MadelineMaureen

TFF was rewritten by the male director to give it more trauma and extend a separation that NEVER happened in the source material. It was a weird choice for the development of the the characters & I'm still mad about it to this day. Also the fact they kept the exact dialogue from the novel without factoring in the 6 MONTHS verse the less than 5 hours no contact(she was on a damn plane TO HIM)....oh wow I am still truly not over this....Imma go touch some grass and brb.

OMG the double meaning conversations happening in episode 18 were so well done. Nice holds on expressions without over explaining. So the audience understands that they aren't just talking about poker. Good job director and good job actors. I still can't believe this is Wu Sheng(Yu Qiao)'s first performance. I don't know if he's been doing stage work or little indie things that wouldn't show up on here, but really looking forward to his future career if this is what we get right out of the gate.
"You folded too early." Shots fucking FIRED.

Spoiler section:
It doesn't matter what "hand" Yu Qiao has. It has never mattered what he has to offer Ying Tao romantically. Because Jiang Qiao Xi exists, it doesn't matter how he plays the "game" Jiang Qiao Xi will win and Yu Qiao will always lose.
When JQX left "folded his hand" it didn't matter because rules don't apply to JQX for Ying Tao. Just because JQX folded his hand doesn't mean Qiao Yu suddenly had a winning hand, he was just the last one left in the game.
Just because Yu Qiao is around Ying Tao doesn't mean she will love him like she does JQX and YQ KNOWS this. He can't stand to see Ying Tao in pain. He and Qin Ye Yun reall are so much alike. The way they would rather be in pain in silence as long as the person they love is happy.😭😭😭

Yeah, And that's being 18. He didn't want her to feel the need to "fix it" or change her plans because his plans had to change.
Communication could have been leaps and bounds better, but he is 18 trying to navigate a very adult situation and he doesn't want to tarnish her . I'm not sure he fully realizes WHAT his leaving does to her. I know he has to remember when she first came to the high school and those emotions. But he's 18 and there is A LOT happening with his cousin and cousin's family(that we don't know yet).
He knows her well enough to know that she would uproot her life at that time if she thought it would help him.

He knew before anything went wrong that he needed to become his own person. I think he could recognize his co-dependance on Ying Tao and how that could hurt her in the future if he wasn't able to fully stand on his own. But then his whole world that he was building crumbled around him and he was the only one left holding the beams to support the only family who do love and support his decisions.

She better get a few chest punches in when they finally do reconnect. I would love to see some begging/apologizing on his part as well. Cause 18 or not...homie saw what 6 years no contact did to her and then he caved and kissed her for one selfish moment.
I'm giving him this final bit of selfishness before going back to sacrifice his youth for his family(cousin who is kind and loving and all the good) things).

Yes, I run into most of the people I've dated because of my job and well, even though I live in a large city/college town it feels very small town most of the time. Literally just ran into another ex two days ago.
We are VERY different people now. I barely knew myself then. Reading old journal entries later on, I realized I was trying to fit into an image he wanted not who I really was.
He's happily married with a wife and kid.
I'm on good terms with all of my exs. It's big hugs and OMG your little ones are getting so big.

All the different friends' advice and perspectives are sooooo freaking valid. They all just want Ying Tao to be happy and at peace. Qin Ye Yun 100% knows her girl would be on the first flight she could book and can't let her fall into a search spiral in the middle of her first year of university. She isn't being cruel or mean spirited...she is genuinely concerned for Ying Tao's physical and mental health and knows that Jiang Qiao Xi is Ying Tao's Kryptonite.
Yu Qiao loves her and feels she has a right to know why Qiao Xi left her without a warning and stopped contacting her/all of them. He wants her to have answers...In the preview for episode 18 Yu Qiao is the one going searching. The fact he's willing to be the buffer shows that his care/friendship isn't conditional imo. Yeah he probably wants to hit the shit out of Qiao Xi for hurting Ying Tao, but he also cares what the hell happened to his friend. It's pretty much, I'll hide his whereabouts until I have all the information because aint no way I'm handing over a ticking time bomb to my friend and watching her self destruct.

Her dormmates are so sweet. They don't dismiss her love for Jiang Qiao Xi, but they do give her gentle reality checks from the perspective of someone a little older and aware of how the future goals can change peoples relationships. One even gives her a lovely explanation as to why he wouldn't want to be forgotten and how someone like the Jiang Qiao Xi, Ying Tao described would never forget her. The Edward Tulane reference had me in tears yall. They really are each other's touch stone. It's like as long as the other one exists they know that they themselves exist. So melodramatic, but I love it.

To add on, I feel like because I was the same age as the characters were in the year they are in I understand the mindset a bit more. It's not as frustrating to me as it appears some people are feeling towards decisions made by the leads.

Not me having an emotional flashback to breaking up with my first boyfriend in 08 right before starting my freshman year of University...like damn. I felt that "You're 18 don't talk about forever" in my SOUL.

Okay...so I don't know how it was in China, but text messages and calls cost money back in 08. If his family was struggling or HE was struggling financially texts and cross country phone calls would have been the first thing to stop. I don't know why email or social wasn't used, but hey idk. This was when myspace was king in the states and facebook was just becoming the norm. I don't know which socials were popular in China at this time.

the main 6 were born in 1990. The timeline as of episode 14 I believe is 2007/2008 so 17/18 years old. He(Qiao Xi) was born in January so I think he's the eldest of the friend group.

The main thing missing editing wise are transition scenes. But that could boil down to an artistic choice while filming rather than a post production choice because of lack of footage or time constraints to fit the 40 minute mark.
But the script was always 24 episodes long. They maybe shot 28 episodes worth of footage for wiggle room for editing and potential censorship cuts. The film shoot was not long enough for a 40 drama shoot. This isn't like 'Ski into Love' which DID have a substantial edit post filming with whole storylines being cut.

The reason I think it works for him is because the character had to grow up quickly. He's had more pressure and stress than the others around him. He is haunted by the ghost of his dead older brother and he carries the expectations and hopes and dreams of someone who isn't even there. I think it works because they are going to get the their 20s eventually and someone who is younger wont make that believable imo.

I'm thinking of the show "When the Time and Him are Just Right" they all looked WAY too young for anything post year 2 of college. Of even with Mai Mai's show "A Little Thing Called First Love" they were playing older than they were and it was noticeable, at least to me.
"The Glory" was the worst offender in casting someone closer to 40 than 20 to play the older half-sister of the FL. It didn't help that the character acted like a 11 year old going through puberty.

Take all of this with a heavy grain of salt as I'm 35 and am seeing these actors and their portrayals through a much different lens than someone who is in their teens or twenties. I'm just saying why it works for me.

There first child would have died in the 80s as Qiao Xi was born in 1990...so therapy wasn't even considered then.
Side tangent: I didn't even realized that the son was 13 when he died. So at minimum his parents should be in their late 40s early 50s when he's in high school. So they would be a decade or more older than all the other parents of the kids too.

I personally only think of a love triangle as a love triangle if the people in it are aware of the feelings and struggling to chose between two different people.

The closest love triangle in this one the "third" (Yu Qiao) is barely acknowledging his own feelings toward his childhood friend(Ying Tao), and she's completely oblivious to his potential interest as she continues to try and set him up with the other girl bestie in the friend group(Qin Ye Yun). So it's giving Midsummer Night's Dream. Where two people obviously love each other and a guy is interested but he has another girl following him around waiting for him to notice her.

Then you have the leech(Cen Xiao Man) trying to force her way into Qiao Xi's life. He can't stand her and barely tolerates her presence so I can't consider her when thinking love triangle. She interferers with his life, but his feelings never faulter.

The show 'Always Home' had a whole ass love square in it that was on a whole other level of mix and match. Girl 1 ---> Guy 1 ---> Girl 2 ---> Guy 2 ---> Girl 1. It ended with Girl 1 <---> Guy 1; Guy 2 <---> Girl 3, Girl 2....?

I haven't looked at Viki's translations yet. Not gonna lie I truly and utterly miss translator notes or (t/n:) in my subtitles. fansubs always enriched the viewers knowledge of the culture/language. They would define a word like a title for example Oppa/GeGe or Nuna(Noona various English spellings) etc & then use the Korean/Chinese/Japanese word instead of an English substitute which half the time is wrong...or god forbid they use the character's name instead of the word that was actually used to show character relationship context...looking directly at you Netflix...you know what you've done. Anytime something is translated to English when it comes from a country that has different respect levels in linguistics oh boy...puts me on edge.

Alternative title...Our Generational Trauma.....I hope he ghosts his mother so hard.

It was always supposed to be 24 episodes or around 24 episodes based on rumored script length. But editing and censorship process can sometimes cut down footage so they probably filmed enough footage for like 28 episodes. But it was 100% never going to be 40 episodes long. Just based off of length of filming alone.

Okay so maybe I'm weird, but I thought it started in episode 1....that boy was head over heels on that mountain when lil homie gave his name meaning. "My favorite color is red." he says to the girl named CHERRY.
If you mean physical romance...episode 15.

I think episode 15/16 are the transition episodes. So episode 1-2 elementary/middle school years. Episodes 3-14 high school years...15 end of senior year...16-? college.

The block button is my bestie anytime I'm watching one of Zhang Ling He's dramas or Mai Mai's dramas. Their popularity makes their dramas easy targets for people who lack attention and access to real life grass and fresh air to breath. Block them and live in peace. They are like roaches and pop back up under different accounts, but that block button is infinite and free.

It's going to cover short periods of time over decades from under 10 to in their 20s...I don't know if the novel/story goes into their 30s or not. Can't remember when it was published/written. But the main characters were born in 1990.