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Thank you for the recs! ^^

Thank you sm <3 I've heard about the Condor Trilogy, but I was overwhelmed by the number of different adaptations that have already been made, and didn't know where to start - thank you for clarifying that for ma a bit :D (I was also wondering if it would be easier to just read the novels, since they seem to have got a decent English translation ^^)
I've seen Bloody Romance, it is indeed unique and dark. I didn't like the main leads much, but the second ML, the villains, and stunning cinematography have compensated for them enough to keep me interested :D Actually when I was watching Ancient Detective, the only other drama with similar cinematography style I could think of was exactly Bloody Romance :)

Thank you!! ^_^

Thank you for the recs! I'll definitely check out The Legends then, Love in Between and Nirvana in Fire are on my to-watch list, but as far as I know they are a rather heavy stuff, so I gotta get in the right mood :) I loved the Untamed, it's the first time I see the "candy wuxia" expression, but I think I know what you mean :D So yeah, sect wars are fine by me. My first cdrama was The Flame's Daugther, which was also mostly sect wars :)
Anyway, I'm definitely joining the hype train for Ancient Detective and I'm hoping for the second season! :)

Thank your for sharing this article! I do prefer my drama to have a HE, but I've also learnt to appreciate sad endings (after all, I was raised on The SiImarillion, and one of my first Asian movies was House of Flying Daggers), although my first reaction to a SE is almost always along the lines of 'WHYYYYY?!?!?' ^_^
From your list I've seen Hotel del Luna, Guardian and Princess Agents. And I consider these three dramas as my favourites, despite their sad endings.
Watching Hotel del Luna, I was bawling my eyes out already in the middle of the story, so I was pretty sure how it would end, and that's why the ending felt totally natural for me and I had no issues with it, even though it was sad.
With Guardian, I suspected a sad/bittersweet ending both from some tidbits I saw here and there on the Internet, and from the last track of the music score (I love this score btw), but I was still MAD after seeing it with my own eyes... Still, I kinda appreciate this ending. Even though I definitely would have written a different one :)
What happens to the characters from Princess Agents is absolutely fascinating to watch (like, how can so many things go this wrong...). As for the ending, my approach to open endings is a little bit different - as long as I don't see a body in the coffin, buried deeply under ground, then the character is not dead ^_^ Open endings are better than explicitly sad endings, because you can make of them whatever you want - that's why I headcanon that FL saved both herself and the ML with her new powers. And I'm happy this way ^_^
One other example of a drama with SE that initially made me go "I've watched all these episodes for THIS???" is Bloody Romance. But then, I've decided that it actually fits into the narrative. Has anybody ever been happy in this drama? No. So why would the ending change that? :D
I have The King's Woman on my to-watch list, and I hope I'll get to see it someday :)

Thank you for this article! It is one of my favourite dramas I've seen this year, exactly because of all the points you've mentioned - the relatively simple story, the main characters (each with their own twists), entertaining side characters I wished could stick for a bit longer (like the Thief), great OST (I'm in love with the ending song), beautiful shots and nice color-grading, and of course THE END that blew my mind (a little) :D

Initially I had no intention of watching this drama when it was airing, the synopsis didn't sound interesting enough, and I'd just finished watching Miss Truth and was a bit tired of case-solving plots. However, a yt reviewer whose opinions I trust had recommend this drama, and this recommendation made me give it a chance. It was the best decision I made this Spring!

(If I didn't watch this drama then, I'd very probably check it out after reading your article, though! So I think there's hope that more people will get interested in it, too :D)

One thing though: is it really an adaptation of a novel? My impression was that it was an original script (yep, I searched for the novel just after finishing watching, because I wanted to know what happened next in case we don't get the second season... :D anyway, I didn't find one).

PS. If anyone knows about any other wuxia dramas focused solely on Jianghu, without any court drama, I'd be grateful for recs :D

Has this drama actually aired on Aug 7? Or has it been postponed? I can't seem to find any episodes online... does anybody have some info on this?

Hehe, yes, we're completely on the opposite sides here :D I think it's great that people are so different, and are looking for different types of characters and themes in stories!

After some hits and misses I am fairly certain now what my tastes are like and what I'm looking for, but even then sometimes a drama that looks good on paper turns out to be a disappointment (like what you had with Eternal Love of Dream) :)

I'm not exactly sure which second FL you are referring to (I'm guessing Su Jin?) but it doesn't really matter, as almost all female characters in Eternal Love were selfish and bratty, to various degrees (even my fave Bai Fengjiu). I kept watching, hoping for some character development for them, but instead it was getting worse and worse, so I finally gave up, because it's hard to watch a drama when you simply don't like the characters... :)

I can certainly recommend Young Blood and Bloody Romance, but not exactly Ten Miles - I dropped this drama after 46th episode, when even the side characters couldn't alleviate my irritation with the main couple and the story itself anymore :P But I know that a lot of people love this drama, so maybe it will suit you, too :) It just didn't work for me.

Nice article, thank you for sharing!

I can certainly relate to "getting emotionally attached to the characters and then suffering because of their deaths or mistreatment", especially when it happens at the end of a 50+ episode long drama... The struggle is real :) and painful :)

I'm also not a fan of the "never-ending palace drama" - I've watched half of The Story of Yanxi Palace and, even though I actually liked this drama, I decided that I've had enough :) so now I'm trying to avoid dramas with main focus on the palace affairs. I don't mind if it's a subplot, but I prefer the main plot to be focused on something/someone else. One exception was for me Joy of Life, where there's a quite heavy palace-related plot, but the ML still has a life outside the palace, which provides a kind of "breather" for this drama.

Now, I can't really agree with "too many side characters" argument, but that's just a personal preference :) sometimes the side characters are actually saving an otherwise boring drama (I watched Ten Miles of Peach Blossom and Bloody Romance for everyone but the main couples...). I also liked Young Blood, where the main character was... a group of 6 characters :D It was really interesting to watch how they work together, how they grow together and how their relationships change. About The Untamed and several names for one person - it was indeed hard in the beginning to remember the names, but I loved this drama so much that I made a conscious effort to actually learn them. So I guess in the end it's just a case of having a motivation to do it, or not having one and not caring :)

Yes, I will always associate Summer 2019 with The Untamed, and I consider myself so lucky I was able to watch it when it aired, without much spoilers, and along with the excitement of the community watching the drama! I didn't read the book, because after watching the donghua I decided I liked the live action version better ;) but this year I read Heaven Official's Blessing and I loved it, I hope the donghua adaptation will be good (hehe, I'm actually hyping myself for it), and that maybe one day someone will make a decent live action version as well? :D

Well, I'm waiting for Miss S, because I loved Detective L :D and I hope this new drama will be just as good and with similar vibes. It's supposed to come out on Friday, Aug 7, so yeah, I'm hyped :D
I'm also waiting for Joy of Life season 2 (because I loved the first season and it ended on a massive cliffhanger), Sword Snow Stride (because I like Zhang Ruoyun, and I've just seen the trailer - the cinematography seems really good so I'm hyping myself about it, too :)), The Legend of Fei (because I'm a fan of both Zhao Liying and Wang Yibo, and the trailer looks good), Douluo Continent (because of Xiao Zhan), Immortality (the synopsis sounds great), My Best Friend's Story (because I like watching slice of life from time to time and there's not enough female friendships on tv :D)

These are all good points!

I usually fall into the category of being mildly to extremely annoyed when there's a new 'global' hype for a new drama, and it does turn me off, at least for the time when the hype lasts. I sometimes go back to these 'overhyped' dramas, but, like a year or more later, when all the commotion has already died out, and then I'm kinda mad at myself when it turns out that the drama is actually as compelling as people have said... :) (example: today I still can't believe I deliberately missed Guardian two years ago and Hotel del Luna a year ago, because I loved them when I watched them this year for the first time)

Anyway, if I'm watching a hyped drama when it airs, it's usually because I have somehow missed the fact, that it was hyped :D This happened with The Untamed last year, I clicked on the first ep having no idea what it was about, and that's the only reason I got into this fandom early. If I didn't, I would most probably not have watched what turned out to be one of my favourite stories ever till this day, as the hype surrounding this drama is still huge (and now I'm part of it, ups :D).

I tend to hype dramas for myself, though. I have a list of my personal highly anticipated dramas, and I'm just trying to avoid reading any social media posts that create hype around them, so I wouldn't loose my interest in them :)

I know, right? :D I didn't have much hopes for this drama, but wanted to check it out as I was getting a bit tired with period cdramas. I'm a sucker for the found family trope, and the way it was executed in MPUB? *chef's kiss*. I loved all the main characters and their stories, but I agree, Choi Won Young was really great! :D

Yes, fantasy elements definitely do help in keeping my attention :D but in the end it's always the character development and the construction of the plot that's the most important factor :D Example: a year ago I managed to watch and actually finish Her Private Life when it aired, even though it had no fantasy in it (and to this day it's the only non-fantasy kdrama I finished), but the way the characters and relationships were written was really engaging! Second example: I gave up on Eternal Love - a highly popular and recommended xianxia cdrama that, on paper, should be right up my alley, but the characters and their development or lack thereof brought me nothing but frustration. I dropped it after going through about 80% of it, and I don't regret that decision :)

Nice article! :) My stages were a bit different though:

When I started watching kdramas, I used to drop almost every. single. one. of them, usually around 10th-12th episode. I liked the thrill of a new story, but then I couldn't get past the "middle of the story stage" when everything just slows down and the story becomes dragging, or a lover from the past shows up, or just any "unnecessary drama" happens. During the first two years of watching I actually finished only one (1) kdrama! I think that was because I used to choose the dramas to watch a little bit too blindly - I went into classics like Boys Over Flowers, Playful Kiss, etc. because various blogs recommended them for kdrama beginners; then I tried the most popular latest dramas on viki, but the result was the same, I couldn't find neither contemporary nor historical dramas that didn't bore me in the middle.

So in the end I dropped kdramas almost completely in favour of fantasy/historical epic cdramas, and it turned out I was perfectly able to finish a 50-episode drama! What I'm trying to say is that it took me a while but I finally found my niche :D even though I sometimes drop cdramas as well, after only a couple of episodes, if they don't compel me enough.

Also - after a year without kdramas, I recently watched Mystic Pop-Up Bar on a whim, and I fell in love with it! Now I'm finishing Hotel del Luna, and I'm planning to watch Goblin, so I guess I finally found my niche in kdramas as well :D

Reading people's opinions here on MDL also helps me now to pick the dramas which have a higher probability that they'll be my cup of tea and I'll be able to finish them :) I can also recommend finding a blogger/youtuber with a similar taste to yours and base your drama choices on their reviews. Doing so helped me a lot to pick good dramas and avoid the disappointing ones.

You can watch viki for free, but then you have to endure several advertisements during a single episode. But an ad-free monthly subscription is only USD 0.99, the plan is called VikiPass Basic. That's what I use and it works great for me :)

I really like this drama, but (fortunately?) not enough to get a show hole out of it. The Untamed is for me like a show crater at this point, and I still suffer from Guardian withdrawal syndrome (coping mechanism: reading the novel...), so I don't think I can handle another one :D Detective L got me pretty bad, too ;)

Yeah, it often happens with subtitles on youtube, that's why I prefer to watch dramas on viki, when it's possible :) I suffered through Love of Thousand Years on yt with similar subtitles problem... :)