MarkWasHere

Sigh. ANOTHER Chinese drama romanticising sexual assault. We even get fireworks during the assault - how romantic.

I'm happy to agree to disagree. I will confess I am triggered when I see, what I perceive to be, a male mistreating a female, and that influences my assessment of him. My assessment may have been a little harsh, but I think yours is overly generous and forgiving. Perhaps the truth is somewhere in the middle? Anyway, thank you for the courteous conversation and I wish you happy drama watching.

I agree that both Luke and Flora are imperfect, but the degree to which they are imperfect is not comparable. In my judgement, Luke's imperfections are far, far, FAR more worse than Flora's. His behaviour is often genuinely toxic. He's controlling and abusive and narcissistic and obnoxious. Flora is none of these things. Her fault is that she isn't as communicative as she should be in a relationship.

Thanks. I'll check it out.

This drama was certainly well made, with high production values and excellent acting. However, the plot was problematic for me. Basically I found my self, for the first time ever, actually hating one of the lead characters.
Luan Nian (Luke) is a narcissistic, immature, inconsiderate, selfish, abusive, petty, jealous, manipulative, entitled and obnoxious bully. He entered into what I would describe as a "friends with benefits" relationship with a Flora, much younger employee, and then proceeded to insult, emotionally abuse and embarrass her almost non-stop for the majority of the drama. He never asked what she wanted, never had any empathy for her situation and never showed even the slightest hint that he had any respect for her as a person. He dominated her, bossed her around and controlled her. He told her what she should wear and who she should socialise with. It was the very definition of an emotionally abusive relationship. Some of this abusive behaviour was even romanticised in the drama, which I suspect may reflect the patriarchal norms that exist in China. Sadly Flora was unwilling or unable (or both) to do anything other than tolerate the mistreatment. That is, until she finally snapped and broke up with him.
Even in the final episodes when Luke decides that he really does "love" flora (to which I call bullshit because none of his behaviour was consistent with actually being in love), he still disrespected and manipulated her, continuing to pursue her after she very clearly told him to stop (which is sexual harassment), repeatedly turned up unannounced at her door after she told him not to (which is stalking) and just generally ignored her wishes and prioritised his own desires. Of course the drama romanticised this as well, and he soon got her back into bed.
There was a big, elaborate proposal scene in the final episode which I guess was supposed to erase all his previous toxic behaviour, but in my mind is was far too little, far too late to redeem him. If they get married, unless Luke has an entire personality transplant, I cannot see any chance that their "relationship" would be happy or successful in the long term.

By "criminal", I meant it broke a criminal law. I don't think there would be any law in China that made any of Luke's behaviours illegal. If there was such laws, then there would be no need for Lime to have a policy against employee dating. Whereas Dony did indeed break laws and ended up in prison as a result.

They do get back together, but I'm not so sure that is a happy ending because their relationship is so utterly dysfunctional.

I'm watching episode 21 and Luke is still acting like a piece of shit. Flora has just had the worst day of her life with her best friend committing suicide and her being robbed of the award that was rightly hers. She was understandably emotional and she vented her frustrations to Luke, including pointing out CORRECTLY some of his toxic behavioural flaws, as well as the significant difficulties she's had over the last six years. Did he try to comfort her? Did her show her one scrap of empathy or understanding? No, instead in insulted her (for the millionth time this drama) and criticised her and demanded that she calm down. He raised his voice at her (for the millionth time this drama), angrily chastising her and warned her that his patience was wearing thin. He also refused to correct her misunderstanding that he supported the decision to unfairly award the award to the other candidate. Only a sociopath who is unable to feel empathy would do these things. He is truly a piece of shit.
So, I'm not so sure it is only the first few episodes.

Rookie actresses don't get CGI spent on them. There would be hundreds of rookie actresses willing to bare pretty much everything to kickstart a career in the Korean drama industry. The CGI budget is for A-list actors who are popular enough to make people want to watch the drama. Viewers don't care who the support actors are, so why would the makers of the show allocate budget to protect the modesty of an unknown rookie actress? If the actress cast in the role doesn't want to show her tits, they just replace her with one of the hundreds of other rookie actresses who will.

Netflix pays a lot better than independent films do, and he gets his money no matter how well the show does.

I thought lawyers were supposed to be smart and good at reading people. Ran's mother could tell her that the moon is made out of cheese and Ran would believe her. It's exhausting watching Ran getting so easily manipulated by her manipulative bitch of a mother.

On an unrelated note, I see you have "My Mister" as one of your very few perfect 10 dramas. If you look at my MDL list, you'll see I'm the same. In case you're not aware, but there is a Chinese remake of "My Mister" that is, in my opinion every bit as good as the Korean original, and in some regards, even better. If you loved the original, you will probably also love the remake.

I agree the Korean original was a masterpiece, but I thought this Chinese version was just as good, and in some regards, even better.

The Korean version is a masterpiece, but I will admit that it took me two attempts to watch it. While the Chinese version has a lower MDL score, in my opinion it is just as good as the Korean original, and in some regards it is better.

In recent years, Nana has made a concerted effort to change her image into a more seductive or sexy image. Her recent fashion shoots heavily lean into sexy. Also, this is not her first nude scene - she had a fully nude scene (only viewed from the back) in the drama "Mask Girl" and she went on social media to clarify that the scene was her and not a body double. When I saw that Nana had accepted the role in this drama about a year ago, I strongly suspected that she would be baring all for this role. To be frank, there would probably not be another A-list actress in South Korea who would perform such a scene.

Episode 7 in particular?

You are probably thinking of the sex scene with Kim Ji An. When I saw that scene, I thought the character looked about 15 years old, but the actress playing the role is actually 25. To many Westerners, Asians tend to look younger than they actually are.

Exactly! He's an immature, petty, jealous, narcissistic, controlling, manipulative bully. But he's pretty and he's rich, so he gets a pass.

It is true that both Dony and Luke sexually harassed Flora. However, the severity of their harassment isn't comparable. Luke's behaviour was unethical, whereas Dony's behaviour was criminal.

I've just watched episode 17, which is 4 years into their "relationship". That is the episode where Shang Zhi Tao tells Luan Nian that she'd like to be married and have a child, and Luan Nian dismisses the idea.
But pretty much everything I've seen in their "relationship" up to now is a red flag. It is dysfunctional on almost every level. It seems to me that the ONLY thing their "relationship" has got going for it is the intense physical attraction they have for each other. I'm still hopeful for some character growth from both of them, especially from Luan Nian, and I've got 7 more episodes for that to happen, but I'm not optimistic.