L13

I'm several episodes behind, but I thought it was the SML?

Wait, I misunderstood what you were saying and thought you meant the Gong sect leader. Never mind.

Isn't his father already the sect leader? Or is the sect leader different from the Sword Wielder?

He also told the dead assassin to protect someone and we all assumed it was the Mei (I forgot her name), but the cinematography was ambiguous and it could have been Weishan instead. There was something else as well that I'm forgetting at the moment. They definitely have some kind of connection.

Watch The Longest Day in Chang'an and The Wind Blows from Longxi actually. Ripe Town, which is coming up this year, also promises to have a darker atmosphere.

She really is too smart to be a Chi, and the guy with the buzzcut seems to take a special interest in her... I wonder if she's not actually of a higher rank? And if not, I wonder why Wufeng didn't send one of their top assassins on such an important assignment and if we'll get to meet an actual Liang later on.

Are you kidding? The fight choreography here is noticeably better than in most other dramas, including the ones you mentioned.

Off the top of my head, The Sleuth of Ming Dynasty is one of the few historical cdramas with good fight choreo (and it was produced by Jackie Chan, so that's why).

I'm sick of accounts like that one searching far and wide for the stupidest possible criticisms of actors' looks/performance and publicising them as if they represent a significant chunk of the audience.

ZLH looks great in this drama and is doing a fine job with his character. The sad scenes were totally convincing. If someone "couldn't help but laugh," then they're probably just a hater.

This is sooooo good! I love both leads and can't wait to see how their relationship develops. Ziyu is smart, but he really is a sucker for a pretty face, so his IQ drops to the single digits whenever Weishan bats her lashes at him. And Weishan herself may be desperate and manipulative, but she's really not as ruthless as she acts. For example, she refused to kill the original Miss Yun, only gave Miss Jiang a light poison instead of something lethal, and framed the bride candidate whose health would suffer if she stayed in the Gong residence so she could leave. I can't wait for them to get closer and for Weishan to get attached to him for real (and then for the angst when he finds out what she is, of course).

The political intrigue and suspense are well done too, and every character has their own motivations. I want to know more about the other female assassin, the short-haired assassin (I think there have been some hints that he actually wanted to help/protect Weishan, not his own protégée), the former Sword Wielder's second wife (Lady Wuji), Young Master Yue, etc. At this point I think the assassination of Ziyu's father and brother was an inside job, but I'm not sure it was done by Shangjue and Yuanzhi. Who suck. But Shangjue *is* hot in a douchey way...

But Gong Zishang (Elder Young Mistress) is by far the best character. She steals every scene she's in, and I love Jin Fan's reactions to her antics. I'm rooting for these two.

There’s a Chinese proverb (also exists in Korean, I think) about how you can’t break a stone with an egg or something like that. I think it’s a reference to that.

Thank you for explaining, this clarifies it!

Thanks, I genuinely couldn't tell.

Just to check, when Solhee told Doha that Deukchan trusts him, she was lying, right? I can never get the truth and lie sounds right.

"OK, then die," is absolutely the right response to someone trying to manipulate you into not breaking up with them with threats of suicide. It's a very common tactic IRL too and I absolutely despise it.

Haven’t seen the new episode yet, but the CEO’s brother calls Seungjoo a killer to his face and behind his back, and the CEO acts supportive but keeps showing in small involuntary ways that he doesn’t actually believe in SJ’s innocence. Even if the brother is just being shitty on purpose to deflect attention, the CEO wouldn’t act like that if he actually knew who the real killer is IMO.

How can Syaon remain so annoying for so long? Someone smack this girl to bring her back to her senses! The CEO keeps enabling her by not being firm enough when she does outrageous shit. Which BTW, he is also getting on my nerves with how he's trying to control Seungjoo, and the mother (actually both mothers) obviously sucks too. The people around Seungjoo claim to care for him but treat him with complete disrespect for him as a person.

But Solhee's ex is kinda cool actually... The way he took her comment about thinking about another man on the chin and told her "that's because you like him, so go date him quickly and come back" made me look at him differently. But he deserves someone who will like him wholeheartedly, so he should get over SH instead of waiting for her.

The neighborhood goofs being exes was a nice little Easter egg.

That's fair. They could have retained LGBTQ characters/themes even if they took out that specific relationship. Good point.

Goblin sucks ass and is creepy too. I don't think it's romantic at all and I should hope it wouldn't get made today.

As for "why didn't they just change the protagonist's age," you're right that they could have done that and made the drama into a romance. I'm guessing the producers were more attracted to the premise of a grizzled gangster possessing a high schooler's body and navigating teenage life with the experience of a career criminal, and for that story to work, the age gap and gap in life experience is crucial.

So they were looking at the different stories they could tell by repackaging the original material and picked the one that didn't have a questionable romantic subplot. Sure, they probably didn't want to make a teen gay romance in the first place because the audience for that kind of drama would be smaller and they couldn't sign an actor like YCY for it, so homophobia played a part in their decision. But getting spitting mad that you won't be able to watch some old man in a teenager's body romance another teenager is just goofy. That's not a compelling premise in the first place!

There's no straight romance in this? They simply removed the creepy romance between a middle-aged man and a high schooler? If you want that kind of stuff, Wattpad is full of it, so calm down.

Not sure, sorry!