Captivating The King Failed to Captivate Me
Before I start, what the %&@* was up with the ML's beard ?I started it because I am a lover of the historical genre and I was interested in seeing how they planned on writing a fictitious animosity between Qing and Joseon. Now, I am fighting to see a reason why I should even continue this show. I must be a masochist because watching the FL act gives me a headache when without subtitles you can't tell if she is angry, sad, confused, upset, or in love. She only knows five looks to consult from her acting playbook. The writing is just abysmal at best. The side characters have less screen time and have shown more dimension to their characters with their acting. This goes for the royal family members and Court Lady Jo.
It started strong and then the foolish ploy to get revenge just lost me. I am a big lover of revenge plots but it seems like the FL can't seem to get her head out of her ass for one minute. Her anger at the king makes no sense when for one it was Myung-Ha who faked the confession, secondly, he was not even the one who let her father go to the Great Qing. Her reason for revenge is not because she thinks he is corrupt, her pride is just hurt. She was surprised that a newly crowned King did not lose common sense when tasked with exiling her.
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A story of girlhood, motherhood and love
I had tried starting this numerous times but I was finally able to brave through the first 3 episodes and was able to start enjoying the show. We follow the story of Ming Lan and her family in the unstable Northern Song Dynasty. The show does not try to shy away from the harsh realities of being a woman during this dynasty. We learn what women must do to survive, their hopes, dreams and nightmares. We see their commitment to their families and the constraint they feel. We see their desperation to escape the fate of their concubine mothers. We watch them fall in and out of love. We watch their destinies intertwined with politics and being used as pawns. We watch them long for stability in a patriarchal setting. Mothers and daughters are both desperate to keep themselves safe and ensure they can make it in a man's world. Even the female villains were well written and displayed as victims of the patriarchy rather than just evil women.SPOILER STARTS HERE
The only flaw I find with the show is the character decline of Ming Lan after she gives birth and the sharks start swimming in on her home. The marquis is in danger and her reasoning is flawed and is repeatedly pointed out by other characters. They all claim it is because she cares too much. I find that reasoning stupid considering she was able to confront her Grandmother's attempted killers and her mother's killer and exact revenge. She cared for both very much and it is shown to us how much she loved those two women who shaped her.
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Let me save you hours of watching
Just a waste of everyone’s time.Petty plots and scheming are drawn out for no reason for the first 20+ episodes. Honestly, I enjoyed the parts where women of the harem covertly had hands in politics/war. They spent too much time dwelling on petty schemes in the harem with no actual consequence but just so the FL is shown suffering. Logic seems to be thrown out the window just so that our FL and her pimp are seen as cunning and “smart”. None of the decisions make sense for anyone with sense.
I’m not one to judge characters. I love grey characters but Haolan is too much of a hypocrite. She kills her sister (justified) but is upset when Lu Buwei kills that girl at the banquet. She gets upset at Yiren for not betraying his country when she has committed several traitorous acts for him and Lu Buwei. The only reasonably written characters that make sense to me seem to be Lady Li and Princess Qionghua.
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