Destined (2023)

Destined is a great historical romantic “comedy”. It is a drama with stellar actors that did a great job bringing their characters to life. There are usual twisted palace antic, great action scenes, striking cinematography, remarkable friendships, and a strong, beautiful and steadfast slow burned romance for the leading couple. Although their great romantic scenes are at episodes 27 and 28 only, the leading couple oozed phenomenal chemistry every time they were together, even when they were bickering, just looking at each other, or planning their next strategic move. This drama might seem not well done for individuals that were looking for a great factual based historical drama with no plot holes, but for those looking for a drama on a leading couple who are perfect match in mind and spirit with great values and deep love for family, friends, and their countryman, this drama offers all of that in a very satisfying way and entertaining way, Enjoy it!

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Best drama for women, understanding couple, forgiving nature.

I am very pleased after watching this drama, It doesn't show emotion of 1 character. it tells collective stories of all the characters and in a very raw, unfiltered, and natural way.

I also doesn't show super powerful villain or hero but rather show how they use their brains and even lie and trick to win the battles. The plots were not like alien attacks or supernatural infact they were exactly what you would expect from a historical drama like war, politics, society, and all these small social issues.

My only thing that i wanted to see was the highschool reunion of drinking wine of jisung that they promised in early episodes. Every Time jisung visit his hometown i was expecting the reunion from his best buddy but it never happened i was expecting it at the last episode too. His friends sacrificed so much for him i really wanted them to see each other again sometime.

But it was so good it has sorrow but still understandable. i cried alot but also enjoyed every single episode. There wasn't a single episode i ever wanted to skip. Thank you to actors, producers and writers for bringing this to light.

No crazy or sad ending thank god. Jisung and ye acting was good according to roles. Yuru was also good.

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Paying the price for stupidity

Let me just say JH and ZLS's relationship as father and son is messy and the reason for the rebellion at Yangzhou and the annihilation of the families of ZY YSH and LY. But ZLS didn't even realize he is taking revenge on Gu family until the last minute. ZLS could have been admirable had he walked the right path after all that struggle but he felt the world was unfair to him he so he should take revenge on the world too.

LY and GJS this couple was so perfect although their marriage was an accident at the beginning LY determination to make it work was admirable. Their relationship was built on trust so no matter what ZLS does LY won't be swayed.

SM and YY was an unexpected pairing but cute too bad the series didn't show how this relationship developed.

ZY and QW could have been perfect too bad it was not. They admore each other and fell for each other but because of LZS plot they never got the chance to live happily.

The brotherhoods:
Gen. Zhou and Emperor Fan's friendship is so admirable. GZ pointed to EF that his son is not fit for the role after trying to frame GJS for murder. A real friend is not scared to tell the truth it hurt but EF knew he was right but he loved his pathetic son.

ZY, YSA, SM, and GS these three combined is unbeatable from plottinf to assessing the situation they are brains and brawl combined. Their concern for each other was sincere and their friendship built on going through thick and thin and life and death.

The sisterhood between YY, LY, QW was showb briefly but they meshed well.

Side:
Mom in laws- these two are pillars for LY and GS they were able to do what they want because the MILs trust them. No monster in law here. Maybe LYR dad but he died early.

The righthand man of ZLS and his lady ally who keeps on being used and manipulated. I felt vad for them and happy for Lady Feng to have realized she can have a life without ZLS after her talk to LY. Her ending is fit for the story.

All in all the current generation is paying the price or consequences of what happened in the previous dynasty, there are other irritating characters like the dowager empress and princess but they also got whatvthey deserved off screen.

The last episode where they tried to stop GZ from killing FY was epic in a way. It's an ending fit for how everything went down but a bit anticlimatic if you ask me.

Actors were will fit and acted freat to the point that I want to curse LXY for his role as LZS .

***many actors were on BOY and even the scene of GZ at the last epsiode was similar tothe BOY ep when they tried to usurp the throne***

Osts:
Liu Yuning's ost for this drama was good and all the songs were well chosen to fit the story.

Rewatch: definitely specially the beginning when GJS was aimless and LY trying to mold him to be who he should be.

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Long time not found very enjoyable historical drama. This drama make me laugh & cry with them.

The story start from a girl named Liu Yu Ru (YR) that comes from business family, that even though she is the legitimate daughter, but her father prefer & more love her step sisters (from Concubine). So from the injustice in her home, she plans her future life where she can married to good family so she can support her mom, Ye family is her goal. But life turn upside down when she meet Gu Jiu Si (JS), a playful rich man, that never have consequence for his action including everything that come out from his mouth. As the result, YR find herself engaged to JS in the end. And their story begin.... ^^

At first of course YR try to avoid her destiny to married to JS, but in the end she accept her fate & finally she even manage to change JS. Her action of course supported by JS's parent that also want to see their son change into better man. Mean while there's a man in the shadow that ready to turn their world upside down, together with the changing politic in the capital city, that make Gu family loses their support. In this drama we see how support from family & friend, together with clever & smart decision from YR & JS make their journey full of story that we can watch together. Haha...

What I like:
+ What I really like about YR is what ever life give her, she take it, try her best & sometimes even punch life back in its face. Haha... Really like how in the end she really can stand & make the power for herself.
+ The chemistry between Bai Jing Ting & Song Yi quite good. Love to see they love each other, not to the point lovey dovey but enough for us to feel their love for each other.
+ Bai Jing Ting give us good performance for JS. We can sense that even though people see him as aloof rich man, but he is kind man & later on we can see how he grow up become smart & mature man.
+ All the friendship JS, Ye Shi An, Zhou Ye & Shen Ming is one solid friend, they willing to do their best to support their friend. We also have Fan Xuan & Zhou Gao Lang, (the emperor & his right hand man) even though in the end they kinda grow apart, but that also one lifetime friendship.
+ How love never make people stupid here. Like even though Luo Zi Shang (ZS) love YR, but he never stop or even pause his plan even for the sake of YR herself.
+ We can see the strong woman here. Like YR & Ye Yun (YY). How YY herself also turn herself around after what Wang Shan Quan did to her.

Now the minus:
- They never really give the deep background of our villain, ZS, Never at least until the last episode we finally understand why he did it & where the grudge come from. And that just one stupid misunderstanding in the end,
- The obsession of Fan Yu to become emperor never really explained. His swift in the character is the one that make my eyebrow raised the most. I know this not a story about him, so we don't get too much explanation about him. maybe if the episode longer we gonna get some explanation about this. But I mean how a boy that at one time really trust, adore JS & I can say a good kind hearted boy can change to become jealous, sentiment and all the obsession about the throne itself. Maybe the explanation lays in the last interaction between him & his father, where we can see how hurt he is that his father is more trust JS than him as his son.

Overall this really one good drama that I enjoy very much...

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good start, good drama, but story is very unoriginal

Destined (2023) - 8,5/10 -cdrama

historical cdrama witth quite nice and :unusual: start of :forced marriage: and hate/love relationship.
Still in middle and end drama it goes to old thousand times used :fight for throne and court intrigues:

main leads personality changes in course of the story to better. As for chemistry between all pairs. Its good but its lacks something.

plot - ML is notorious son of provincial wealthiest family[Gu family]. FL is is only legitimate daughter of former merchant, sadly her father dotes on concubine and she lives in :hell: together with her mother. FL tries to marry into famous scholar family of city to run from oppression, but unluckily she crosses way with ML and pisses him off. ML in his prankish retaliation publicly confessed his love for her and destroyed her :honor: that way + closed her chance to marry into scholar family. Sadly for ML his parents heard of it and made him marry her, partly too cause Emperor tried to force marriage between ML and princess in attempt to :steal: their family wealth that way.

genre - romance, historical, wuxia

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It's Refreshing. Very Recommended

The characters' growths *chef kiss* It's very refreshing to me, that when I watched this drama the role reversal of how the woman becomes the provider and head of the family. I mean, sure, the ML was amazing too with his principles and his actions prove that. Again so refreshing when her in-laws were good and kind people.

Their love story was slow burn and I enjoyed that. Their mutual respect for each other gradually turned into love. Still, I love that moment when I screamed at the screen, now give me the first kiss scene and then it happened few sec later.

I love how this drama showed their up and down and every phase/stage of their lives. I cannot stop watching from one episode to next. I also love that we got to watch their friends stories. Feel sad for Zhou Ye though.

I wonder why they decided to keep both ML and FL looking so young when it had been like 10 years probably since they both married and they went through a lot of things.

Good casting because I can't help but think Zhou Ye really looks like his father the great Commander. The way I was shocked when I saw the ML former fiancée to be, that princess face, lmao her face looks so modern iykwim. The lips filler lmao.

Can't believe they made me cried over the villain. Well

-301123

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Good acting and production overshadowed by a messy plot

This show had tremendous potential. The premise was very interesting and seemed to be a coming of age/revenge story of a young man getting married, finding love, becoming mature and responsible, and finding his calling in life. Unfortunately, that wasn't the actual plot. I don't know what the plot was.

The romance was ok. It only took Jiusi and Yuru 28 episodes to kiss and consummate their marriage. Other than that, they had affectionate and cute interactions with almost no sexual chemistry. But, when they kissed, they made out on screen and it was hot. This makes me totally confused about the logic behind Chinese censorship.

The revenge plot was a big deal at the beginning. But, then it completely fizzled out into nothing. The evil magistrate, who killed Jiusi's family, got stabbed to death by a girl. So, what was the point of that storyline at all? I guess halfway thorough the show, the writers decided to switch the direction from revenge to political intrigue.

The whole drama could've been completed in 25 episodes. After the rebels were defeated and the new emperor took the throne, the story should've reached its logical conclusion, but the writers dragged it for another 10+ episodes to meet the maximum allowable threshold of 40 episodes. On top of that, the drama had long draggy conversational scenes about nothing. I didn't care about everything a character was feeling at a particular moment. I zoned out through most of the conversations or fast-forwarded through half of them.

I ended up skipping the last 10 episodes and just watched episode 40.

The music was good, the acting was great. But all the positive things were completely overshadowed by a totally incoherent plot.

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Best relationship growth!

One of enemies to lovers drama I really enjoyed this year!
Plus good costume with good production, BJT as Gu Jiusi x Song Yi as Liu Yuru really delivered the story of their relationship growth perfectly.
But overall, this drama really have good package in casting and acting. I haven’t read the novel so cannot compare about the adaption, but have read about some dissapointment about how the story was being told in the drama.

Really satisfied to watch to the end even tho the half of their relationship really hurtful to watch because of the hardship these two have to get through. Their chemistry between each other is just top notch! Love it!

As much as I like this drama but I have to make it 9/10 even tho I really enjoyed like majority of this drama because the war scenes really too draggy in the middle.

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What I like:
The reason I watched this: Bai Jing Ting
The reason I keep watching: Song Yi's character - is strong and intelligent
The seal that keeps me watching: Episodes 10 and 11 (the later part of episode 10 and the early part of episode 11)
The reason I watched it again for the 3rd time: episodes 10 and 11 (also the reason why I wrote this review. I do not know what was it on these episodes, but the first time I watched it, I felt so nervous as if I was one of the characters, and the relief I felt when Xifeng admitted defeat)

What I do not like:
Some "punishments" are not enough for me to give that high level of satisfaction example episode 9
The reason behind the main villain's reason for revenge and how they tidied it up at the end. Like really?

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This one is way underrated! It deserves more recognition

This is a really good story, especially the love story between the 2 leads. Juisi and Yuru’s love story was one of the best ones I have seen portrayed in a Cdrama. This is definitely proof that kissing scenes and implied sex don’t make a romance. Their relationship is definitely a slow burn, but their partnership, friendship and ultimately love is evident in all they do. I like that they really are a pair working together. They even arrive at the same conclusion from different angles multiple times. She is soft spoken but fierce when necessary, and above all she is brave and smart. He is a spoiled child when the story begins, but one with a good heart. He grows into the best kind of hero. But I especially love his sense of humor and a bit of his childish delight. He keeps this even though he grows up. Watching this is riveting TV.

What bumps this drama down a bit for me is the stuff outside the main romance. The bad guy is more like the kind who stomps around wearing a black cape and laughing evilly. He is “behind” all of the chaos that happens, but our heroes know it and still don’t take him out. It feels like we are told he is bad rather than shown it. He never really seems like a compelling bad guy to me and more like just an obstacle for plot purposes. Much of the palace intrigue is less than logical and the selflessness of our main couple means they have to start over 3 times before they finally get their happy after. It makes the story drag quite a bit in the back half.

Overall, watch it for the romance and the palace intrigue, but it would have been better if about 10 episodes had been cut.

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Destined is my joy. Bai Jing Ting is my enjoyment.

Destined (2023) is a Woman in Business Period RomCom Drama. This is one of my favorite Chinese dramas of the year.

Apart while together. Destined hones in on a comedy while being a serious drama. The star, Bai Jing Ting, tries his hand at comedy, while reeling in the serious aspects of this story too.

The Story

A pampered son of the richest Costume Drama Plutocrat, has a spat with the daughter of a modestly well off Merchant. The differences are irresolvable. As with happenstance, the two end up in a arrange marriage. He is a bon-vivant and she is prim and proper. This is great fodder for laughter as the two try to cohabitate peacefully. Destined stars Song Ye as the prim and proper Liu Yu Ru and Bai Jing Ting as the spoiled but kind-hearted Gu Jun Si. He begins to teach her business and she pushes him to the highest scholastic achievements. They both “better” each other has walls are broken down to expose love.

Destined is a refreshing Costume drama change. Few things produce more of an anachronism than a Comedic Costume Chinese Drama. I have not seen Bai Jing Ting in a RomCom yet, but this seems to be the year that many Asian dramatic actors are challenging themselves to try comedy. Bai Jing Ting has never given his audience the same acting performance in his dramas and this extends to his attempt at comedy. I found myself laughing a lot. Bai Jing Ting, as Gu Jun Si, utilizes body language and gestures to aid in his comedic performance and his comedic timing is spot on.

Song Yi as Liu Yu Ru plays the straight part in this Chinese drama series. She gives some of the most endearing dialogue about women in business and love, sending goosebumps up my arm. Song Yi’s demur sweetness was so right for this part. Her character, Liu Yu Ru, is portrayed as a high intellectual and a quick learner, becoming the asset to her husband and the longing of other men.

Quote: This business is about Military supplies. Confucius said, “To rule a country of a thousand chariots, there must be reverent attention to business and sincerity; economy and expenditure and love for men; and employment of people at the proper time”. Husband teaching wife what the client needs to hear. From Destined

This RomCom is a high Yes! from me.

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Love that grows from strength to strength

A beautifully told tale of a love story that started out as an accident and evolved into a relationship of trust and genuine love. No unnecessary misunderstandings and jealousies to tear them apart was much appreciated. Instead their obstacles were the situations they were placed in.

A love triangle of sorts, the villain turned out to be victim of circumstances but the flashback sequences of him with the FL was sweet and gave you the usual “if only” wishes hoping he had it better growing up. The reveal during his end was not unexpected but good enough to tie up his storyline.

The star of this drama is the ML. Watching him grow from a carefree, playful person to one who sacrifices himself to fight for the good of the people was the highlight of this drama. Kudos to the scriptwriter for some of the most intelligent and interesting dialogue for this character. He delivers it so well and righteously in keeping with his character’s personality.

It was also nice to see the FL transform from originally resigning to her fate of just being a typical wife to having her own aspirations in business. However, this changes seem too jarring at times, one of which was when she went from crying on her wedding night to suddenly being extra gung-ho as she led men to the entertainment house to chase down the her husband. Brandishing a sword to get him was a nice humorous touch. However, her revealing all her marriage aspirations and how the ML ruined it in front of the many people in there felt so wrong. A normal person would have some reservations about sharing such private information in public, what more she had just spent years learning about a family’s code of conduct. Overly dramatic. (also found it strange she had no reaction when she saw her original target husband in the crowd there)

Watching her start her first business showed some smart moments but not fleshed out enough as she quickly turned things around after 2 weeks of slow sales. Not enough moments to make me believe she is this super business person especially when she was in the capital and when she was lying low during the 3 years.

One of my favourite parts would have to be in Wangdu and how the ML defended it with just 10,000 men against an army 10x bigger. I loved both his confrontations with his uncle here - perfect lines perfectly delivered!

Didn’t care much for the palace storyline with the new Emperor suddenly being sick all the time compared to when he was just a Commissioner. Liked the Empress Dowager and her daughter even less especially their senseless meddling. The twist here became too convenient and a few extra scenes on how it happened would have been better.

The ending was good enough, showing us what happened with all the main characters and how some of them still go on despite not having a spouse. A definite must watch if you are a fan of the ML as he was truly in his element in this drama.

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