L13

I'm still on episode 5, so my comment may be invalidated by the time I catch up on all available episodes, but I'm really not getting the sense that Gao Jun is white-knighting for his first love like your average kdrama SML. It's true he has photos of Zhenzhen from school that he's kind of obsessed with, but he's very calm and calculating in his interactions with her, sometimes makes insulting assumptions about her that show he's not putting her on a pedestal (like when he thought she'd bought the luxury watch for herself with money she was hiding) & in general seems cold and hard to read.

I think the fact he was 'chubby' and unpopular in school may come up later to explain some of his motivations. Remember when Su Wen was shocked by his appearance and GJ was like, 'Well, I wasn't popular enough for you to notice me in school'? Awkward! He definitely has unresolved issues that go back to their school days, but they seem less likely to stem from a childhood crush he's still fixated on than pent-up resentment perhaps. He told Zhenzhen he and Xu Youning were good friends, but is that really true? Wouldn't she remember him if that were the case? I suspect there was more to GJ and XYN's relationship (bullying?) and perhaps GJ approached Zhenzhen after XYN's death with some ulterior motive. Also Su Wen said GJ was rumoured to have posted a giant embarrassing love letter online in their school days, but a. was that really him and b. was it addressed to Zhenzhen? The latter was never actually stated explicitly.

There's definitely more to this than 'I was obsessed with you in school even though you didn't know who I was and I'm still in love with you 15 years later'... which I'm very happy about because all these first-love stories are boring and unrealistic to me.

I mean, Sou did tell him it was okay, then they lost touch, so their status as best friends is kind of questionable, and Minato waited years before he started dating Tsumugi. I don't think "dating someone your best friend in school whom you haven't spoken to in years dated back in the day" is quite as bad as dating your best friend's ex.

This drama WILL be the sexy romantic thriller I've been waiting for with a scumbag ML who falls for the woman he's trying to con and gets his life wrecked and it WILL be fun and dark and full of tension sexual and otherwise, I am MANIFESTING this for myself!!!

I watched the first 6 episodes, but I don't think I'm going to continue. The premise feels kind of pointless; Daqian's relationship with Lizi is not different enough in the parallel timeline from what it's like in the original timeline to justify the timeline hopping shenanigans, and Lizi himself is not a very interesting or charismatic male lead. And there's no plot? Like, the whole drama so far is just Daqian's bumpkin family and friends being loud and annoying?

You could get a calendar or a planner and put the stuff you want to do after you come out on it!

Eh, no, I still feel bad for him. He was put in an impossible situation from the start.

There is more than enough time to wrap up the plot in 10 episodes lol. That's 11 hours and a half.

I'm only at the beginning of episode 6, but I feel so bad for Physician Kwon.

I see, I get what you're saying now! I didn't get the same vibe, but I understand what you mean.

I think I'd be quite repulsed and outraged if I walked in on someone who seemed otherwise sane and functional hugging the corpse of a stranger and talking to it. And then trying to explain to me that they're not doing anything bad, but I should keep it a secret and leave them alone? Yeah, I'd be freaking out if I had to live in the same house as that person too. Physical intimacy with a corpse, which is what that scene looked like from KTH's perspective, is not just "something strange" but deeply taboo.

His reaction did not seem off to me at all and playing it for laughs or having him shrug it off without confronting BDJ would have been super weird. In fact, what's most unrealistic about it is how quickly he started to doubt his initial response just because BDJ mentioned the bridge where the dead woman's husband went.

What is Haemi trying to achieve by following Youngyi and Kyungjoon everywhere to make sure they're never alone together lmao. This isn't high school; you're their boss! You just look weird and are making other people uncomfortable. Get your act together.

I’m really liking the main characters’ interactions so far. Every scene they share together is charged. Also it’s good IMO there’s not too much fantasy, action, CGI, buddy comedy, etc. in favour of a focus on quieter human stories, including the protagonists’ lives.

Thank you!

Yes. The current crown prince is her son and she has four more sons (grand princes, i.e. sons of the queen as opposed to princes, who are sons of concubines).

Because of certain developments, it becomes clear to the queen that the crown prince's position is precarious and if he loses his title, not only will she be pushed out of the palace by the king's mother, but also her other children will probably be in danger. The various concubines in the palace are now trying to put their sons forward as potential successors to the crown prince.

(In historical reality, however, a queen with five healthy legitimate sons would have been undefeatable in the palace and not even the queen dowager could have touched her because of the strong preference for legitimate princes in the line of succession. In this drama, the position of the queen and her sons is weaker than it would have been in reality.)

I'm not familiar with the original webtoon, so could someone who is please tell me whether Shin Hyun-bin's character is supposed to be good or one of the villains (or somewhere in between)? Also, is there any romance in the webtoon?

I'm pretty sure she realises the grandmother is capable of anything. It was implied in her conversation with the deposed queen that the queen dowager was the one who killed the previous crown prince (Taeil? Taein? anyway).

She just hasn't said it out loud that she's afraid her eldest son will also be killed because it won't help. She'll just be treated as someone who's stirring trouble for no reason and it may give the queen dowager the ammunition she needs to push her out of the palace.

OMG

Bogeom won because he's the best student among the three, and also because he was most balanced during the debate.

The examiners were not huge fans of Seongnam's outspoken advocacy for commoners. Some of them also disapproved of his answers in the first examination, though he found champions for both his solution to the half-moon problem (the king liked it) and his construction planning response that went beyond the required material to talk about the workers' lives and needs (one of the tutors whose identity I'm forgetting happened to see that one after another examiner had already given it the worst possible grade). Clearly Seongnam's opinions, although they seem well-argued and principled to us, are too radical for many of the stuffy statesmen involved in the selection process.

Uiseong, on the other hand, may be just a bit too stupid/bloodthirsty to impress them. He has the political backing to do well, but I think Seongnam's verbal smackdown of his idea to burn the quarantined village with the villagers still inside it succeeded in making Uiseong look unsuitable in the eyes of undecided voters.

Which left Bogeom, who didn't take a one-sided position either way, which would have alienated some of the examiners, and is very good at academics. He was a good consensus candidate and it makes sense that a conservative body put off by princes with strong opinions would go for him.

All that said, there have been some signs already that the king is impressed by Seongnam, so I expect him to become Seongnam's backer in the future.

He's a great person and I also hope he doesn't die, but I think the drama is setting up Seongnam as the person who actually has what it takes to become king. Not only does he have regard for the common people, as a couple of his confrontations with Prince Uiseong have shown—like when he told Uiseong not to insult the palace servants and when he said you can't just burn sick people to end a plague—but also he has a streak of determination and resourcefulness that none of his gentle siblings possess, presumably because he had to lead a pretty harsh life outside the palace at some point.

That said, I agree the crown prince is a nice, smart and upstanding guy! In Korean historical dramas, however, the flawless crown prince always ends up dead.

Indifferent. He cares about his duties and is well-intentioned, but he doesn't see what's in front of him and has no interest in his wife, concubines or for the most part his children.