whoissilmoy

ok 7.9 has to be a fluke or a joke right?

iQIYI is so lame. They used Xu Kai to promote their brand overseas while not promoting the drama domestically; and now they have to rely on Fuca Fu Heng and Gu Yan Zhen too?

wishing this drama all the best for both leads!🤞

ah I thought so, if not Friday, they will announce on Monday.

The first episodes need to be really exciting to give the audience an alternative. We need some excitement. Evil Eye had me worried about Xu Kai’s voice, but after listening to the latest iQIYI clip, the way Shen Run speaks has a tone similar to the FL — which tells me he’s doing that intentionally. I think after his second costume drama next year, people will finally see that he can vary his voice for different characters in a costume drama. He already did it in his three modern male leads: Yang Hua, Han Ting, and Yao Zhiming all speak differently. Anyway, some actors have perfect Mandarin and perfect technical control, but they still sound the same in every drama — it’s perfect, but it’s the same. And just like AI voices: they pronounce Mandarin perfectly (it’s immaculate!), but they all share the same tone, rhythm, and cadence, so they end up sounding mechanical.

The key is consistency. If Xu Kai can keep his voice sounding good and change it properly for the different sides of Shen Run throughout the whole series, most viewers I think will accept or barely notice his mild accent. You can't satisfy the language purists.

His real strength is his voice — it has a naturally rich, warm, and appealing quality that can feel both deep and tender, and he knows how to vary the way he speaks to fit different sides of a character.

Is this Youku’s number or the combined total with iQIYI?
iQIYI’s reservations have been climbing steadily at an organic pace — no platform push at all — and it’s at 356K now - 100% organic. Just the other day it was only around 280K.

Youku only pushed it for one day, maybe just a few hours. Everything after that has been organic growth.
Now I finally get why some dramas hit even 7M reservations — it all depends on how hard a platform pushes to get more visibility with potential viewers.

probably. Evil eye says 95% chance it's this week. Drama wiki already added the date 9/17.

A wealthy woman can have as many men as they want to

when you are used to being served all your life

I think the ML is being deliberately unlikeable — it’s part of the strategy. Later, he can drop the act and reveal his real self.

These women‑driven stories are irresistible — that’s exactly why creators keep churning them out.

But this series stacks slavery on top of everything else, which turns the whole thing into a powder keg. These are super‑charged trigger topics, and the industry knows they pull massive attention.

At the beginning of Ep. 1, the young FL asks her father, “What makes someone a slave?” It’s interesting that she doesn’t ask how but what. That shift from process to definition sets the entire narrative in motion.

the director also work on Filter

perhaps if he would smile more, he wouldn't look so mean

Through her acting, she was able to make the audience sympathize with her character in The Double as well.

She has the perfect face for this role; it matches the vibe so well. It’s not just her looks — it’s her acting, her expressions, and the energy she brings to the character. Her face is actually very pretty and distinct compared to most. It’s a shame she doesn’t get brand endorsements, especially for something like perfume.

Noticing his feet, though makes her seem extra perceptive, beyond what an average person would pick up. They're telling us she is an extremely astute person who notices every detail, just like with the painting. But I think in reality it's much harder to detect man from a woman by those kinds of block shape cloth shoes in ancient China but this character is super sharp at noticing tiniest details. This is her strength. I would think the face is a dead giveaway but in Chinese dramas, the face is not. Actually, that makes sense to me for younger adults because Chinese men and women have softer features.

That's pretty sharp of her eyes to detect difference in feet size between men and women of the same height. If it were me, the face would be a dead giveaway. I run into men dressed like woman at a store; I can tell right away by the face.

FL's grandfather was based on Fang Xiaoru. According the wikipedia, "he was loyal to the former Jianwen Emperor, the second emperor of the Ming dynasty. After Zhu Di, the Prince of Yan, usurped the throne to become the Yongle Emperor in 1402, Fang Xiaoru refused to serve the new Emperor and was put to death at the age of 46. There are several different accounts of Fang's death. One account, he was executed by lingchi (磔) which is slow slicing" or "death by a thousand cuts" (this was used in the drama Royal Feast), is a form of torture and execution, and several of his family members lost their lives. Another account involved extermination of nine kinships, and yet another account, the emperor was furious and ordered his death.

I very much doubt it will be like MR. But I think there is a 2ML (Li Cong Xin) who likes FL and they were engaged in the novel.

Well darn, evil eye had to mention Xu Kai’s drama is airing soon and take a shot at his voice — of course she did. She’s an elitist. I thought maybe she treated other actors the same way, but not really. It’s never quite the same treatment she gives Xu Kai. And now I’ve figured out who she likes and who she doesn’t, and it’s obvious she has a double standard — she has one set of rules and one set of treatment for the actors she likes, and a completely separate set of rules and treatment for Xu Kai alone. I thought she hated anything to do with “idol,” but apparently not — not if she personally likes it. I think she only brought up SOTB in her latest video because she found out he’s using his own voice, which gives her an excuse to put him down. Her last video was about which shows are airing in September, and she never mentioned SOTB at all. Either that, or SOTB is so quiet — like, where is the promotion? — that even she didn’t hear about it. But honestly, I doubt that. She’s been doing this forever. She just didn’t want to mention it until she found out he’s using his own voice. Xu Kai just sets her off — she reacts to him in a way she doesn’t react to anyone else.