

can't wait to watch Rebel

Well, that was the initial feeling. Yes, there's some major differences, but I still think this drama leans more towards Moon Lovers more than SFD because it really isn't very deep, it follows a very typical formula which involves a combination of romance, tragedy/revenge, melodrama and some politics to set everything up. SFD seems to revolve mostly around and delves deep into politics/philosophy.

As someone who couldn't get into SFD but is enjoying this drama, I'm not getting the SFD vibe at all, even though there are some similar plot/character elements. SFD was very unique, maybe that's what makes it so great. I think the main difference lies in the themes: SFD lacks melodrama, romance, revenge/tragedy. Romance definitely plays a major part of this drama, you can see this right from the start when Hwa Gun fell in love with the prince. Sure you can say the romance influences the plot but that doesn't change the fact that it's still a major focus.

The first drama I thought of when I saw this was Moon Lovers which is basically an emotional rollercoaster of the romance/politics within a palace/kingdom but without too much substance, whereas SFD is more of a political/philosophical story about the inception of a nation, correct me if I'm wrong, I didn't finish it. Based on this, I don't really expect anything extraordinary to unfold.

"Historical, Melodrama, Political, Romance, (Tragedy)" can't get enough of these

Assuming I have the right definition of cheesy.. as someone who found this cheesy, I only thought that a few small parts could go without as much "cheese" and not be excessively sentimental to the point that it felt draggy. I think the crown prince ties into this, he's a bit too angsty sometimes, albeit justified. That said, all historical drama tend to be very cheesy and relative to that, this is actually one of the better ones. However, there are definitely ones, especially the masterpiece historical dramas, that generally show no sign of cheesiness. There are also people such as myself that enjoy cheesy/melodrama despite criticizing it, so maybe it isn't really a bad thing.

I've never seen a historical drama where most of the conflict is external to the palace. What this means is, usually the queens/concubines are involved in some sortof internal conflict/scheming, but in this drama there is clear line between the people following the prince and those who are with the evil organization. We can also expect a happy ending based on what has happened and the trajectory it's going at.

Unfortunately, it's too cheesy and also has some really poorly designed scenes, there's one where they beat up the "bad guys" and hold their leader captive so that the group can escape but then when they are running away the "bad guys" continue chasing. If you were just beat by someone but they spared your life, why would you then try to hunt them down again.