Thank you for trying, but yikes.
This series represents the quandary of ascribing merit for attempt rather than result.
Is it amazing that Meet You At The Blossom got made at all? Yes.
Does that necessarily make it good? No.
Should it be watched regardless, to ensure more projects like this are made? ...That one's up to you.
For me, Meet You At The Blossom is a strange artifact. I'm not familiar with the novel, but I can see other media influences pulling this production this way and that. It feels as if the show hesitated about being too much of one thing or the other, and as such, never commits to anything with appropriate effort. Nowhere is this more evident than the very extreme split in tone between the first half (Gender-Bender Wuxia Rom-Com) and the latter half (Political Betrayal-Laden Wuxia Tragedy). There's also a lot of intense subject matter that they straight up refuse to deal with in meaningful ways, which makes it hard to respect the effort. Why include things if you don't want address them?
The twelve hour run time is, frankly, insufficient for the political backstory and the relationship and the fallout. Also, the presence of quite so many characters. You can see them thinking that they're going to be like The Untamed, with all this world-building and different dudes with different takes on the political situation, and yet none not enough air time is spent on the range of characters to make it anything but a waste. At the same time they tip their hats to the BL world where trope-laden writing abounds and every five paces there's another potential couple, but none of them are developed enough to be anything more than a curiosity on the sideline. Female characters? In short supply and are objects acted upon. Lurking darkness, tragic health situations and mental unwellness like Word of Honor? Present, but not quite addressed. Not taken to an extreme to make it worthwhile.
Over all, focus was constantly pulled from where it should have been: Zongzheng Huai En and Jin Xiao Bao's relationship. They only spent six episodes establishing it amongst the gobs of backstory and cast, and half of what we saw is subterfuge, lies, and general mistaken-identity goofiness. Very little sincere connection. There simply isn't enough emotional foundation to carry the romance through the second half of oh noooo prison and poisoning and complete betrayal. Huai'en needs more reasons to love Xiaobao besides that he's the first person who was ever nice to him, and Xiaobao needs more than 'he's hot and needy'. These are surface level characters, which nothing more than surface level attraction, there's no justification for the dramatics to follow.
It's possible that is where Meet You At The Blossom fails; it takes itself too seriously. This is a show where a dingbat rich playboy koalas himself onto a feral political pawn assassin he has mistaken for a lady with an aim of marriage. He's then surprised, but not dissuaded from matrimony with when it turns out she is a he. It's nonsense, and they should have stuck just with these two weirdos, rather than trying to invest in all the jockeying for the crown. Whatever Huai'en and Xiaobao have got going on-particularly in the way gender is performed, and where the power dynamics lay in the relationship- is far more interesting than omg which of these assholes should be king? I don't care. I could care about Huai'en and Xiaobao if only they would give me the opportunity to. Unfortunately they never did. I never invested properly in their relationship, so by the end I was tired of them and didn't want them to be together. That feeling was exacerbated by the stark reality that the sex scenes were all basically rape.
One of the reasons I didn't drop the show was wearied curiosity and that there was decent acting across the board. No one here is phoning it in. Props to Li Le for his performance as Huai'en, even if he sometimes felt constrained by a weak script that shied away from embracing Huai'ens madness. I think he would have had fun going full Luo Binghe. He's one of the few guys I could very well believe that a moron who saw him at night would mistake him for a statuesque lady, so, good casting. Wang Yun Kai is green but game as Xiaobao, though his performance is also hampered by poor writing. He does his best with the transition from misguided dope to tragic victim, but it falls flat a lot. The ensemble cast around them are all doing their best. The sets are good and the costuming is acceptable, though basic.
Meet Me At The Blossom must be noted for what it's trying to do. It will remain significant for being the first explicitly queer Chinese Costume drama, but beyond that, it's a confused effort with not much skill in the execution, though lots of enthusiasm. I look forward to a second effort with a more uniform vision.
Is it amazing that Meet You At The Blossom got made at all? Yes.
Does that necessarily make it good? No.
Should it be watched regardless, to ensure more projects like this are made? ...That one's up to you.
For me, Meet You At The Blossom is a strange artifact. I'm not familiar with the novel, but I can see other media influences pulling this production this way and that. It feels as if the show hesitated about being too much of one thing or the other, and as such, never commits to anything with appropriate effort. Nowhere is this more evident than the very extreme split in tone between the first half (Gender-Bender Wuxia Rom-Com) and the latter half (Political Betrayal-Laden Wuxia Tragedy). There's also a lot of intense subject matter that they straight up refuse to deal with in meaningful ways, which makes it hard to respect the effort. Why include things if you don't want address them?
The twelve hour run time is, frankly, insufficient for the political backstory and the relationship and the fallout. Also, the presence of quite so many characters. You can see them thinking that they're going to be like The Untamed, with all this world-building and different dudes with different takes on the political situation, and yet none not enough air time is spent on the range of characters to make it anything but a waste. At the same time they tip their hats to the BL world where trope-laden writing abounds and every five paces there's another potential couple, but none of them are developed enough to be anything more than a curiosity on the sideline. Female characters? In short supply and are objects acted upon. Lurking darkness, tragic health situations and mental unwellness like Word of Honor? Present, but not quite addressed. Not taken to an extreme to make it worthwhile.
Over all, focus was constantly pulled from where it should have been: Zongzheng Huai En and Jin Xiao Bao's relationship. They only spent six episodes establishing it amongst the gobs of backstory and cast, and half of what we saw is subterfuge, lies, and general mistaken-identity goofiness. Very little sincere connection. There simply isn't enough emotional foundation to carry the romance through the second half of oh noooo prison and poisoning and complete betrayal. Huai'en needs more reasons to love Xiaobao besides that he's the first person who was ever nice to him, and Xiaobao needs more than 'he's hot and needy'. These are surface level characters, which nothing more than surface level attraction, there's no justification for the dramatics to follow.
It's possible that is where Meet You At The Blossom fails; it takes itself too seriously. This is a show where a dingbat rich playboy koalas himself onto a feral political pawn assassin he has mistaken for a lady with an aim of marriage. He's then surprised, but not dissuaded from matrimony with when it turns out she is a he. It's nonsense, and they should have stuck just with these two weirdos, rather than trying to invest in all the jockeying for the crown. Whatever Huai'en and Xiaobao have got going on-particularly in the way gender is performed, and where the power dynamics lay in the relationship- is far more interesting than omg which of these assholes should be king? I don't care. I could care about Huai'en and Xiaobao if only they would give me the opportunity to. Unfortunately they never did. I never invested properly in their relationship, so by the end I was tired of them and didn't want them to be together. That feeling was exacerbated by the stark reality that the sex scenes were all basically rape.
One of the reasons I didn't drop the show was wearied curiosity and that there was decent acting across the board. No one here is phoning it in. Props to Li Le for his performance as Huai'en, even if he sometimes felt constrained by a weak script that shied away from embracing Huai'ens madness. I think he would have had fun going full Luo Binghe. He's one of the few guys I could very well believe that a moron who saw him at night would mistake him for a statuesque lady, so, good casting. Wang Yun Kai is green but game as Xiaobao, though his performance is also hampered by poor writing. He does his best with the transition from misguided dope to tragic victim, but it falls flat a lot. The ensemble cast around them are all doing their best. The sets are good and the costuming is acceptable, though basic.
Meet Me At The Blossom must be noted for what it's trying to do. It will remain significant for being the first explicitly queer Chinese Costume drama, but beyond that, it's a confused effort with not much skill in the execution, though lots of enthusiasm. I look forward to a second effort with a more uniform vision.
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