For me, the story of Pei Yu and Ying has been the best so far. However, Ying killing herself at the end didn’t feel right to me, it seemed very out of character and I really hated that part. Are they really going to kill off all the victims/good people in this story?
In general I enjoy historical detective dramas, and this one is a definitely a very nice one, with intriguing storylines that mostly hold together logically. I absolutely love Bai Lu as the “crazy girl” and her boss is hilarious 🙂 I wasn’t sold on the male lead at first but I’m gradually warming to him as well.
One recurring pet peeve I have (not just with this drama) is the idea that exiling or punishing the families of evildoers counts as justice even though those family members are often victims of the evildoers themselves who may have been living in misery long before the crimes were exposed. I understand that this was supposedly common practice at the time but given how many other relatively enlightened ideas modern historical dramas introduce, it feels odd that this is never really questioned by our heroes.
As has been mentioned by others before, nothing terribly new (like 90% of everything in Cdramaland) but, at least in my opinion, executed very well. Really enjoyed this one so far (on episode 20.
Can someone explain to me, like if I was 2 years old, what purpose does the Emperor of this drama serve?In Spanish"¿Para…
Well, it's a harem drama and you cannot have a harem drama without the boss. Apart from that his role in this drama is to be clueless about all the awful things that are happening right under his nose, to be outraged once someone points out anything in this respect, and to punish the guilty. That's it, at least so far ...
After episode 20 I am ready to kill the writers of this drama. So many actors in this one who I really, really like but what an incredible train wreck of a story!
Me too! Could have been an 8. Something but the frustrating subtitles killed the ratings. Some of them made zero…
So far, I’ve only watched a little of this drama and added it to my to-watch list. The subtitles I’ve seen so far are acceptable, and I’m looking forward to watching more. That said, I agree that iQIYI cannot really compare to Netflix or Viki when it comes to subtitle quality. Since they advertise to English-speaking audiences, part of what they are selling is the subtitles, so it is fair for subscribers to expect a reasonable standard in that respect.
However, should a drama really be downvoted just because it was not picked up by Viki? Personally, I base my rating on the drama itself, its story, acting, and overall production, and not on external factors. If the subtitles are poor, I do not let that ruin the experience; I simply choose not to watch it.
Me too! Could have been an 8. Something but the frustrating subtitles killed the ratings. Some of them made zero…
From my experience, the English subtitles provided on official platforms are generally quite reasonable. In contrast, the truly atrocious ones are almost always homemade or auto-generated, and usually appear with “unofficial” releases. Down-voting a drama over something the production team has no control over is, frankly, absurd.
Even if a low-budget drama happens to include official subtitles that aren’t perfect, that still doesn’t justify giving it a poor rating. After all, isn’t having imperfect subtitles better than having none at all?
And, really, where does this sense of entitlement to English subtitles come from in the first place? Imagine being a native Turkish speaker and a C-drama enthusiast… would you expect every show to cater to your language?
Thanks for that great review. I completely agree with you. Absolutely brilliant and so, so sad that not many people seem to be aware of it. What happened here?
One recurring pet peeve I have (not just with this drama) is the idea that exiling or punishing the families of evildoers counts as justice even though those family members are often victims of the evildoers themselves who may have been living in misery long before the crimes were exposed. I understand that this was supposedly common practice at the time but given how many other relatively enlightened ideas modern historical dramas introduce, it feels odd that this is never really questioned by our heroes.
However, should a drama really be downvoted just because it was not picked up by Viki? Personally, I base my rating on the drama itself, its story, acting, and overall production, and not on external factors. If the subtitles are poor, I do not let that ruin the experience; I simply choose not to watch it.
Even if a low-budget drama happens to include official subtitles that aren’t perfect, that still doesn’t justify giving it a poor rating. After all, isn’t having imperfect subtitles better than having none at all?
And, really, where does this sense of entitlement to English subtitles come from in the first place? Imagine being a native Turkish speaker and a C-drama enthusiast… would you expect every show to cater to your language?