SD1D Enthusiast

Have not felt so utterly devastated about a show since Game of Thrones Season 8

I loved this show, okay? I waited eagerly for every episode, I laughed, I cried, I put it down into my "all time favorites." I was so ready to give it a 10 rating. And now I don't think I can ever re-watch it after how the ending completely ERASED and NEGATED the journey of the first 19 episodes. Much like how Game of Thrones Season 8 managed to destroy the previous masterpiece seasons, the ending of this show—literally the last thirty minutes—managed to completely unravel and make the previous 19 episodes utterly meaningless. Utterly pointless. Spoilers ahead:

This ending is garbage. Pure fucking garbage. I don't understand how ANYONE can like an ending like this without completely deluding themselves. I'm mindblown at the amount of ppl going "it was a great ending, it tied everything up!" HOW? The person who the king fell in love with and the person who ends up with the king are TWO COMPLETELY DIFFERENT PEOPLE. The king will live the rest of his life with a lie, with a person he never spared a second glance to before in his life. Bong Hwan will live the rest of his life knowing that history could be changed and yet someone ELSE got to live and love the man he fell in love with.

This whole drama, we followed BONG HWAN'S story, his growth, his fears, the way he progressed as a character, the way he fell in love with the king. Yet in the end, Bong Hwan was nothing but a stepping stone for So Yong to take his place. His journey and character growth became nothing but a means to someone else's happiness.

I don't think people understand. This isn't a happy ending. The one who the king fell in love with (bong hwan) is NO LONGER THERE. He's left with nothing. So yong, a complete stranger to us, is the one who gets the happy ending. Bong Hwan, who actually experienced everything with the king....becomes a side character to his own story.

This was one of my favorite dramas of all time, but this ending managed to erase every bit of rewatch quality for me. It erased every meaningful interaction between our leads bc at the end one of the leads is ERASED and replaced by someone who experienced NONE of what made those two people fall in love with each other. It feels like a slap on the face for everyone who rooted for the actual relationship between the Mr Queen who we came to love and know and the King.

If they wanted to have the ending be with the real So Yong and the King, then they should have had So Yong as the main character. Not Bong Hwan in her body. They could have played with the "they are each other's reincarnation" theory or the "the two people fused into one mind" theory. Anything would have been better than this farce. The king fell in love with the Mr Queen who was strange, wacky, a modern thinker, a feminist, liberal, a little bit crazy. The Mr Queen who walked like a man and who taught him strange words, the one who told him that he was a good man and a good king, the person who helped the king find faith and hope in the nightmare he was living. That was all Bong Hwan. Not So Yong.

And everyone seems to be ignoring that So Yong is now literally doing what Hwa Jin did to Choel Jong lying about who she really is and pretending to be someone else. We all hated Hwa Jin for lying and trying to replace the Queen, but now what? The same thing is happening, but because it's the original woman we're supposed to applaud for it? Think it makes everything fine? Insanity.

I can't help but think that the people celebrating this ending and saying that it's better that So-yong, the woman who the king did not fall in love with, got to be with the King over the man who he did fall in love with are closet homophobes who would rather have a completely different female character end up with the king rather than the man who was at the heart of this show. At the very least, the show producers probably thought that. This whole show feels like one massive queer bait and the ending hurts more than I can say.

"The thought of both Bong-hwan and Cheol-jong going through life with a gaping whole in their hearts longing for something they will never have again just kills me." A comment I read that I can't help but agree with.

The first 19 episodes would have been a clear 10/10. If only the last episode hadn't completely negated those 19 episodes. If only.

I haven't felt so devastated since Game of Thrones Season 8. It feels like a slap on the face after all the feelings I and other viewers invested in this story, in BONG HWAN's story, only to be paid dust.

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Story with strong FLs sabotaged by irredeemable men being presented as their romantic partners

I was very excited for this drama but have come out of it disappointed. However, I'm already seeing people blame the criticizers for "not understanding this is realism and in real life back then men were horrible." I LOVE historical chinese novels to the point I've machine translated hundreds of them (yes I'm addicted) and one of the prevailing themes is always how women's lives were horrible back then and the men largely neither prioritized nor saw women as their own people worthy of respect. They were meant to be obedient, sensible, virtuous, gentle, generous, and basically never show any dissatisfaction. Their lives were easily discarded or kept imprisoned or slaving away in the women's inner house, never living for themselves.

And so yes I UNDERSTAND that the men in this drama so far show the same tendencies and are rather realistic of their time, but that doesn't mean we, the viewers, have to like it for the romantic partners of our female leads. I know that there will likely be character growth for these men, but I don't really care. No amount of character growth will make me like the second sister's pathetic, cowardly, cheating husband who tormented her to the point she chewed her mouth bloody with pebbles to cope. No amount of character growth for that noble brother law of the emperor will make me like him simply by the virtue of the fact that he tried to seize a woman like she was property and make her his concubine, and had he succeeded he would have become a proponent of female slavery and martial rape. No amount of "misunderstanding" or reasoning will make me like the husband of the first sister who (spoiler from teaser) BEATS HIS WIFE TO THE POINT THERE'S BLOOD? There's no going back for me after they've already shown these parts of themselves. I don't believe in second chances for men who are like this. These are not "character flaws" you can come back from.

Maybe if the story was about them divorcing these so called "perfect matches" things would be different, but that's not how it's being presented.

The only one that I'm still on the fence for is the character played by Wang Xing Yue and that's because it does seem like there are some misunderstandings at play and it is true that he was "asked" to meddle in his cousin's affairs by his aunt and repeatedly by his cousin. It doesn't seem that he helped due to actually caring at first; the first time he helped it seemed he did it for the sake of the family's reputation and after that it was a matter of personal pride, competing with the third lady. That isn't enough of an excuse for me though; he knows how awful his cousin is and knows how he must be treating his wife for him to spiral like she does, but he still seemingly has no empathy for her. His advise is from the perspective of making things easier for his cousin, but never thinks of what his cousin's wife must be suffering. And yes, you can ask: why would he? The wife is no one to him. But that's where I think a lack of basic human empathy shines through and a lack of willingness to see the plight of women in this world. He is not an idiot, and he himself employs women in his business without having them resort to selling their bodies. He should know better.

Then there's the whole competing with the FL with their business. I get it. I get that his pride is wounded and that he's annoyed that the FL got one up on him by snatching his manager and painting. No one likes being tricked or taken advantage of. It also makes sense that he wouldn't just sit there and watch her steal his customers because that's his source of income. But again, I felt like there was a certain lack of empathy in how he employed methods. These are 5 girls and a widowed mother with barely any funds and nothing to rely on, trying to make a decent living. He knows this and he knows their difficulties, because he explains this to his mom when she's angry to calm her down. Yet he still was rather callous in how he dealt with them.
There's still room for hope in him toning down that arrogance and using some damn empathy, but what he's done has already left a sour taste in my mouth.

I don't expect men in historical dramas to be feminists. But it's a valid criticism when dealing with a drama centering around women, where the audience is largely modern day women. The writer isn't from the song dynasty, the writer is from the modern day era. The reason so many historical chinese novels get popular is because they promote modern values within the historical context and it's what makes the characters stand out. Some of the most popular fictional historical MLs are popular precisely because they are a breath of fresh air for their time. One of the reasons I loved Duke Su (past character of WXY) was because he supported women's wrongs lol! If I wanted to just watch shitty guys do shitty things, I would just go outside. When 3 of the MLs so far seem unbearable and the main one is precariously sitting on the fence, you know that the writer could have done a better job setting them up.

I am a big fan of Wang Xing Yue and was really looking forward to this drama so I'll give it a few more episodes, but yes as of now I'm rather disappointed. It sucks bc the chemistry between WXY and LYX is GREAT and they do have a lot of potential. I just can't get over this writing. I can maybe root for their pairing but every other pairing sucks big time.
The one positive thing I will say is that all the sisters are fantastic: strong, smart, brave, resourceful, hard working, survivors. They're working their asses off and they don't take mistreatment likely, but all the more reason why I think they deserve better. If you consider this drama as a story of 5 sisters doing whatever it takes to survive in a shitty world with shitty men surrounding them, sticking together and protecting each other, instead of a romance, then the drama might be worth your time.

Note: this review may be updated if I continue watching. For now, paused at ep 4.

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