Vlr17

So I watched this drama because I just finished watching Prisoner of Beauty and Zhao Lusi is my favorite cdrama actress and I absolutely loved it until the ending. The ending was so unsatisfying and disappointing that it dropped this from a 10 to a 9.5. Believe it or not, I don’t hate sad endings/ambiguous endings but they need to be well done. This was, in my opinion, not well done. We got no closure and were not told explicitly what happened, which takes it from tragic to frustrating. My heart would break having to watch it happen but at least I would know for sure instead of being left to assume. But I don’t want this entire review to be me ranting about my disappointment with the ending, let me talk about what I actually liked. For one, I absolutely loved Duanwu as a protagonist. She is intelligent and hard working and has been through some horrible things and come out on top. Lusi is a phenomenal actress and she absolutely killed it with this role. I enjoy her modern dramas but I must say, historicals are truly where she shines. Next, I absolutely adored the platonic relationships in this drama. Especially between Duanwu and her female companions. I enjoyed the romance fine, I shipped it, but I would have totally been fine if there was no romance and they only focused on the platonic relationships. But that’s just me. Speaking of romance… I preferred the second lead. Which is truly a rarity for me, usually I find second leads annoying, but I actually much preferred her with Mr Zhang. I enjoy enemies to lovers but as I’ve gotten older, friends to lovers has become much more my thing. I also cannot stand the miscommunication trope, especially when the reasoning doesn’t make sense to me. Not wanting her to be consumed by revenge thus lying to her and making her think it was all his fault just did not make sense to me. But back to the second lead. It was obvious she had no interest in him whatsoever but I couldn’t help but wish she would choose him. Speaking of couples, why did I low key like the second couple? Wu was so toxic and I despised him plus I got such sapphic vibes from Lady Cui at the start but man, some how they wore me down and I was shipping them at the end. Overall I really really enjoyed this drama but I think the ending is too vague and prevents it from being another ten star drama for me. 9.5/10