PeachBlossomGoddess

Li Shimin is relieved to see Changge safe and sound. She says as long as she has not caught her mother's killer she will stay alive. She tells him to keep a distance from her mother's memorial altar; is he not afraid of karma? A hypocrite like him is not worthy to be there. And that one day she will kill him. Li Shimin tells her that she is a child he raised himself, he knows what kind of person this child of his is. He looks approvingly at A'Sun and says they are a good match. Now that there is someone to protect her, her mother will also be relieved.
Wei Zheng tells the story of how a very capable young general (must be Li Shimin before his father seized the throne) rescued a beautiful young girl. The general had many military successes. Unfortunately while he was away at another campaign, his older brother got drunk and mistook that girl (must be Changge's mom) for his concubine.
It was playing very fast but that is the gist of it.

I agree it is a really tired trope but both roles are so well acted I can go with it. I actually find Mimi and Muji more annoying bc I feel that the Mimi role in general is not well acted so I can't empathise with her. Similarly think Khatun role is also badly acted, probably the weakest performance in the whole cast so I am really struggling with her parts I just want to FF.

You mean that magnificent mustache doesn't rock your world???

Unfortunately I think if they wanted to give us satisfying character development they could have wrote about one of his brothers, who were much more outstanding than Wei Shuyu or used a fictional character. So I am not hopeful this character goes anywhere but he did improve a little bit IMHO.

Yes of course, and I think it is important they didn't name Hao Du or Leyan on an actual historical figure.

Wei Shuyu was a true historical figure known to be a disappointment as he lacked his famous father's talent and ended up with a mediocre career. He was once engaged to one of Li Shimin's daughters but he fell out of favor so the marriage was cancelled.
Li Shimin married a different daughter to Du Ruhui's son but that son helped Li Chengqian try to overthrow Li Shimin and was executed. That is hopefully NOT the son Hao Du is modeled on but at this point I am a bit more worried about Hao Du and Leyan's long term future than Wei Shuyu who is not being dealt a raw deal by the scriptwriter, he is a sheep in sheep's clothing.

oh wow, it looks like this was really shot at Wudang, a UNESCO heritage site:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HbxIduacogo&t=17s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iW66nTkM44U

NIF is a masterpiece but I would not consider it fast paced. That said, kiddie Wu Lei stole the heart of an entire nation in that drama. The other one you can consider is Joy of Life, which is fast paced and hilarious.

This is a spoiler. Please tag it.

You could check out Secrets of the Three Kingdoms. Its the same scriptwriter who likes to weave dramas into histories with a twist.

Both FLs are very well written and showed courage and strength in different ways.

OMG borrowing some names is the least of it... there are so many clearly Jin Yong inspired parts in this its ridiculous (drinking snake blood, the way the parents died etc). This was one of his later works from the 1980s when Heaven Sword etc were already huge hits. So to be fair, I think it would have been impossible to write about Wudang without pretty much adopting what Jin Yong wrote about Wudang and their founders and martial arts as canon.

LOL - I am about there too but I thought I would continue at least until he loses the crazy hair and see if he grows up a bit.

Where did you get up to? I am also not sure if I should continue.

Different writers but they were contemporaries. They all tended to write about the same few sects but maybe focused on different periods in history.

They are popular Chinese dramas that were also popular overseas.

I think Longest Day in Changán, Yanxi Palace, The Untamed and The Story of Minglan were other recent Chinese dramas that did very well overseas. Although it is a bit older now, I think Nirvana in Fire was one of the earliest big hits, it has even been dubbed in English and a few other languages.

Fingers crossed we will get there soon... HK/Singapore travel bubble from May 26 is a great first step. And you know its FOMO, once one or two places start to open, every govt wants to open as well to get the tourist $$$...

I must admit I am dying to visit the Wudang site - it looks like it is indeed an ancient Chinese mountain temple and not something they constructed just for this drama.

Yes and indeed this ability to be simple about all these supposedly profound manuscripts is the core reason for among others, Guo Jing's martial arts skills as well but I got it that the dude is simple by episode 4, I don't need them to waste another 15/16 episodes driving that simple fact home to me. And as much as I loved Jin Yong, Guo Jing was my least favorite hero, even Hu Ge's portrayal could not make me like that character.