Skibbies

transmigration/time travel trope. It's clearer once you watch more since he has very modern ideals and knowledge. I think the way they got around it is really clever, especially since clashing of modern values vs fedual (?) values is central theme of the story.

omg i thought i replied rip. I actually like this drama's scheming more than NiF's, since the opponents are also very smart, and things tend to go wrong for protagonists more than you expect. The emperor in this is probably one of my favourite.

THAT said, this drama click with far less people compared with NiF, so don't worry if it doesn't work for you. You could also technically skip to just Ni Ni's scenes, I liked her character a lot even if the writing is comparatively lackluster when it involves her, which is a shame.

I'm a binge kind of person too haha. I've gotten so annoyed with certain US shows that should have ended 5 seasons ago but didn't, or it had foreshadowed big plot but was promptly cancelled. Season wouldn't have worked for this drama, since I think it just wouldn't get seasons renewed, and scheduling conflict would be a big issue.

oh yeah entirely understandable, especially since political scheming can get pretty serious or just tiring. While I actually really like romance, I find cdramas scriptwriters not very good at them half the time, or they overuse certain tropes that really annoy me, so I actually super appreciated when romance are a side thing since if they aren't great, it's ok to ignore them. I know I'm in the minority though.
Oh yeah the episode count is a lot, I used to think 40 ep are forever, now I'm happy to see them. If it helps, the first arc is about 15 ep? There's been discussion that it might work better if cdramaland could support seasons, since the mini arcs can be split like that.

<3 I'm glad that I encouraged someone to watch this, since it's definitely flawed and quite a hard sell.

The romance is what I call central to otp's characterisation and why a lot of people like it for, but it is not the focus. The focus is on political scheming, sort of like Nirvana in Fire if you've seen that. It's also fairly different in terms of portraying romance, there's not much outward affection, there's no proper kiss! I did like what little there was though, and the chemistry was off the chart for me.

You can stop at around ep 45 for happy ending, but the next arc features most fluff AND also suffered the most cut, which is a shame. Personally I liked the drama up till about 55 due to the cast' excellent performance but that leaves you with a sad ending too. The writing itself is still mostly okay after that until 64 where it completely collapse on itself. The novel have a happy ending after a similar ending like the drama if that helps, although the characterisations and dynamic are very different.

I love the drama so so much, from the cast to the production team to general themes, but oof the writing and pacing. Oh yeah, the pacing is also fairly slow, so it might take a while to get into so uhhh yeah. Ni ni did an excellent job here and I really liked her character. There's also not that much romance tbh.

there's more, the drama only covers challenge's league, they end up in official pro league so there's lots more. I recommend starting from the beginning too, and skip things you find too technical.

The novel is pretty different, especially later on, since several supporting characters' personality and story was changed. The novel is also much more gaming focus, and can get fairly technical. The drama doesn't cover a lot of events and pro league section is completely unadapted, so I think it's worth a read, the novel is very very long though.

They built a lot of the sets (Jin Ling's for example is very noticeable), most of the indoor scenes would have been sets. I think they filmed the outdoor scenes (the waterfalls for example) in Guizhou province, I'm not sure about the exact place though.

Naive happy go lucky hardworking girl who struggles to make it in a big city, not super interesting but probably bit more likeable than the other two you've seen but could still be annoying (I liked her in AoL but not in GGS). The series is pretty interesting since it's rare to find cdramas focused on women, I have minor issues with it but it's overall pretty unique drama.

It's a popularity award and she had 4 hit dramas in the last 3 years (Ode to Joy and its sequel+two you mentioned) soooo yeah.

@mizuharaaya: her equivalent role (same production company, better director) would be 2014 Battle of Changsha's, it's just older, before her big break and more serious/depressing since it's set in war times.

go in with low expectation and keep in mind that it's very different from the novel and you should be golden. The first third is reasonably close to the novel, then it turns pretty different. I think the drama managed to keep the core spirit pretty well and manage to be engaging and fun while friendly to non-gamers and newcomers, which is honestly pretty difficult for such a long novel with high barrier of entry.

they are actually supposed to be the same, it used to be different, but they changed it last year? the year before? the process could be different though. but then again, Go Go Squid had to change esport to hacking competition, and The KIng's Avatar gave up broadcasting on TV to keep the esport aspect, so who knows.

mostly, it's just the romance is not overt or outright stated. you technically can't have teenage (high school) romance, but there's all these youth dramas with couples practically going out, but they never actually say it, and it's fine. it's still utterly surprising how MUCH the production team manage to slip in.

She's definitely much more idealistic compared to Ning Yi cos of how she grew up, but I don't think she was dumb. She was actually more irritating in the beginning because she had no context of what's going on (certain situations in first 15 episodes). She was fairly in sync with Ning Yi till ep 50ish, they disagreed on how to go about making the empire better or defeating the enemies but I actually like that part. She was overwhelmed with blood feud but still fairly understanding of Ning Yi till ep 63. As for the ending arc, the idea was she blamed herself for every death that was related to her, I don't particularly like part of her personality but it's been that way the entire drama.

Their initial big clash was over the fact he believed she caused death of his subordinate (ep 15 ~ 20ish), they both have pretty sound reason for why they did what they did, although you could say Zhiwei was bit too trusting and rash, I think she learnt to be more careful later. Then it's ep 22ish over Crown Prince and the princess, which is again clashing of ideals. I don't remember big conflicts during Second Prince & Minhai arc. I think the whole situation with her mum is pretty understandable too.

I'm not defending that last arc though, the chain of events is just really bad writing, and it's clear they were piling on misunderstanding to push her over the edge.

Just noting it's not actually a spin-off, it does use similar concepts but they are common in xianxia. The sets and directing style does look similar cos the production team is the same.

@hhtahsin: I genuinely doubt it. Sequels are generaly in minority in cdramas, because often the source doesn't have a sequel and writing from scratch is too much hassle/risky.

@Linda_KD: This is how the book ends too, the author wrote what amounts to beginning of an epic, and have yet to continue it. For Princess Agent, the source novel was way too long, and the production team just bombed in adapting it.

NRTA is actually proposing 40 episode limit, which I think is for the best, unless it's an actual epic, like Qin Empire or Romance of Three Kingdoms. Anyways, for this drama, I was definitely wary of the episode count. but after watching it, it actually could use more episodes due to pacing. If you think 70 ep is too intimidating, I say try going for 15 episodes at a time, there's mini arcs and you can totally think of them as seasons :P

Netflix updated their subs I believe? Not sure if weTV have yet.

Hey, appreciate you guys subbing for non-chinese speaking fans. Just want to give you a heads up that the King's Avatar discord (associated with the TKA reddit) have someone subbing the episodes too. Perhaps you can contact them and split the workload?

PYHOMS is very much a drama you watch while winding down or something. Historical, maybe Nirvana in Fire? the Rise of Phoenixes (on netflix)? Young Blood? Love & Destiny?

I was going to try rec'ing dramas but you have some quality plan to watch. I say go back a couple of years and dig. I think if you have 30mins to kill, it's easier to pick a nice school drama or fluff drama than continue this lol.