littleberry09

Gave slight Xie Wei vibes there for a minute 😂

This is how it is in the original story from the novel. Both the leads are meant to be red flagged, and they portray that this is why she doesn't end up with the nicer, good guy 2ML. Eventhough she wants to be with him, she can't help herself by deceiving him. So she ends up with the ML eventhough he's a scary and toxic bastard

8.5/10 - Surprisingly really enjoyed most of this drama apart from the last 10 episodes which concentrated much more on the politics, battles and certain other characters dying or going unhinged. I wished the whole whole drama was actually about "A Splendid Match" between the FL and ML.

It could have also been much better with clarifying the timeline at times, and not rauhing the last 2 episodes in particular. Felt like they needed 5 more episodes.

Saw a comment saying this drama should have been called "Ye Xian and all his friends" - Which I feel is apt. It did feel like a lot of characters revolved back to him. Not that I'm complaining entirely, Winwin also did a fantastic job 👏

I also need to find time to watch Eastern Palace. And so many other new dramas this year, can't get on top of all of them.

Thanks for the award too 😁

You're welcome :)
For what it's worth I haven't read the novel, but from what others have said FL is more assertive and braver in the drama. They also say the ML is also more 'alpha' dominant in the novel, whereas he isn't like that in the drama at all (he seems like a softie and always lets FL get her way, etc)

I really liked/enjoyed this drama until around Ep 30, if it carried on like that till the end I would have loved it. It's really only when the drama gets to the 30's which is where it gets more frustrating.
So I reckon if you didn't like the first 10 eps or the FL, then you might not like the rest of the drama either tbf.

I wouldn't say it's bad, just very abrupt. They definitely ran out of time so couldn't fit in everything they needed to. If you expect a drama where you find out what happens to every single secondary character, then this isn't it. You will only get a closure for the ML and FL.

1. Wedding in Ep 28...but carry on watching till the first part of Ep 29 for the best part 🔥
2. The last episode is very rushed, they definitely didn't have time so were rushing to fit everything in. They focus so much on battle and the villain in Ep 39 & 40 that the drama just aprubtly ends by the end of Ep 40.
3. She does not get pregnant in the drama. She is required to be very active so they must have written the pregnancy out, as it wouldn't have worked for the plot they were rushing through at the end.
4. We don't see any of the side characters who remain alive in the last episode. In this regard the ending was disappointing because we don't see what happens to anyone besides the ML, FL, 2ML and main villain. In general out of the last 5 episodes or so they stop showing a lot of the side characters (like FL's sister for example)

This really helped me make sense of the characters so thank you - along with your comment and by scrolling Wikipedia I figured out that most the cast in Emperesses in the Palace, Ruyi's Royal Love in the Palace, Story of Yanxi Palace, are all loosely based on the same historical royal family in China. Emperor Qinglong is still a Prince in Emperesses of the Palace, but is the Emperor in the dramas for Ruyi and Yanxi.

I intend to watch them all one day but it's been daunting knowing the length of each of them, plus that I might get confused. But reading up more on them has helped.

Seen him in both Perfect Match and A Splendid Match. He's so good and believable, want to see him as the ML in a historical preferably

Best child actor in a Cdrama I've seen of his role in Splendid Match! An excellent young emperor!

Ep 31 - I'm frustrated Jin Zhao doesn't tell Chen Yan Yun everything about her past with Xuan Qing. Especially because by this Episode he has even gifted earrings to her 🙄. Just ignoring it isn't enough. FL has been a clever and straight forward character all this time, but this is another example of miscommunication trope which is annoying.

I hope it doesn't lead to anything bad between her and Chen Yan Yun 😭😬

I don't think they had too few episodes, but rather they developed too complex and unnecessary plotlines from around Ep 8-9, which led to it being harder to develop and finish. Ideally this could have even been a shorter drama 😬

Same just passed that 💀😂 they don't even put any caption or title saying how much time has passed. And actually in Ep 18 they say it's not even 3 years since her Mother died, but less than 3 years.

Another thing was that Ye Xian's sister had a baby before the 3 years/before FL's mother died, but the baby is only a few months old after nearly 3 years have supposedly gone by. So the timeline seems very dodgy 😬🤔

The Crown Prince/new Emperor also looks the same like 3 years later. So I think they clearly messed something up here by not specifying how much time has gone by, and not ageing up children. We have to assume nearly 3 years are up but it could only be 6 months for all we know lol

It really had no relation to the story, I was guessing it was more of a metaphorical thing where she joins in his freakiness.

This ML is not even red flag... He is black flagged. He gets even worse before he gets a little better for 10 minutes at the end 💀

Pretty sure that was when he wrote something like scarecrow___ on it. She got the hint

Because one is Korean and the other is Japanese. They are different ethnicities and racial background.

About Hae-jin, no her body was never found. Most of the drama is fictionalised, but this part must be based off the real serial killings, because in real life they never found the 8 year old's body either. She was the only one to never be found and the youngest of all the victims too :(

I agree with all this, although I rated it lower than you did. Ultimately nothing was resolved, and a lot of the victims don't get justice. The brief 'what if' ending might have felt better if it led up to more of a sense of closure.

6.5/10. Felt VERY frustrating and VERY stressful to watch especially midway through. The first half was quite good but I thought the quality of writing dropped in the second half. Also from around Ep 9 onwards it goes on unnecessary plotlines with no direction. It turned from a crime thriller into being entirely focused on corruption and internal family drama. This one wasn't enjoyable for me tbh, and I agree with others saying it could have been a shorter drama. Overall quite disappointing that even with 12 episodes nothing was really resolved and left a lot of unanswered questions, hence it left me feeling unsatisfied.

I did appreciate a lot of it though, like the scarecrow theme and how that comes into metaphorical play at the end of the drama. Also if anyone noticed they made little callbacks to film Memories of Murder? At the end of EP 8 - The field where Kang Tae Joo found a dead body in the canal is exactly the opening scene from Memories of Murder.