ksk79

It's not Cantonese, but some form of Mandarin blend. @Xm1012 thanks for the post. I have a hard time understanding it, too!
Also, one of the mother character is so greedy of money, and that person is in the period just right when the Cultural Revolution was ending. She should have been sent for re-education, if the scriptwriter would have wished for more historical accuracy.

Thanks, that makes a lot of sense. The scriptwriter is careless and not just in this scene. Other scenes lacks background explanation.

Could anyone figure out how Tunnel Cleaner Guo's deaf and mute wife found out about the hostel where her husband lives?
After episode 18, I am enthused with the Zhuang Zhuang character. I hope East Asian people see this and follow her straightforward communication style, which is enjoyed primarily in the West.

Also saw inadvertently that Love:X the dating reality show has Chinese producers although it is made with Thai actors and actresses and marketed as a Thai content. (I usually don't watch Thai content for personal aesthetics).

Great to hear. That means we will hopefully get more CN BL genre content so East Asia will not be cluttered with Thai BL productions. Also more Cantonese dubbed content will make it accessible to overseas Chinese consumers. :)

Thank you for the info. So, is it true that if a production is distributed in Hong Kong, even perhaps Macau, then there wouldn't be censored?

@Nauriya, thank you for the great comment about historical facts.

Thanks for the share. You'd make a good PR person. I've lost interest in this "pseudo-documentary" approach and dropped the series. The interest in how the CR is shown on pop media has gotten me interested, and so I stayed to watch how the screenwriter cleverly adapts this source material into an entertainment product that will attract its large consumer base. Romanticizing the CR is not to be taken lightly, as many Chinese diasporas are likely the direct result of it. I am very sure my mother would scoff at this series, but then, she is not the target audience the series is after. I don't know if it will be a commercial success for its producer. Just popularity on social media does not equate to the actual purchases of foreign-branded products.

@Frost_edelweiss Thank you for providing the historical background to this fictitious historical drama series. I am impressed that the screenwriter has "successfully" adapted this from the original novel to get so many viewers.

@iane Your quote deserves an accolade: "What matters is the effectiveness and people-centeredness of the government". Geopolitics is hard to know unless learned or experienced from the real sources. For many, if not all of us, were/are permeated with "ideas" which might or mightn't be factual. Seeing vid clips of Southern China's major cities from recent trips my relatives made greatly surprised me. I cannot rely on TV series for reliable information; similarly, your perception of Thailand based on media bombardment by the extremely popular Thai BL series is guaranteed to differ from what you experience here in person. "...always good to think critically about information you see on the internet" is another good quote! I worked with high school teens and university young adults, so I could relate, sigh, and tolerate. Again, thanks for the info. :)

@iane Are you saying that the PRC is just as commercialized as ROC, except for its unique government? I've never been to the PRC but observed that PRC colleagues at work are just consuming branded products like locals in Thailand. Oddly enough, I've never met one in the US, just those from ROC or ABC. Thanks for the recommended YT channel. :)

If he were a properly brought up Chinese, Fei Ting should have repaid his sister and his brother-in-law for getting him that job.

@sakie, one of my pastimes is reading the posts here. Interesting observation.

@Sandrusca thank you for your recommendations.

Thank you for your reply. Watching a few episodes of this currently aired drama spurred me to re-read the history of the Cultural Revolution.

Thank you for your interesting comments. Please share, if possible, if the USSR today is similar to the PRC (commercial + communism).

Interesting thought from you for a series focusing on a FL.

While not perfect, this is the best Chinese drama of 2025 for me.

Wong Kar-wai's a legend, indeed! His 'Blossoms Shanghai' is great. :)

@AleksandraSucur "first time I see it in a drama". Many Cantonese-language movies or series have Macau settings as most people there speak Cantonese, although I've never been there.