Good god I'm so sick of watching Situ. Is this series all about Situ Ling and his disgusting obsessive stalking? Is he the hero? Why is this show spending ridiculous amounts of screen time staring at his sad, woe-is-me face all the time? Why is it constantly playing flashbacks of all the misfortunes this psychopath suffered? As if those misfortunes justify his psychopathic nature?And why do the writers keep having the FL be so clueless about obvious, simple things? All the facts clearly tell her that she MUST be the last Bo clan descendent. But she acts as if it is a great mystery. All the facts make it clear that Situ Ling is an obsessed, dangerous stalker -- he literally ran up to her, cast some sort of paralyzing spell on her and forced her to drink some potion without her consent. But she lets it slide? How on earth she would agree that she is 'indebted' to him for that is ridiculous. And why can't she see the obvious disconnect between Situ's potion and the fact that her spirit veins have been repaired and realize that something else must have happened?What the F is wrong with the writers of this show? Is FL the strong, independent and intelligent champion warrior Ming Xian? Or is she a clueless, stupid and easily manipulated idiot? They are literally writing her into a willing stalker victim. It makes me want to vomit.The cast, costumes, sets and overall production of this show are fantastic. But the writing and plot direction at times are just painful and cringy to watch.
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This episode gets a 10 simply because it finally kills off the stupid lie that has been dragging the series down for many episodes. The FL's unwillingness to confess her identity has been an absurd and stupid plot device that should have expired long before this. But at least now it is finally done with.
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Love between Fairy and Devil Episode 36
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Great finale! Love that the final battle was both tangible and intangible. The scale was dramatic and also romantic. Beautiful visuals, especially in Dongfang Qingcang's Heart Sea. Kudos to the two leads, Esther and Dylan, for really great performances throughout this series. The two of them really carried this story with each taking the lead at different moments and always having great chemistry.I'm glad they stopped spending so much screen time trying to make Ronghao a sympathetic character in the finale. They had wasted so much time on him in recent episodes and it just didn't work. He was despicable all the way through and I felt not single tear of sympathy for the creep so all the flute playing and sad memorial flashbacks just felt contrived and manipulative without succeeding. And boy did that slow down those episodes. Thankfully, they left that behind for the finale.I was a little disappointed that the SML, Changheng, started to backtrack on his character growth in the middle of the battle, but he seemed to have recouped in the denouement. They left it hanging whether he will truly grow past where he's been stuck but it was at least looking promising.Most of the other side characters seemed to move toward positive directions that made sense.
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This was a good episode overall. But the thing that is dragging on this whole storyline is that the writers have failed to give us a reason to empathize with Ming Yicontinuing to lie about her identity to Ji Bo Zai. There is no apparent reason for her to continue to do so and it is hurting both of them that she is. It could be accepted if the story presented a compelling reason for why she continues to lie. But it doesn't. So it has become annoying and feels contrived. As if she is only doing so to drag the plot gimmick out. This is a pretty big flaw in this otherwise very entertaining drama, and the flaw is getting bigger as it proceeds. If they don't either explain it or conclude it, it could make the entire series unwatchable as the audience looses empathy with the heroine.
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A Female Student Arrives at the Imperial College Episode 18
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Zhou When Yuan, upon receiving his graduation honors, literally and verbally announces in front of everyone that he is willing to do evil in order to get what he wants?What a loser creep he is. But shouldn't his words have sent alarm bells in the heads of everyone at the ceremony? Or do we assume they were said so softly that only the Vice Principal could hear him?Smart enough to be the 'top scholar', but not smart enough to know he can't really ever get what he wants?.
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The characters and plot of this drama are engaging and well-executed. So far, no annoying reliance on poorly contrived plot tropes. The leads are both really, really good and have an obvious chemistry that is, of course, thwarted by their circumstances. This episode ended on such a sad note for Jiu Ling and Zan. But we all know there is a long way to go.
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Most of the world-building finally finished and we get started on the main story, which is the relationship between A'Jin and A'Yin. Again, while the ML's behavior is irritatingly childish at this point, just grit your teeth and accept that there are reasons for that due to his full back story.
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This first episode is mostly exposition and the real story doesn't get going just yet. We start with a glimpse in a future time and then immediately go back to much prior times for the world-building exposition before the back story starts. Caution: The ML during these early episodes is very irritating and not yet likable as he's basically the equivalent of an orphaned rich kid who is a bit of a lazy brat who is avoiding responsibilities like they are hot potatoes. This is not entirely his fault but is not obvious why unless you know the backstory of his parents from Ancient Love Poetry. At any rate, be prepared to find him irritating.
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And it's all due to the absurdly bad editing / direction with no sense of pace or storytelling. The episode opens with again, just dragging out forever something that could have been conveyed in a fraction of the time. They dragged out the Jiu-sacrifices-himself-by-pushing-through-the-forcefield for a ridiculous 12 or so minutes of the last episode and then they open with another 8 minutes of Zhou being broken up over his death. I don't want to belittle the importance of Jiu's character's sacrifice. But dragging it out this long tends to make them comical. Too over-the-top. At some point I just get impatient for the story to move along and lose empathy for the plight of the characters. And meanwhile, Wen Xiao has been getting rag-dolled all over the place by her demonized father to the point that shouldn't she be a bag of broken bones by now? How is she still alive? As I said, it starts to get too comical and the intended drama of the story is lost. And all the standing around and long slow ponderous lack-of-action by the characters is just so at odds with the urgency that they should be exhibiting as people all over Tiandu are suffering from the fall-out of Wen Zong Yu's scheme.
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given the massive confrontation between ZYZ & ZYC against Wen Zong Yu finally resolves .... but it was an exercise in patiently enduring one long, long, drawn out scene after another. This episode took all the problems of pace in this show so far and just magnified them tenfold! My god, the scene of Bai Jiu pushing through the forcefield took well over 10 minutes of screen time! SO much time spent with characters doing nothing and flashbacks happening. So much over reliance on 'dramatic moments' that nothing feels dramatic. Bai Jiu might be dead through a key sacrifice at the end of this episode and all I could feel was, "Jeeze that took forever!" The editing / directing has been just such a disappointing waste of great cast and production talent.
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This episode opens up with Wen Xiao taking a beating from her demonized father. The scene encapsulates the whole frustration that viewers have voiced throughout this drama with just how weak and incapable Wen Xiao has been made to be in this show.. And similarly Pei Si Jing also promptly gets beat down by a demonized Zhen Mei. I guess the point of these scenes is to show how helplessly weak the humans are? So the show beats up the women? And now we see why the show insisted on granting the undeserved mercy to Li Lun in prior episode ... so the writers could bring their favorite character back to save the day! Yay! He is fully redeemed for all the horrible awful evil crap he did! Right? Right? The moral lesson here is obviously that the most important thing in life is how handsome the actor is that plays your character. And how about an actual explanation for why Fei is not dead? Oh - he's a fake? Then why is Qing Geng so broken up over him? My goodness. Then SHE dies? And then they the throw this bizarre sentimental flashback of Zhen Mei giving Jiu candy after treating his wounds? This show has just become a massive mess. The epic battle against Wen Zong Yu was so weirdly dragged with so many long pauses as characters held in-battle conversations and long stares at each other. or otherwise standing around doing nothing The awful editing / pacing of this whole show was on full display in this episode.
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The best part of this show has easily been the growing bromance between Zhao Yuanzhou and Zhou Yichen. And the level of closeness of these two was on full display in this episode when they both immediately realize that their best way of dealing with the fire-based powers of Wen Zongyu was to transport the fight to the frigid cold of Mt Kunlun. They act in that scene in perfect sync without having to say a word. Way cool.
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Li Lun is nearly dead and only saved his life by hiding a tiny fraction of himself inside Jiu. And talks repeatedly about how diminished he is because everytime he possessed someone, his power was cut in half. And he's dying because of poison. And way back when both were healthy, he was supposedly no match for a healthy ZYZ. Yet in a prior episode he held his own against a ZYZ loaded up with Malicious Energy. And in this episode he basically rag-dolls the rest of the team fighting him together - including a now demonic-form ZYC (armed with the reforged Cloud Light Sword) ... ultimately leading to the death of Ying Lei. This makes no sense other than the writer falling in love with him as a villain. Despite his terrible, stupid dialog. And because the writer is in love with this character ... he once again gets another get-out-of-jail-free card because instead of finally killing him, they instead allow him to take refuge in the pagoda tree root. Are you kidding me? He has killed SO many innocent people - including their good loyal friend - yet they are granting him mercy? The chance to come back after a 100 years? And the show turns all maudlin as we are supposed to empathize through ZYZ's memories of LL as his 'friend' way back when? Give me a break. This is just absurd, whitewashing. And of course, let's now throw in the "hero is de=powered' plot trope as ZYZ has lost all his demonic power. Oh, and this episode manages to chew up perhaps 20 minutes or so with various flashback scenes for both LL and Ying Lei. Overall, not my favorite episode.
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His character gets WAY too much screen time as the show resorts to the cliche' drama trope of trying to build sympathy for this disgusting, vile character. We get the usual sad-sack back story bits trying to make us feel sorry for him. But ultimately, the episode ends with giving him yet another get-out-of-jail-free card, escaping death once again just to stick around and annoy us more with is awful stupid villain dialog. On the good side of things, the 'bromance' between ZYZ and ZYC continues to grow, even as the latter obviously hurts a little every time he sees the love between ZYZ and Wen Xiao.
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"I'm willing too. But I'm not strong enough. I'm always not strong enough. I hate myself for that. My master. My best friend. ... My beloved." -- Wow. That really felt like a punch in the gut as those last two words came out. Chen Duling's delivery here was so powerful, expressing her character's , despair, frustration and helplessness. (And, of course, echoing the frustration so many viewers have with how weak and ineffective the writers have made her character.). The reveal about the ancient demons, Bingyi and Ying Long, and their relationship, was pretty cool. And very emotional as well. But .... how on earth did the director let ZYC utter "five" as the count of their 'family'? It should be six!!! Overall, this episode is a real roller-coaster ride. From extreme lows to extreme highs. Nice moment when after first getting a long tight hug from Wen Xiao, out of sheer relief that her best friend is not dead ... Zhou Yichen watches as she first play-fights and then embraces even more tightly her 'beloved', Zhao Yuanzhou. And he actually smiles. No jealousy. It's obvious that ZYC loves her, but he's happy that she is happy. That is so cool. Overall this was maybe my favorite episode so far.
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