Editorials 
1
This review may contain spoilers
A Story About Living, Choosing, and Becoming
Against the Current is one of those dramas that I did not simply watch — I became emotionally attached to its characters and their lives.
What drew me in first was Lanxiang. She is intelligent, observant, practical and incredibly courageous, but never written as someone who survives simply because the script wants her to. She thinks before she acts, understands the limits of her position and usually finds solutions by using her mind rather than making reckless displays of bravery. Watching her solve problems was one of my favorite parts of the drama.
More than anything, though, I loved what her life eventually represented. Her mother left her with one final word: "Live." And Lanxiang truly did. She survived unimaginable loss, created a new family with the Xu couple, earned freedom not only for herself but for the people she loved, built a meaningful life and never forgot the women around her who were trapped by circumstances they did not choose. Her ideas about women, marriage, work, dignity and independence often felt far ahead of her time, yet they never felt strangely modern or out of place in the story.
The Xu family was another part of the drama that I loved deeply. Their relationship with Lanxiang gradually stopped feeling like people pretending to be a family for survival and simply became family. Some of the warmest moments in the drama came from the three of them together.
I also became very fond of Lin Jinqi. His love for Lanxiang was sincere, patient and very easy to believe. He admired her intelligence and courage long before their relationship became romantic, and I loved watching that admiration slowly turn into love. He was not always right — some of his decisions frustrated me very much — but I could understand where they came from.
My one major disappointment in their romance is that Lanxiang remained emotionally restrained for too long. I never doubted that she loved Jinqi, because her actions eventually proved it, but he often seemed to give love by the bucket while she returned it by the drop. Even in their final scene together, her response of “One lifetime is enough” to a dying Jinqi wishing to find her again in another life did not sit well with me. I wanted, just once, to hear her love him as openly as he had loved her for years.
The drama is also filled with memorable female characters. Some made terrible choices, some changed beautifully, some fought against the limitations placed on them, and some never managed to escape them. I especially appreciated that women who might have been treated as disposable side characters in another drama were often given their own desires, regrets and paths forward here.
Up until around episode 39, I was completely absorbed. After that, the story began moving through time extremely quickly. There were so many time skips that sometimes I had to stop and work out how many years had passed or how old everyone was supposed to be. I wish the later years had been given more room to breathe, because there were still many events and relationships I wanted to spend more time with.
Despite that, I never skipped a single scene. Not once.
There were characters I loved, characters I wanted to shake, scenes that made me laugh out loud and others that genuinely made me cry. I waited from the first episode for justice for the Shen family, and although that justice came far too late to undo what happened to them, I loved the idea that their story would continue to live through Lanxiang’s writing and would not simply disappear from history.
I also really enjoyed the OST. The music complemented the story beautifully, especially during the emotional and reflective scenes, without ever feeling intrusive. Several tracks stayed with me even after the episodes ended, and they are definitely songs I can see myself listening to again outside the drama.
Against the Current was not perfect for me, particularly in its later pacing and some choices in the romance, but strangely that does not make me love it much less. There are already scenes I know I will return to.
It gave me a heroine I admired, a male lead I became very attached to, a family I loved watching grow, and a story about a woman who was once told simply to "live" — and did exactly that.
What drew me in first was Lanxiang. She is intelligent, observant, practical and incredibly courageous, but never written as someone who survives simply because the script wants her to. She thinks before she acts, understands the limits of her position and usually finds solutions by using her mind rather than making reckless displays of bravery. Watching her solve problems was one of my favorite parts of the drama.
More than anything, though, I loved what her life eventually represented. Her mother left her with one final word: "Live." And Lanxiang truly did. She survived unimaginable loss, created a new family with the Xu couple, earned freedom not only for herself but for the people she loved, built a meaningful life and never forgot the women around her who were trapped by circumstances they did not choose. Her ideas about women, marriage, work, dignity and independence often felt far ahead of her time, yet they never felt strangely modern or out of place in the story.
The Xu family was another part of the drama that I loved deeply. Their relationship with Lanxiang gradually stopped feeling like people pretending to be a family for survival and simply became family. Some of the warmest moments in the drama came from the three of them together.
I also became very fond of Lin Jinqi. His love for Lanxiang was sincere, patient and very easy to believe. He admired her intelligence and courage long before their relationship became romantic, and I loved watching that admiration slowly turn into love. He was not always right — some of his decisions frustrated me very much — but I could understand where they came from.
My one major disappointment in their romance is that Lanxiang remained emotionally restrained for too long. I never doubted that she loved Jinqi, because her actions eventually proved it, but he often seemed to give love by the bucket while she returned it by the drop. Even in their final scene together, her response of “One lifetime is enough” to a dying Jinqi wishing to find her again in another life did not sit well with me. I wanted, just once, to hear her love him as openly as he had loved her for years.
The drama is also filled with memorable female characters. Some made terrible choices, some changed beautifully, some fought against the limitations placed on them, and some never managed to escape them. I especially appreciated that women who might have been treated as disposable side characters in another drama were often given their own desires, regrets and paths forward here.
Up until around episode 39, I was completely absorbed. After that, the story began moving through time extremely quickly. There were so many time skips that sometimes I had to stop and work out how many years had passed or how old everyone was supposed to be. I wish the later years had been given more room to breathe, because there were still many events and relationships I wanted to spend more time with.
Despite that, I never skipped a single scene. Not once.
There were characters I loved, characters I wanted to shake, scenes that made me laugh out loud and others that genuinely made me cry. I waited from the first episode for justice for the Shen family, and although that justice came far too late to undo what happened to them, I loved the idea that their story would continue to live through Lanxiang’s writing and would not simply disappear from history.
I also really enjoyed the OST. The music complemented the story beautifully, especially during the emotional and reflective scenes, without ever feeling intrusive. Several tracks stayed with me even after the episodes ended, and they are definitely songs I can see myself listening to again outside the drama.
Against the Current was not perfect for me, particularly in its later pacing and some choices in the romance, but strangely that does not make me love it much less. There are already scenes I know I will return to.
It gave me a heroine I admired, a male lead I became very attached to, a family I loved watching grow, and a story about a woman who was once told simply to "live" — and did exactly that.
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