This review may contain spoilers
Lowered expectations
I hadn't seen any promo material except for the trailer. I didn't expect anything really - other than a kickass female general. The first 20ish episodes were solid, even though the plot developed rather slow and wasn't complex at all. I still liked He Yan claiming her life back so to speak. But the drama never really hit it off. The villains were laughable, flat, rather ambitionless compared to c-dramas I've watched and there was just not a lot going on, other than the ML and FL starting to trust each other more.
And that was it overall. Almost no cool fighting scenes, especially not by the FL - I hoped for that and was really dissapointed. There were a few stocky feminist catchphrase teaching moments, telling the audience that women can do anything they set their mind to. Being strong and doing whatever you want as a woman would only get you killed most of the time in real ancient times and even now, irl femicides are rampant. So while I appreciate the message and think it is important to show strong females in any kind of situation onscreen, the fact that everyone kind of just went along with He Yan doing whatever she liked doesn't tranaslate into the real world well.
The thing I liked most was the contrast created between Xiao Yue and Chu Zhao - showcasing the difference between a man who loves his chosen for what she is and accompanies her on her journey and a man who just wants to posses and manipulate.
From around ep20 onwards I got impatient and the last 5 episodes felt too rushed but too long at the same time. Which is also when the emperor transformed from bland but reasonable to villain-y, but clueless how to handle a situation.
The ending resolved everything in an okay way, but I was still a little bit annoyed because of what happened before the last episode - the drama created between FL & ML wasn't necessary and out of character, since it could have been resolved by them talking to each other.
And that was it overall. Almost no cool fighting scenes, especially not by the FL - I hoped for that and was really dissapointed. There were a few stocky feminist catchphrase teaching moments, telling the audience that women can do anything they set their mind to. Being strong and doing whatever you want as a woman would only get you killed most of the time in real ancient times and even now, irl femicides are rampant. So while I appreciate the message and think it is important to show strong females in any kind of situation onscreen, the fact that everyone kind of just went along with He Yan doing whatever she liked doesn't tranaslate into the real world well.
The thing I liked most was the contrast created between Xiao Yue and Chu Zhao - showcasing the difference between a man who loves his chosen for what she is and accompanies her on her journey and a man who just wants to posses and manipulate.
From around ep20 onwards I got impatient and the last 5 episodes felt too rushed but too long at the same time. Which is also when the emperor transformed from bland but reasonable to villain-y, but clueless how to handle a situation.
The ending resolved everything in an okay way, but I was still a little bit annoyed because of what happened before the last episode - the drama created between FL & ML wasn't necessary and out of character, since it could have been resolved by them talking to each other.
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