Reviews

A Very Sweet High School GL!

I swear, there was no one more excited for this show than I was! I have been on the MilkLove train since day one, and practically sobbed when this show was announced. And it took so long, but here it is!! And it was really good!

While I'm not always a big fan of high school stories, I thought this one was well done and nice. It was sweet without feeling juvenile, and had a lot of fun and silly moments. The side ships (ESPECIALLY AylinLuna) were great, and I enjoyed watching Ongsa and Sun fall for each other.

Of all the actors, I was most impressed by View. She did such a good job with Aylin's character, and really stood out! I sincerely hope we see a lot more of her in lead roles in the future, because she really deserves it. But the rest of the cast was really great, as well! It was a larger cast than these shows tend to have, but every character felt distinct and had their own stuff going on without overwhelming the narrative.

While I have my complaints (largely about the entirety of the eleventh episode conflict), on the whole this was a great show! I can't wait to see what Pluto, Us, and all the future GMMTV GLs bring!

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A cinematic production.

Honestly the biggest point for this show is the production. It feels very cinematic and is less "happy sunshine rainbows" which I think matures it in a way I quite enjoy. I really appreciated the more ambiguous way that Si Won and his mothers' relationship was rather than tying it up in a neat bow. The main couple had many beautiful scenes, but I think more dialogue would have been beneficial along with more time. The ending feels a bit choppy and though I was pulled in by the beautiful way the show is shot, I am left a little empty handed with why I should care about the main couple.

It feel more like we are kept at arms length by the show. Never truly pulled into any of the plot beats - other than perhaps Si Won's one conversation with his mother. It was a nice show, but I think that is what makes it fall short in the long term. Beautiful but lacking a little substance, which is an ironic thing when you take into context the themes that it was trying to portray.

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Mediocre but it has it ways to impresses the audience

In the intricate web of love and family, status holds significance, but a genuine heart can work wonders. This tale revolves around a brother and sister, their tumultuous relationship, and the transformative power of love.Born from different mothers, they shared a home but not a bond.

The brother harbored resentment, blaming his step-sister and her mother for his own mother's suffering. Fueled by bitterness, he stripped her of everything she held dear, driven by vengeance and misplaced anger. Yet, her love for him remained steadfast, a beacon of hope in the darkness of his animosity.

Despite his cruelty, she never wavered in her affection for him. With the support of her devoted partner, she embarked on a journey to reclaim what was rightfully hers, including the fractured bond with her brother. Their love not only restored her possessions but also softened the hardened heart of her estranged sibling.

In a parallel narrative, the brother's own love interest becomes his guiding light. However, his path strays into darkness, influenced by his misguided actions. It is the unwavering devotion of his sister and the revelation of truth that lead him back to the right track, mending broken relationships and restoring harmony within the family.The story delicately weaves through four intertwining love stories, each contributing to the overarching theme of redemption and forgiveness. While the plot may seem commonplace, it is the emotional depth and poignant moments that captivate the audience, ensuring they remain invested till the very end.

Despite its flaws, the story manages to evoke empathy and introspection, proving that even the most ordinary narratives can hold extraordinary beauty when infused with genuine emotion and sincerity.

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Life of a First Born.

Allow me to talk about Night, first born of renowned chef Ramon; Not only he's enduring the pain & guilt of hurting his nong chai, but having a mother who tends to put you second - I truly felt where it is coming from. When Night said "Is it my fault" it tore me up. As perfectly as he tries, he wasn't good enough. He's hurting more and more! Yet, you could barely say much as if you do, it felt like you're being selfish. Oh well~ at least he is content now. Proud of you naaa ai Night.

Absolutely enjoyed and adore the entire episode of this series. Always having each other's back, whether it is your boss, your friend, your ex-gf till the end is simply well put. What's more showing everyone's green flag side is the best.

Their sound track of course - THE BEST ! I listened to their songs first before watching the series 5 months later. Hhehehe ~ Satang's voice really fits. William did an amazing job and Jimmy version is merely ethereal.

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One of the best of its genre and sure to be an instant favourite for many.

As someone who watched and loved Ancient Love Poetry shortly after its release in 2021, as soon as I heard that a sequel was in the works, I was already excited. A little nervous, perhaps, since ALP delivered so much that I wondered if the next in the series would be able to follow or build upon the existing material in a satisfying way. Yet I needn't have feared.

If anything, The Last Immortal not only builds upon what Ancient Love Poetry established, it gives such an extension of growth to its universe that, truly, I ended up loving the sequel even more. Which is high praise indeed, considering ALP is very much one of my favourite c-dramas' from the last few years.

The Last Immortal follows the story of Shang Gu and Bai Jue's only child, Gu Jin (Yuan Qi) during his time throughout the Heavenly Realm. His True God powers have been sealed, and after an accidental event that causes the Phoneix Immortal's essence to shatter and scatter across the three realms, Gu Jin and the little water divine beast he hatches, A'Yin, work together to gather the pieces of her immortal essence.

I never once found myself bored watching this show. The pacing felt natural and engaging, with enough development with the different plots that were going on to keep me wanting to watch the next episode and find out more. There are so many interesting and fun characters too, a few of my favourites being the fox demon Hong Yi, the ghost realm's brother's Xiuyan and Aoge, and the Eagle Princess Yan Shuang. Truthfully however, there is no one in this show that I felt was annoying - even the Phoneix clan's father and daughter duo were compelling to watch.

One strength this show has is that everything feels as if it has a purpose. There are side plots that are introduced early on that seem as if they have nothing to do with the larger story, yet it isn't until later on that you realise they are incredibly important to the plot and have been included for a reason. A perfect example of this is the Ghost realm. One of my favourite realms in the show and perhaps the most interesting, it felt so satisfying to see certain characters within it return later on down the line and to know that they were always supposed to be a part of the story. That they weren't just added in to aid the main characters in their own goals, but they had their own story and purpose for being there.

I will warn any future viewers that are coming from Ancient Love Poetry however that The Last Immortal can be a bit confusing, and this is simply down to the way that the drama chooses to change the names of mentioned characters that appear in ALP. Shang Gu and Bai Jue are installed called Yi He and Di Juan. Xuan Yi is called Ming Qi. Thankfully, there is a thread on this site that explains the names of the characters that are featured in both shows, so do take a look if you find yourself confused or just wanting to know whose who (https://mydramalist.com/discussions/shen-yin/121769-shen-yin-the-last-immortal-novel-content-and-its-connection-with-ancient-love-poetry).

All in all, if you are a fan of xianxia, The Last Immortal is definitely something you should check out. A fantastic story that is well acted with a talented cast of actors, and with features some beautiful visuals and a great soundtrack. Do give this show a chance - you may just find yourself leaving a new favourite!

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There is no absolute fairness in the world, but efforts can be made to prevail relative fairness.

Overview of Plot:-

The drama starts with Fan Xian faking his death and discovering the truth of his identity. When he returned to the capital from Bei Qi, he realised how corrupt the government officials are. He felt infuriated yet helpless when he saw how the people holding power treats the common people.

Fan Xian discovered many secrets at the end of the season 1 which now made his trust on his backers to waver. This season is more focused on character development of Fan Xian and developing a goal for his unruly life towards changing the world, as his mother aspired to back then. He reluctantly started to walk down the same path as his mother but with a new witty way.

Will Fan Xian still be able to get his revenge after knowing who the mastermind was behind Teng Zi Jing's death? Will he be able to unveil the one who is in cahoots with the enemy country? Will he be able to stand firm against injustice and unfairness of the world? As he discovered his identity, what will he going to do now? Will he ever be succeed in uncovering the truth of his mother's death and the suspense of his own birth and memories? Will he trust again those backers of his?
Stay tuned to know more.

My Views:-

This season is highly focused on political intrigue and there is a lack of adventure. However, this doesn't disappoint me even a little. After a number of dreadful events, Fan Xian realized no matter how capable he is, he alone cannot upholds justice for innocent. He figure out if he wants to walk down on the path of fairness and justice, he needs to make alliance and his own faction.

Fan Xian becomes aware of fact that in the struggle of power, lives of common people are treated as chess piece. No one cares for them. Almost everyone is accustomed to this, and those who are not, can do nothing about it. They are afraid to speak up because they have no one to watch their backs and so will end up being dead eventually. The cruelty of world opened his eyes wide.

As this is a long awaited season, therefore, it's inevitable to compare both of the seasons. In terms of writing, this season is not as marvelous as the season 1 but it doesn't mean it's a disappointment. I loved this season as well.

Nevertheless, this season is more of character building of Fan Xian and other characters. It's the foundation of his journey of becoming most influential and powerful being and to polish his ruthlessness and wits to make him capable of surviving in the power struggle. Not everything can be done by force, by fighting, sometimes you need people and it's become a game of mind power, a game of wits. This season conveys this game perfectly. Don't worry about the serious vibes, humour is there all over the drama, but there are also some unnecessary comedy which was definitely not needed. Additionally, the story arcs are a bit mess. It's not a smooth sailing as it was in season 1. I wonder what happened to the writers while writing the arcs in this season.

Speaking of acting of the original actors from season 1, it's excellent, no more words needed. Even after 5 years, they all did justice to their characters with the same vibe of season 1. However, the casting of new actors to replace old ones fell short. Yan Bing Yun in season 1 was more like a paranoid and dead serious person, but in this season his demeanor seems to change completely to a person who often smiles and not as serious as he was introduced in season 1. That serious vibe and tension between him and Fan Xian is gone completely. Coming to Ye Ling'er, the previous actress did her job perfectly as a hot-headed tomboy, but in my opinion, the new actress couldn't match upto the character's essence.

Lin Wan'er became more likable as a character for me as compared to season 1 which is quite a good thing. She finally has grown up and acts like adults in this season. In this season, I loved her chemistry with Fan Xian.

Fan Ruo Ruo is becoming the best female character in this drama, the girl was already well versed in literature and discipline, now she became a surgeon and snipper at the same time. Her character is becoming more and more strong.

My most loved characters in this season besides Fan Xian are Fan Jian, Fan Ruo Ruo, Fei Jie and Wu Zhu. They are the only ones who never left Fan Xian's side and never seek any benefit in return. I am so glad that Fan Xian never changed his surname and never left his family.

Fan Si Zhe shows the most development in his character. Sometimes it takes a moment for a man to grow up, this suits him very well.

Li Cheng Ze, the second prince, now playing on front. We now realised what his mother said about him, when she met Fan Xian, was all true. He is not as simple as he looks like, so is the Crown Prince. Nonetheless, he always seems like an interesting character to me from the season 1. He is as crazy as his aunt.

Action part is there but in the last quarter of this season and new mysteries and revelations came into picture but it's far from enough compared to season 1. As for production, colour palette is bit warmer compared to season 1 and looks really good. Costumes are beautiful as in the season 1. But music was somewhat off. It feels like, makers added wrong background music in some scenes which doesn't go with the vibe of that moment. For example, at the time of Fan Xian's surgery, they added somewhat light-hearted music which does not fit with serious vibe of that scene in starting. It tonned down the significance of that particular crest fallen moment.

Overall, despite its minor cons it still was a great watch for me. It's captivating enough to make me binge watched this season as well. However, I have some mixed feelings about the ending. Ending felt a bit rushed and unexplained but obviously for making a path for next season.

If you still couldn't decide whether to watch it, then go and watch, it certainly won't disappoint if you love to watch political intrigue and how crazy can people be just to gain power. This is the best choice indeed.

Hope the next season won't take another five years to air.

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Best thriller airing right now

Omg I was just holding my breath till the end of the second episode. what a fast paced series.. with lots of suspense and everytime leave us in a cliffhanger. Not to mention the acting, we all know the leads and their extraordinary performance. Ji sung my fav..
From the 1st two episodes, we can see friendship, revenge, love, death, investigation, fight and everything. This is a complete pack.
The plot also seems new to me. A detective from the narcotics team (jang jae- he is the main lead) who, after being forcibly addicted to drugs by some illegal drug dealers, finds unexpected turns in his life. And at the same time, his old friend commits suicide which he believes as a murder. The main plot twist is that, his dead friend left 5 million dollar worth insurance money to both our main leads jung jae and oh yun ( btw they were not so close to give them 5 million dollars lol). it's suspicious. Now our officer has many things to unfold, like.. the drug dealer, the murderer, and also the reason for his friend to take a life insurance worth 5 million dollars, all while hiding his addiction from everyone. The answer to the questions is all connected.
It's interesting to me atleast. But I can guarantee you.. you will all wonder what will happen next.. for sure
So go and watch this masterpiece

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Joy of Life? More Like Joy of My Life

Just finished the last episode and the sense of loss hit me hard. What a truly mind blowing end to this season. I don't think there are up to 3 Cdramas that had successful sequels that have the same level of quality and story telling. I can categorically say JOL is one.

I understand why some are nitpicking and looking for faults that don't exist, this is literally the diamond of the season, the more we the fans gush about it, the more they wanna tear it apart, holding this masterpiece to such high standards but literally turning a blind eye to all the trash dramas being rolled out every week in cdramaland?

I also know we can't all have the same tastes, but the 2 seasons shouldn't be compared as they're intrinsically different, if Fan Xian had continued the same journey of season 1, the same critics complaining season 2 is boring will be the very ones saying how stale the story has become. Most people don't even understand the premise of this show tbh, this isn't one of those shows where everything is explicitly revealed, even an eye twitch alone here can mean the admission or rebuttal of a fact.

The depth and writing of the characters is unlike any show out there. No one is a plain bad or good character, we all know the emperor is a sadistic megalomaniac, but damn I have such a deep admiration of him, he has such presence and charisma I'm yet to see in ANY emperor, when I watch dramas with the dumbest emperors being led around by their consorts, i roll my eyes and ask why can't they be like HIM comeon! Even the scene he revealed himself as FXs dad had me teary.

I'm so proud of FXs growth this season, every character was meaningful, every episode was interesting with zero fillers and I'll miss everyone, even He Zong Wei, lol

Season 1 : 10/10
Season 2: 10/10
Season 3: 10/10 in advance hehe?

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They took everything that made the webtoon a masterpiece, and threw it away.

Great casting, based on a very good story, this drama had everything to become one of the best... but no.

The beginning was ok, but it started to get very messy in the middle. What made the story good was the fact that human beings are very weak in front of money, and they can do ANYTHING to gain more. There is no specific bad or good guy, only desperate people wanting to get rich. And that's what the show is missing. Here, they strictly threw the line between the good ones and the bad ones. They got rid of the biggest plot twist ever which made the main point of the story (won't spoil it to ppl who want to read the webtoon after watching the show). It's supposed to be a very complicated and psychological story, and I think that the show is not showing that AT ALL.

Biggest disappointment of the year so far.

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A watchable and decent, but somewhat bland, historical mini drama spin on Flower of Evil

Shadows of You is like a historical mini drama spin on the K-drama Flower of Evil. Overall, it was surprisingly not bad for a mini drama and the production values were pretty decent too. It was refreshing to have a C-drama where the main couple was already married from the start. Like FoE, behind the mystery and intrigue, it's a story about trust. How well do you know the person you love most? Unfortunately, that's where the similarities end. For a fairly angsty story premise and title, Shadows of You didn't feel very angsty. While the acting was fine, it somehow lacked the passion and chemistry found in many other mini dramas, let alone FoE.

My biggest quibble, however, was the "low budget" music -- the music itself was fine, but it was the same soothing, sleepy melody (like those calm work/study music found on YouTube) throughout almost the entire series regardless of the context, scene, mood, opening or closing credits. Once I noticed it, it was hard to ignore, and I believe it hampered some of the dramatic tension that Flower of Evil did so well. (Granted, it's silly to compare a low budget mini C-drama with a high profile K-drama production!)

Overall, an easy background watch that deserves higher than the current 6.8, but also nothing to get excited about.

(Warning for those who rely on English subs -- unfortunately they are hilariously bad and confusing. :( It seems like they ran it through an audio transcriber, so words that sound similar are mistranslated, like "hua" for example -- which was meant to be "painting" (4th tone) in the drama, but kept getting translated to "flower" (first tone) instead.

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SO MUCH MORE THAN JUST A BL

When we hear "BL", people start to stereotyping. but BL is not or it shouldn't be a "genre" as we don't have the "straight" genre.

This show is something else and dare I say one of the best works of P'Aof.

The casting was on point. Choosing EarthMix was the right choice as they show chemistry in a level we haven't seen before and their acting was convincing and emotional. This was Gemini Fourth first work together (they shoot it before MSP) and they SHINE. Fourth played anxiety and angst so well while Gemini on his first job had to act without being able to talk and it was perfect. First and Khaotung were also amazing in portraying emotion and heartbreak but nothing new there.

The cinematography and photography that allowed us to see the real skin tones of Earth and Khatung is amazing for me and that's something P'Aof always brings in his shows. It was also beautiful, aestheticly speaking

the storyline made me cry several times. it was a good script and the actors knew how to bring it to life.

We got past traumas, the harsh reality of those in lower class, anxiety, family issues, the struggles of parenting, internalized homophobia, grief... and all of this being treated with respect and realism

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