Love and Crown

should've seen the writings on the wall ...

so this is the same screenwriter for sword and beloved , that being said ; here's what went wrong

from the start everything was confusing and tended to be rushed and made non sense , the scene where she stabs him in the beginning , her running away and getting caught , the wedding by the way you get all of this in first episode , then we get a flashback without even giving us a hint that was a flashback , you find out from the context that they don't know each other yet

the ML with his cold illness like he is dying and getting poisoned every episode and FL is crying for him it was really tiring .

FL indecisiveness like make up your mind do you love ML or wanna kill him for kill your master , one minute she is plotting to hurt him and the other she is in love with him .

a lot of dragging in the middle she gets kidnapped , he tries to save her by using a stronger poison to suppress his cold poison and we drag for a little bit

prince of yuzhang the most clueless person i've ever seen or he is playing dumb don't know , nevertheless he the one who gets to live in the end ,

Du tingxin can't remember her name , however , for 19 episodes no sure of the number , she is all about i want to save xiao huan he is my savior , suddenly she discovers she is his half sister and a princess and get that hunger for power and goes into i am gonna kill everyone phase .

for ep 20 onward everything becomes a whole lot messier .

ML role here was all about suffering and dying the end , don't know what was I expecting from allen ren drama usually they all have sad endings or he dies .

everyone dies empress dowager , FL , ML , du tingxin "not sure " , zhong lin "don't know why she died " , xiao ying .

on the bright side acting was superb and music also and that's it can't think of something else .

if you watch this drama don't expect much .

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Personal complaint: What is the story with Ren Jia Lun's hair and makeup? Everyone else's is lush and beautiful, but Jia Lun's hair piece is fakey-fake and his makeup causes him to look sickly and washed
out all the way through. He is such a handsome man, this movie did not do him justice.

OK, now that I've got that off my chest.... the production is a little clunky all the way through but worst at the beginning and does improve.

The acting is reasonably good with a wide array of interesting characters.

The plot is a little tortured.

Spoiler alert: I personally hate when everyone dies at the end. 😕

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It would be much better if the drama ended on 24th episode

The first half was really good and interesting. The fall of the Grand Tutor could end the story and thus the whole drama would have been a lot better. Or, if the producers wanted more conflict and more tension, they could have gone as far as the episode 27 with a final coup by the Tutor helped by this horrible women, Grand Preceptor. And then just destroy their plot, by feigning the emperor's death in cooperation with his younger brother. But no... they just had to have a tragic end. The problem was not with the tragedy itself, but that it seemed really unnecessary and far fetched. The younger prince was completely unconvincing in his collaboration with the Preceptor. He was clearly aware of her scheming, but unreasonably choose to turn against his brother. As if he became completely dumb all of a sudden despite being really intelligent before. And the last straw: the apparition of emperor's mother out of nowhere... And if she could reveal the truth to the Preceptor at the end, why couldn't she do it before the emperors' death? It was just nonsensical: lots of possible exits to have a happy ending, but just going for a sad one.
And the last criticism: the level of primness in this drama is abnormally high. Even in the context of chinese censorship, how this drama is avoiding any warmer scenes... it is unbelievable. They really exagerate here.

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Strong Potential Undermined by Weak Writing and Inconsistent Characters

I really wanted to like Love and Crown, mainly because I see genuine potential in Allen Ren. He was excellent in One and Only, and his performance in The Blue Whisper was solid as well. Unfortunately, this project doesn’t live up to that promise. The shortcomings don’t lie in a single area—the writing, production choices, character construction, and even the chemistry all feel underdeveloped.

The male lead is framed as a ruler forged by prolonged patience—someone who willingly surrendered regency and endured years of restraint in order to consolidate strength. Instead, his character remains surprisingly passive. Rather than embodying the weight and transformation of a king, his primary motivation revolves almost exclusively around protecting the empress. This makes him feel more like a reactive figure than a decisive one—more talk than action—undermining what could have been a far more compelling arc.

The empress, meanwhile, is written as an idealistic heroine guided by a simple moral framework: protect the weak, punish the evil. While this concept works in theory, the execution falls flat. When faced with real consequences, her responses rarely align with the strong moral stance she claims to uphold. Emotional reactions often replace meaningful action, and forgiveness is handed out too easily, even when it contradicts her stated values. This creates a noticeable disconnect between who the character is meant to be and how she actually behaves.

Performance also plays a role here. The actress struggles to convey emotional depth through facial expressions, which weakens pivotal moments and makes it difficult to fully believe in her character’s internal conflict or convictions.

Two recurring narrative patterns stand out throughout the series. First is the overused trope of “hurting someone for their own good,” repeatedly employed without enough nuance to justify its emotional weight. Second is the persistent tendency to shift blame onto the king for nearly every misfortune, as if other characters lack agency or responsibility for their own choices. This imbalance becomes increasingly frustrating and reduces the complexity of the story’s moral landscape.

Ultimately, I decided to stop at episode 23. By that point, the script felt repetitive, the plot logic strained, and the emotional chemistry still absent. Love and Crown had the ingredients for a strong political and emotional drama, but weak writing and inconsistent character development prevent it from reaching its potential.

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The story and The casting

the story is outstanding but the the acting is even more intriguing than the story itself, the actors played their roles perfectly I thought it was real at the end I shed tears hoping it could have ended a little differently but then I remembered it's just a movie, anyway Thank you for the experience and unique feeling I had while I was watching this series. I loved it especially the character xiao Huan and Ling cangcang their story was so touching that I almost felt pity for them that it had to end this way and without a proper goodbye and reunion after so much struggle, I felt as if I was the one experiencing the loss but truly the acting was exceptional and grand I thank a lot the casting crew and also the one who played xiao Ying, I loved her cause the way she played that character is profound

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The actors saved the drama that was poorly written

I feel so bad for RLJ! This has the poorest plot I've seen this year. I would rather watch low-budget vertical dramas than this one! I like how the cast followed and acted what was needed to do but the last few episodes were so rushed as vital scenes were trimmed horribly, creating obvious gaps in the drama's logic and flow - most especially how Cangcang got a son whereas Bai died on that ceremony. They just showed they got a son 5 years later instead of following what's shown on the ep. teaser? WTF hahaha. The narrative suffered from the said disjointed editing that omitted impt sequences ngl. Good thing RLJ is done done in that agency. Hope he'll be treated well on this new journey - more freedom to accept better projects soon . Still trending because the actors gave their best but the creator sux.

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Great Acting from the Whole Cast, Captivating Plot, But Too Many Tragedies

This is a great story. The acting from everyone is done very well, and I love that I am getting certified evidence that Ren Jia Lun is a captivating actor, despite the criticism I often hear about his wooden, copy&paste acting or his "No Kissing Rule" (which is true, and is in effect here, but he has time and time again proven that you can really sell a romance without any explicit intimacy).

PROS
The Main CP Falling In Love - Despite the opening scene showing a rather forced marriage between 2 people with no affection, the immediate next flashback arc (which lasts several episodes, and really should’ve just been the chronological exposition of the show) was like perfect sugary romantic candy. And their relationship is so believable and goes so deep, and has so many real, non-superficial, marital issues that they deal with with so much grace towards the people around them. So the main CP is a win win WIN, and all of the side couples are also very enjoyable (everyone is so dang attractive in this drama).

The Rizz of Ren Jia Lun - RJL has so much charisma, this is the drama that made me realize that his face is actually attractive. It has attractive angles, a manly eyebrow bridge and cheekbones, glistening eyes, and the fiercest eyebrows you’ve ever seen. And he seems to have a very stern, furrow-browed default facial expression, and that perfectly, perfectly fits his character as the Emperor. It is a deadpan look, but it is the kind of deadpan look that gives you the impression “I am the one in charge here. De facto. My aura alone commands everyone’s attention.” And seeing this expression always mixed with some very whipped, lovesick boy idol drama-type behavior is the most satisfying juxtaposition, it gives “I am a man, and I am not afraid to love you” <333. And on top of that, he also has some great micro-expressions that I remember him also pulling out in previous dramas like DHR, so it's definitely not a fluke. An example is early on when he tries to get accepted into Fenglai Pavilion and he wakes up after they’ve tied him up; when he recognizes his surroundings, processes the situation, and then quietly says to himself “I let my guard down”, there were SOOOO many small expressions and beats in that realization moment, and it gave so much context as to who his character is. I’m telling you, some may see his acting as stiff, wooden, and always the same, but the proof is in the minor details, this guy can ACT.

The Brotherly/Sisterly Love - This drama features really strong bromance between siblings who should’ve been rivals for the throne, but instead trusted and understood each other like no one else (all this in the face of a mother who vehemently tried to pit them against each other their whole life to get her biological son to fight for the throne?? Like not only did he not give in to this manipulation to grow animosity towards the ML, the emperor, but he even spent his whole life pretending that he was somewhat in agreement with his mother in order to protect his older brother). And then there are so many touching sibling moments between the ML and his 2 younger siblings that I just had to repeat (XY coming to ask her gege to allow the boy she likes to like her back, in the middle of the night while he is sleeping on the empress’s bed, whiel giving him the biggest most innocent puppy dog eyes, after she spent most of the drama plotting to murder him before she fell in love with someone). So many people are used as pawns to destroy the ML’s life, his siblings, his wife, and yet he never falls for it and always recognizes that someone else is pulling the strings, so there is no retaliation, no enemies with the middle man, and no bad blood. We need more smart, perceptive, cunning, cool-headed ML’s like him.

Fierce Battles w/ the ML Coming Out On Top - And then there are so many great battles that the ML is in. Like he has been an emperor since he was a teenager or younger, not even the type that needs to go to war and lead troupes, and he has his own secret service - why is he such an OP fighter? And this is even when he was born weak and has lived with a fatal poison in his body since birth. I love, love, love over-powered ML’s, but this drama doesn’t even need to have one since it is a romance+politics drama, so the fact that it has that is just icing on the cake.

Epic Reveals - And also, there are some really great “satisfying” reveals, particularly in episode 17 when he reveals his Emperor identity to Kumor, after beating him in a physical combat 1-on-1x and then flexing on how much power and reinforcements he has, and then choosing to show mercy and give in to all of Kumor’s demands. What a boss-like reveal + negotiation, I literally replayed it several times.

Jam Packed with Sweet, Happy Moments - Like in Episode 24, which was the “calm before the storm”, when everything is going right, the main villain is presumed defeated, all the side couple are coupling up and the main CP is even expecting a baby. The first 2/3rds of this drama had so much fluff and cotton candy, anyone would be full on all that they gave us.

CONS
Bad Ending - I haven’t seen how they do the ending yet, but **spoiler alert** I know that everyone dies, and this is pretty upsetting because the ML has been set up to be so OP and cunning and 5 steps ahead of everyone else that it is almost inconsistent with his characterization to ultimately lose in the end (lose in the sense that he may stop the bad guy, but he will be unable to protect the lives of anyone he loves or even himself).

Too Many Realistic Tragedies - There were too many tragedies that I had to skip over because my heart couldn’t take (e.g. when the FL miscarries their child due to a punch in the stomach from the ML’s sister of all things, and she’s not even evil or an adversary, she was just weak and manipulated through hypnosis). I don’t know how the ML/FL can still function immediately after all that, but I sure couldn’t.

So I'm docking points because it made me sad, and docking points because the ML seems too good to die, both of which, will limit the re-watch ability of this show for me.

And also, I still have 5 more episodes left, but it really seems like we are in the last battle, especially since we’ve already seen so much tragedy and death of leading characters. So I am concerned about how they will drag out this battle for 5 more episodes, and how many more smaller losses I’ll have to sit through knowing that the ML and FL, SML and FML, and everyone else will probably lose and all die in the end. I don’t anticipate any more scenes that will be making me happy, and that’s a lot of tragedy to sit through, so I don’t look forward to finishing this drama.

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Mark Cousins once suggested that a quick way to success is a wedding in your series/film. It didn’t quite work out in “Love and Crown”, by Jiangsu Satellite TV currently shown on Netflix.

It starts with a bride-to-be in a red dress seeing revenge at a CGI location mimicking Court of the Fountain in the city of Minas Tirith!? During the course of this 30+ episodes it only gets further away from being a remotely coherent story.

But if you are willing to give it a try, or not try to reason with the unreasonable, there is an exceptional leading man who burns both ends of the candle portraying a king who ruled nations but not himself. Yet still, it is imbued with profound anxiety, jealousy, constraint, angst, and a commanding, yet nuanced, regal posture.

There is also the question of quite what makes a family – how strong loyalties can be without a blood tie, how weak they can be despite them.

On-screen chemistry gets better in later parts of the series. undecided on the remaining 7 or so episodes as it's already been written that the ending follows the "Tragic path" - it already feels unearned when it betrays the story's established tone, and most importantly the character development.

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Palace Intrigue Done Exceptionally Well

I absolutely loved this. I typically struggle with Ren Jialun’s performances, but I have to say this one is a top-shelf favorite of mine. Everything worked—even when it didn't.

While the overall narrative wasn’t entirely new, with its focus on palace infighting and conspiracies, the execution was so effective that I was fully absorbed, hanging on every line and plot turn. I loved the rich martial arts and the bold characters whose power and potential weren’t limited by gender. Each character captured my attention and drew me into their storylines in impactful ways that stayed with me throughout the drama. I was truly invested in their lives, and I appreciated the multiple layers in both the plot development and the character growth as they navigated identity and relationship dynamics.
This drama isn’t perfect—there were a few moments that made me raise a brow—but everything else made up for what became minor flaws. This is a 10/10 win for me.

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This plot is so predictable, That you can write up every possible way the next conflict can be interesting, and still get the most predictable one. After watching 3 eps I was just skipping true to see if my prediction are right, there is absolutely no effort puts into the plot twists. What threw me off to write this review is the baby thingy, do people get pregnant from hugging now? and the way its presented its so unnecessary, the suspence from the physician has no use, because it doeasnt connect with thw audience, got no emotions from me. Even when she lost the baby, you could see it coming. I have to question why is the baby in the plot anyways.

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