TDevil

Obviously, the elephant in the room is Qing Ci magically being cured off screen when the producers have been screaming “there’s no cure!” into our ears for the past 10 episodes.

Then there’s Wen Si Yuan, who got 2 minutes of screen time in the entire episode. They spent half of that hinting that he died off screen. The very next scene flashes forward 5 years. Surprise! Dropping a bombshell that he got magically saved, again, off screen. I have no idea what purpose those two scenes were supposed to serve in the episode. They accomplished nothing.

And there’s just little complaints here and there. Not a fan of how pathetic they made the evil marquis in the final episode when he had been built up as this untouchable and intimidating villain the whole drama. The master plan they had been hyping up for 3 episodes was basically concluded by a small argument in the imperial court. Zhu Yan’s death pretty dumb, and we never get to see Yun Luo reunite with her master who I guess just ceased to exist. Overall, the last episode had more holes than a Beggar Sect’s collective rags

I’m going to have to offer a differing opinion here. I’ve listed some of the biggest problems I’ve had with the final episode in the spoilers below.

IMO, it’s not enough to just say “look at how many bad final episodes are out there, that means this drama’s was good”. The finale was undeniably disappointing in its own right. There were way too many loose ends that were inadequately explained off screen.

It’s really just a simple fact that they ran out of time. And yet, instead of thoroughly explaining anything, they decided to spend another 5 whole minutes of screen time on flashbacks, half of which were literally repeated in the ending song a few seconds later.

This drama tries WAY too hard to live up to its telling as this dark and tragic drama by constantly inserting unnecessary angst and killing off a character every three episodes. I still have no idea what was the point of Xie Li and Zhu Yan's deaths. Especially Xie Li, like come on man, this dude was up walking around, drinking wine, and chatting up his buddy Su Xuan after supposedly suffering a fatal injury. Him dying literally did nothing to progress the plot.

Spoilers lol. But yeah, it was extremely rushed. First 30 episodes would've been a 10/10, but after finishing the drama on a disappointing note, it's probably a 8.5/10 for me now.

Yeah, they do, but with an extremely unsatisfactory arc. They showed up for like a grand total of 30 seconds and I'm still left confused hours later about what purpose they served in the final episode. The drama just completely ran out of screen time on the final episode and Wen Si Yuan and Man Qing's part got reduced to pure narration to explain what happened. I'm nowhere as big of a fan as you of those two and even I'm infuriated over how dirty they were done.

Honestly, I'd still recommend finishing it because episodes 39-42 were absolutely amazing. You just gotta shake your head and go with the ending though. Pity, because even just one more episode could've done this drama wonders.

Lol it just goes to show when I've totally forgotten about Su Xuan until you mentioned him.

I have no idea how Chinese dramas can put out 40-50 episodes and still fail to write a complete drama like this. It's honestly so infuriating. I guess they're just too busy investing hours into having the main leads play the cat-and-mouse game to spice up some angsty romance.

I can understand the emperor part though. This drama was pretty consistent in showing the Shi Ming, despite being a weak emperor, typically had noble intentions. Removing the imperial court bully should in theory rebalance the powers and allow Shi Ming to thrive as an emperor. Plus, Ai was already a monk by the time they found him. I don't think there was any chance of him getting back on the throne.

Right? The only thing worse than a tragic ending is a forced happy ending, it just leaves you feeling so empty outside. I was really hoping for Yun Luo and Qing Ci to live happily ever after, but that wasn't the way to accomplish it.

We were explicitly told that there is NO cure for Qing Ci's condition and that he would die in 10 days, yet there he is, alive after 5 years, without any explanation. Any time you have to assume anything, it's just bad storytelling.

And that's not a good excuse to have a weak finale. I've seen dozens of historical Chinese dramas that finished stronger. This was a big let down.

Agreed. Not really sure what happened there at the end.

The conclusion was absolutely awful. There were too many loose threads to tie, so we just ended up with a rushed half-assed ending where everything was explained by a quick narrative at the end.

What in the world was the last episode? What happened on Wen Si Yuan's end of the finale? How the hell did Qing Ci cure himself of the poison? How come the grand master plan they had been building up for two entire episodes was concluded by a 10 minute argument in the imperial court? I can't believe they wasted 3 whole episodes on the whole nonsensical Qing Ci poisoning Yun Luo arc just so that they could run out of screen time and just completely ruin the ending of such a beautiful drama like that.

Depends on which part you're on? Episodes 31-34 are definitely the absolute low point of this drama. I haven't watched the final two episodes yet, but it definitely starts trending upwards from there until it gets back to the flawless writing from the first 30 episodes.

Wow, kudos to the writers of this drama for capitol arc in episodes 39-41. After the incredibly draggy and infuriating romance arc, the writers sent the drama right back on track and returned it to the heights of the first 30 episodes. The suspense and plot building was absolutely flawless, and man did the emotional scenes hit home. Hell, they were able to make a 5 minute scene where the main leads sat around doing nothing but waiting absolutely nerve-wracking just with the tense atmosphere and impeccable music choice. Let's hope they can ride this momentum into the final 2 episodes and finish out the drama in a blaze of glory.

But we don't know that Jin Xu is a target of Qing Ci. The drama's never established this. Sure, Jin Xu is an "ally" of Weining Hou, but everyone knows that their relationship is about as strong as toilet paper. Weining Hou can't mobilize the 5 sects because Jin Xu would never listen to him anyways. The only reason why Qing Ci allowed the Lang Wei to escape would be because he wants Wei Ning Hou to wipe out the Zheng Yang Sect, and the drama's never indicated that Qing Ci would have any reason to want this.

Thanks for the thorough response.

I still don't understand why Qing Ci needed to spare Shen's helper though to report back to Wei Ning Hou. Jin Xu wasn't his target to begin with, so Qing Ci had no reason to stab him in the back like that. Plus, he totally didn't account for the possibility of Jin Xu finding out about his betrayal. This would've completely wrecked his masterplan if it weren't for a little deus ex machina with the Emperor's assistant magically finding Ai.

And yeah, I agree on the poisoning Yin Luo part being an overkill. He could've easily just handed Su Xuan the poison himself, then tied up Yun Luo (which he did anyways) and knocked her out with a drug for a few days. This could've easily been accomplished while she was asleep after the night they spent together. Like what's the point of having her run back to her master, and then drag her back and tie her up? Really just a plot device to insert unnecessary angst.

"I don't know what happened after episode 30, but it feels like another writer took over or something and the drama doesn't have the same flow as it did the first 2/3."

This is exactly how I feel and I've been very vocal about it on this page. Personally for me, it was more of an episodes 31-33 problem, because 34-36 were much better written once they started shifting the focus back onto the wuxia story. The problem of course was needing to close out those horrible plot threads and die on the hill that those disastrous 3 episodes conceived.

Why did Qing Ci need to help Jin Xu "kill" Su Xuan then? He could have easily killed Official Shen without conspiring with Jin Xu, and he was able to find Emperor Ai on his own. The only possible reason I could think of is maybe that was the only way to get close to Jin Xu.

In hindsight, the whole "poisoning Yun Luo to poison her master" arc was completely pointless. Everything could've easily proceeded without it, and Su Xuan didn't even die by the poison. Just seems like a stupid plot device to drive conflict between Yun Luo and Qing Ci.

Why did Qing Ci spare the one Lang Wei so that she could return and report to the evil marquis? Jin Shu would've been willing to hand him Emperor Ai as part of their agreement if it weren't for that happenstance.

Yeah, the way they had built up Yun Luo over the first 30 episodes made her one of my favorite historical female leads ever. They did her so dirty over the last 3 episodes though, it was just maddening to watch. Hate that Qing Ci did a completely reversal too from somewhat obsessive and straightforward (which I loved about him) to a noble idiot.

Right? While I'm thankful that episode 34 gets a lot better and pulls the drama back on track, I still have no idea why the writers thought it'd be a good idea to just completely drop the story to have a "romance only" section focused on nothing but introducing conflict. After the last 3 episodes, I'm going to pull my hair out if I see another "tear dramatically trickles down character's face as love interest walks away in slow motion with dramatic music blasting in the background" scene for the rest of the year.