mukkanna

Just my opinion (also, novel spoilers and analysis below):

Anning's character in and of itself is not much different from the novel. She's brave (on the battlefield) and speaks up (against her father), and her martial arts is really good. She's a strong and brave general. But in court politics, she's terrible...the proverbial bull in a china shop. Her intelligence is only average; she's straightforward and tends to take things at face value. She's been paralyzed by what happened 10 years ago and has been haunted terribly, and yet has done nothing about it because she's afraid of the consequences and has been since she was 8 years old, and she hates herself for that. She hasn't even told Han Ye, whom she trusts pretty much unconditionally, for fear of what he would do. Novel Anning also asked Di Ziyuan to give up her revenge. The only differences I can see is that novel Anning doesn't seem to get drunk constantly and she doesn't have a traitor in her camp.

The cause of the difference (also just my opinion) in the portrayal of Anning is just the man by her side. In the novel, she had Shi Zhengyan, an upright and brave son of a loyal general who is her second-in-command in the Northwest. There was no challenge to her intelligence to try to root out a spy because she had no spies at her side. She had Shi Zhengyan, a friend of her brother's who had defended her loyally through life and death situations and who wouldn't hesitate to throw away generations of his family's loyalty to the throne to defend Han Ye. It would only be right to trust him with her life. Instead she gets Mo Bei, who doesn't even exist in the book but is probably an attempt to mash a different novel couple's storyline into Anning's. Now she looks like a fool because she's harboring an enemy spy.

He never said he wouldn't help her, and he also didn't say not to do it at all. In the carriage, he asked her to wait until he was strong enough to protect her from his father. He asked her for grounds for her to challenge a case that was closed with overwhelming evidence 10 years ago; her response was basically that she'd get evidence later, but she just knows it's wrong. If you go to a lawyer or a judge with that argument, who's going to take your case to court?

Also...she herself says she's been Ren Anle for 10 years. Ren Anle has always been her. Ren Anle can be safe in court, whereas Di Ziyuan has many enemies, and he knows he can't completely protect her with his current influence. Maybe it's wishful thinking on his part, but it's not at all unreasonable.

He's a person who's been trying to get her off Mount Dai for 10 years. If there was a way to easily show they were innocent and prove the truth, wouldn't he have done it already?

Her family are convicted criminals, and she's a convicted criminal's daughter. That's why she needs to find evidence to get them exonerated. At this point, in 10 years no one (including Anle) has found any concrete evidence to overturn the case. Without evidence, she's just going to end up dead and no one's name will be cleared at all.

Everyone in the court has been saying Di Chengen is "a criminal's daughter" since she showed up. He's pointing out an unpleasant truth, but it's still the truth: no one's going to believe her, "a criminal's daughter," until she finds hard evidence that no one can disprove.

Hilariously, my first thought was: because it costs a lot of money to travel to the capitol. And maybe they couldn't get a visa.

Maybe try to look at it from his perspective?

He asked her to wait until he was strong enough to protect her (he told her pretty clearly, his father has been in power a long time and can be cruel and ruthless), then asked her to tell him the plan so he could help her, and then finally asked her to be careful after she rejected both those overtures. He also still helped her anyway, even though he knew she was only using him.

He's the crown prince and should be impartial; how can he overturn a case just because he's in love with someone? The Di family was convicted of rebellion with lots of evidence 10 years ago. He asked her for evidence so the case could be overturned, and she didn't have any in hand. With just suspicions and no proof in hand, should he stand aside and let her take her accusations to his paranoid, ruthless father?

And also, because he loves her, he doesn't want her to die. He's willing to let go of her and marry Di Chengen to continue to hide her identity from his father.

Is it justice to overturn previous court rulings without any evidence because you like a girl?
Is it love to just let your loved one do something foolhardy, dangerous, and probably futile when you could help them if they just gave you more time to prepare?

HY does become emperor. DZY becomes his empress. I doubt he'd ever consider having a concubine, given that he nearly demoted himself to a commoner to avoid marrying one.

I also find Han Zian's actions a bit unfair...but in the end, it was Di Shengtian who was willing to do everything for him, and he'd have to be an idiot not to accept!

The relationship is believable and develops beautifully. But it's a roller coaster, there's lots of angst and probably more to come.

Soulmates. Sadly, Han Zian had married young and the first time they met, Han Zhongyuan (the current emperor) was already old enough to be accompanying his dad on campaigns.

Di Shengtian was crazy in love with Han Zian, and he also was in love with her, however neither of them ever told the other. Her otherwise bizarre behavior for essentially her entire life boils down to her (seriously obsessive) love for him. Now, in the novel Han Ye looks a lot like his grandfather, and Han Ye is handsome enough that no one thought it was weird that a bandit lady offered 30,000 navy for his hand in marriage...so yeah.


NOVEL SPOILERS:
Di Shengtian, in Han Zian's lifetime, performed such feats as:
- randomly using her family's army to conquer half the country as a gift to him
- depleting her martial arts for several years to prolong his life
- vowing to never set foot in the capitol again after his death, basically breaking the influence of the Di family in the capitol, and continuing to keep this vow even after Han Zhongyuan kills the whole Di family even when she could destroy the entire palace by herself
- promising she will protect the country until it's stable and prosperous (since he threatened that he'll refuse to see her in the afterlife if she comes before then)

- The emperor is a paranoid guy who kills anyone who threatens the security of his throne. But other than that, he's not a bad emperor. I think he could be worse?

- Di Ziyuan decides that the country has suffered enough after the war and decided she would work with Han Ye for the good of Jing.

- The dowager is a jealous woman. Does that count?

- Di Ziyuan's great-aunt mostly just sits around drinking tea and playing chess, other than a stint where she blew a crater out of a field. She made a vow to Han Zian (Han Ye's grandpa) that she would never set foot in the capitol again after his death...also in the novel, she partially raised Han Ye and still has a lot of affection for him. But she's the reason a lot of the bad guys never leave the capitol.

In the novel:

Han Ye does recover his vision.

Han Ye's mother (the empress) died when he was a child. Anning's mother (a concubine) also died when she was a child. They're half-siblings in the book; Han Ye is the only legitimate heir since he's the empress's only child.

Not sure. I don't remember them mentioning the colors of the uniforms in the novel.

The emperor's intelligence network is only rivaled by the East Palace's intelligence network in the novel. Not sure about the status of either of them in the drama.

Anning doesn't have spies in her household in the novel (her "bodyguard" and love interest was the son of a general and is basically I-go-where-his-sword-points-loyal to Han Ye). Han Ye's guard captain was a famous swordsman secretly working for his brother in the novel (although, yes, the brother was trying to kill him; but this swordsman had been flawlessly guarding him for 7 years, probably because he genuinely liked Han Ye).

To each their own :) I'm enjoying it. Cheers!

His medical condition is treated and he's alive. I don't know what he ends up doing in the end, whether he stays in the capitol or returns to Jinnan.

I suspect so. It was a very tangled web in the novel...lots of hands in the pot.

He's very pragmatic, and possibly only calculates tangible results and not emotional damage (that's my suspicion based on his actions so far, but we'll know for sure later in the drama).

No matter what, the Di family and its army is already dead. Clearing their names is an intangible win. When he weighs the risks (Anle and Luo Mingxi losing their lives; destabilizing the court) vs the benefits (rehabilitating the Di clan's reputation; maybe taking out a corrupt minister or two) he thinks it's not worth it to continue.

His approach for sure can be maddening to people who value emotional outcomes more than he does.

I don't think this is the case. From Anle's standpoint, maybe she hopes they'll stand with her, because they're people who are just, and she's disappointed to find that they're not supporting her unconditionally. But I'm not sure she really thinks about what things look like from where they're standing.

Anning: has been burdened with guilt since she was 8 years old. She had the choice between betraying her family (including the woman who was her mother figure) and allowing 80,000 men that she didn't know to die. At 8 years old, I'm not sure any of us would have chosen differently. She clearly regrets that decision now, but the eggs are already broken. Even if she turns in her grandma, those 80,000 men are dead. She's been trying to atone by killing the North Bei army that supposedly killed the Di army and/or die on the battlefield for 10 years. Now she sees that the last survivor of the Di family (the person she says she can never repay) wants to go up against her grandma, who she knows to be cruel and ruthless enough to kill 80,000 loyal men--an entire army--and never blink an eye. She's thinking, "with what army???" so yes, she wants Anle to hide forever, because at least then she can be alive. But she's overlooking the fact that Di Ziyuan has been stewing over this injustice for the past 10 years and can't let go of how those 80,000 men died (rightfully so).

Han Ye: at this point, doesn't know the truth (in the novel he was secretly searching for evidence for 10 years and never found it...not sure if this is the same in the drama). While he doesn't discount that it MAY be true, currently there's no evidence to say that the conclusion that the Di family weren't traitors back then. Han Ye sees how his father protects corrupt ministers and discounts their evil deeds, but he also sees that his father has zero tolerance for disloyalty. He first asked her to wait to overturn the case until he could protect her, then asked her to tell him the plan so he could help her, and then finally just asked her to be careful and helps her where he can. You've seen from the rest of the drama that he's a person who calculates everything before acting; now he sees her running towards danger when she doesn't even have the evidence to clear them already in hand. With his father's personality, if she has just suspicions but no convincing evidence, what ending will she have? He sees this very clearly. If he were a lawyer, what he'd be saying is, "You have no case at this time."

He gets a lot more screen time than he has in the book. Some viewers say it should be renamed Legend of Luo Mingxi. I don't really think so, but I think that does speak to the amount of screen time he gets.

They find out the Empress Dowager was just another "fall guy." She did bad things and deserves the end she got, but she wasn't the "final boss."

Han Zi'an had poor insight into his son's character and decided it would be good to decree that the Di family could also succeed the throne. Supposedly it was to drive his son to work towards being a better future emperor? But actually, it only made him afraid, paranoid, and suspicious. Even if Di Ziyuan's father was loyal and didn't want the throne (which he didn't) there was no guarantee his descendants would be loyal to the Han family. And so, to clear the way for Han Ye and his descendants forever, he decided to uproot the Di family completely. His original plan was to spare the 80,000 Di family army soldiers and divide them up among loyal imperial army regiments, breaking the power of the Di family forever. But additional plotters got involved, resulting in the Di family army's getting wiped out.

I find Han Ye's character to be admirable, given the impossible choices he's being presented with. The problem with Han Ye is that he sees where all of this is going to go if she keeps on with her revenge, and it's nowhere good. As he points out, his father has been in power for a long time. More than anyone else, he understands how cruel and ruthless his father can be. He knows he can't protect her, and that's driving his behavior. His best hope is to keep her identity hidden. The emperor is very smart and very suspicious, and if he doesn't marry DCE after doing everything in his power to do that very thing for 10 whole years, the emperor will start asking questions. So, the best thing he can do to protect RA is continue on like he didn't find out anything and marry DCE like he thinks she's the real one. The other option (dethroning or killing his father) realistically doesn't exist for him. Despite his father's (many) flaws as a human being, he's been the best father to Han Ye (and anyway, patricide is frowned upon).

Given his situation, what do you think Han Ye should do?