Warm on a Cold Night (2023)

underrated

I absolutely loved this the romance is so cute between them, the ML slowly gets a soft spot for the FL and they eventually get together.

Plot: Qi prince goes to the Qian kingdom to find a long lost friend of his and solves cases along the way with an investigator who were investigating the same case at the time and decided to do it together then they gradually developed feelings while the Qian prince also took an interest in the FL.
(Happy ending btw)

Acting: acting was on point i haven't seen the ML before and i'm hoping to see more ancient dramas of him cause in terms of looks and acting he's perfection. The chemistry is really good between the actors. And the other actors nailed their roles

Quality: Amazing backgrounds and camera quality, this drama deserves so much more.

RECOMMENDED!

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detective historical fantasy with strong start & cute chemistry but sizzles out

It has potential for so much more, but what it is right now is that it's enjoyable enough.

The main couple has the tropes of smart pure girl/smart (bad) boy with a bit of star-crossed lovers feeling because he's a prince, she's just a normal person, he's from a different race than she is. However, they can't help but come together since she needs him physically (literally) because something about him helps with her physical health whereas she's smart and clever enough to help him with his own investigation.

It's enjoyable enough thanks to the cuteness and chemistry of Li Yitong and Bi Wenjun. I think they really make this worth it. The storyline though starts to drag about midway to 2/3 of the way. I kept wondering when it'll come back to the main plot that got male lead investigating in the first place. It really feels like the cases don't even connect until the very end where the plot twist is, well, that. (I personally didn't care for the plot twist and was actually quite disappointed.) Also, there were cases to do about the two different races but I feel like it doesn't go quite deep enough...

Anyway, about 2/3 of the way, I ended up watching it on double-speed or fast-forwarding through scenes because it feels like none of it really matters. My score of this drama is also impacted by the fact that I got super attached to one of the characters that ended up, uh, not being what I wanted. I felt like it was badly written.

So I won't be returning to this drama anytime soon. Maybe for the cuteness of the couple and definitely Bi Wenjun since he's super good-looking. But this drama isn't memorable enough for me to return to it often.

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Tepid

I went into this due to ML and FL. Starting was good MLs and supporting cast was good. Half way through the series i started getting annoyed with FLs attempt to control the ML and she trying to compete in the bureau. There are so many plot holes that it is obvious that they trying to force the scenarios. Romance part is okay but no chemistry. FL is acting like a spoiled brat and it keeps getting annoying and it never ends. Li Yi Tong for the first time i felt she does not have much range for emotions, he r acting was tacky. Biggest plot hole is in the last episode won't disclose it here but you got to watch it. Ending felt rushed. I was frustrated it suddenly ended.
Good part is Yang Shi Ze rocked the look and part of prince Wen Ying, looked dapper.

My two cents, if you have nothing to watch then watch this .

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A historical mystery with romance, great fight scenes and attention to detail

This historical drama is about a prince who meets a female local law enforcement from an unfriendly tribe. And the struggle to have a romance begins with murder mysteries that they try to solve together. The clues lead them through a swap of historical drama politics and local crimes of passion and hate. With some excellent sword play and fight scenes. And of course unrequited love.

The drama does get off to a slow start but if you stick with it the action, laughs, tears and romance does eventually pick up. The clues are there for the twist if you follow the mystery closely.

Actors sport nice layered costumes to add to this show's atmosphere.
This drama is filmed nicely with pleasant shots and above average cinematology. The effects and attention to background detail was excellent. Definitely a nice watch.

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Cute but nothing special.

Warm on a cold night is a cute and fun historical fantasy drama, that unfortunately leaves me feeling lukewarm. It has a happy ending and is perfect for someone who wants to watch something that doesn't have angst or misunderstandings and is light. It's also perfect for those who want to watch a drama that fully revolves around the main leads, without the drama having millions of side characters.
The drama is an investigation drama that has romance mainly in the 5 last episodes.

STORY:
The story is about two neighbouring kingdoms, Qian and Qi. Qi is a northern kingdom, where people are very different from Qian people. Qi people are shapeshifters that have powers and can live up to 200 years or so. Qi people have "super" hearing, are extremely strong, have a really good sense of smell and can be super fast. Qian is a kingdom where no one has these kind of "magical" powers. Qi and Qian have a peace treaty between them but they need to officially sign it. Qi kingdom needs it, because after getting their "Holy Fire/Ember" stolen, the snow and the cold has started to make their lives hard.

The story revolves around Su Jiuer, a Qian investigator of the investigation bureau. She is righteous and smart, following her father's footsteps. When investigating a murder case in the Qian capital, she interrogates an arrogant Qi man, Han Zheng. She soon realizes that Han Zheng is not a suspect, he is after the murderer too. The murderer is suspected to be a man with three scars on his cheek, Mu Yan, Han Zheng's childhood friend who stole the Ember. When touching Han Zheng's hand, Su Jiuer finds his touch strangely revitalising, almost as curing her strange disease that makes her dizzy and pass out. She wants to stay close to him due to this and quickly suggests that they investigate together. They become partners and they go from case to case, solving murders, meeting new friends and looking for Mu Yan. They slowly fall in love.


SPOILER PART OF THE STORY, MY OPINION:

The plot started of great. This had the ingredients to be a really good fantasy investigation drama, but i think it kinda fell through. In my opinion Su Jiuer wasn't an interesting character and to me it was no surprise that in the investigation bureau she was the ONLY one with intelligence and the only female in the whole bureau. The fact that her only competition in intelligence was our male lead, Han Zheng, didn't come to me as a surprise. Han Zheng is a prince of the Qi kingdom and is expected to become their next king.
While investigating a murder case, they meet the 2nd prince of Qian kingdom, Wen Jun. He was very lacking as a 2nd male lead to me. He had been looking for Su Jiuer for a while, because they met when they were kids and she was the only one kind to him when his mother was dying. He wasn't really all that smart but wanted to tag along to every investigation. He was a great help but mainly because of his influence in the capital. He was an okay character but he was nothing special to me, just a 2nd prince whose only hobbies were writing plays, paintings and running after Jiuer and Han Zheng.

Han Zheng was also a very typical male lead, cold and arrogant at first who warms up to the people around him and falls in love with Su Jiuer. Now, im not saying there's anything bad about being the typical male lead, but i think he was just missing a little bit of spice. The Qi people are shapeshifters, yet we only see a little bit of the shapeshifting. In Warm on a cold night's poster, behind Han Zheng is a wolf. Qi people also howl to each other. Yet we didnt see any wolves or shapeshifting into one. I get it, it must be because this is a low budget drama..

Warm on a cold night started off strong, introducing these characters and the mystery of Mu Yan and the ember. The plot flattened very fast. It was a case after case and i didn't see much development in the plot or in any of the characters. After watching the drama i was really confused how they managed to spent 36 episodes on this plot. From the very start the villain is suspected to be Mu Yan. It was indeed a plot twist to find out that the Crown Prince was Mu Yan. It left me baffled. He had a skin like mask on his face and i never would have guessed he was Mu Yan. It felt like they just decided towards the end that Mu Yan is the crown prince because they didnt have time to properly tie the knots. His reasoning for doing all of this didn't make sense to me at all and he didn't seem like a real villain. Also his fate was left unresolved. Han Zheng and Chi Lan ( their childhood friend, (who clearly has feelings towards Mu Yan as he does towards her) a Qi general, who in the end becomes the new King of the Qi) fight with Mu Yan, when he is trying to kill Su Jiuer because she has the Ember inside of her. Han Zheng nor Chi Lan have the guts or the will to kill Mu Yan, Chi Lan gives him a dangerously fatal blow but he leaves the scene alive. No one knows his fate. So he was left unpunished.

Su Jiuer has the ember inside of her and in the last episode suddenly without telling Han Zheng, she takes the Ember out of her body (with the help of her mother), so they can cure the Qi people affected by a poison that Mu Yan spread. Now.. This felt rushed too. How did she know how to get it out and stuff? There wasn't much time to search about the matter either..
She dies and Han Zheng gives her a lot of his Qi vital energy core. A blue jem on every Qi persons chest that helps them control their powers and keep them alive. When a Qian person ingests it, they see the Qi person in their dreams and can have some Qi powers too. Suddenly we get a time skip to their wedding and in the middle of the ceremony Su Jiuer hears someone calling for help, so they rush to help. Su Jiuer now has the super speed and hearing but Han Zheng doesn't. And that's how the drama ends.
It wasn't a bad drama, but not the best ones i've seen. I'm giving it a solid 7-7,5. It would've been a 8, if the ending was not so rushed and left me with so many questions and plot holes.


ACTING:

Li Yi Tong as Su Jiuer,
I love her. She is so beautiful, has a pleasant voice and is a really nice actress. Her acting never annoys me. She bring out this childish yet mature vibe in all her characters and think she was a really pleasant female lead!

Bi Wen Jun as Han Zheng,
A great choice for the male lead. He brings out a cute and mature vibe as well. A solid male lead.

Honorable mentions for Hei Ru Xian as Chi Lan, who seemed cold but was a warm person deep down. A great pick for this role. and Wang Mao Lei as Godfather of Su Jiuer, Hu Badao. He was the amazing comic relief in this drama and was the scene stealer!

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Blows hot and cold

What i liked:
The fight scenes were really awesome
The acting was good enough
The cases they solved were good and well written though a bit dragged out
Some side characters were really awesome
The plot twist was really good, i kept second guessing myself

What i don't like:
The storyline could have been much better
The main characters were not written well, i would have hated the characters if not that the actor and actress pulled it off in a way that made it tolerable
The ending was not good enough, they did not give us any conclusion on the other characters
Too many plot holes, i had to suspend my common sense for a bit.

Overall some aspects were really good but some aspects were not so it's somewhat in the middle for me. The cases was what made me keep watching. Would recommend but definitely not rewatch.

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Did you run around in gym class on all fours as a kid? This one's for you!

Spoiler FREE review.
In this delightfully fun story of Jiu'er, the sickly assistant of the local police, and Han Zheng, the werewolf she befriends, we get a lot of fluffy foolishness and the semblance of a plot. Listen, if you came here for a start plot to keep you on your toes, sit down because the ending is going to slap you in the face a few times while punching you in the gut. Are there loose ends? Yes. Does it matter? No.
You fall in love with these characters and that is what upholds the entire drama. The acting is well done with just the right amount of goofiness to make it funny but not cheesy. The main couple have great chemistry despite my initial doubts.
Great for: lazy weekend watches, sick days, staying up later than you should, and stuck-inside-bc-it's-a-hurricane-outside.

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A special feeling just like warm and cold

My first completed Chinese drama, which is not a short story. Since I'm still watching modern dramas, I haven't really delved deeply into historical dramas. Which I know that China is the best known for, I didn't have much expectations going into this drama whatsoever. However, this drama caught my attention because it featured mystery in addition to the prettiest faces. Finding a drama about investigations that keeps my interest after the first episode has been difficult for me. I'm aware that many people have claimed to find this boring, but to be completely honest, I don't buy it. I really enjoyed all the mystery elements in episodes 11 through 14, but it does feel a little draggy. I also acknowledge that since the appeal of the story is in its world building, I wish there had been more of it in the last episode, it ended to aburtley. The ML personality may have even surprised me. It's because I'm accustomed to CEOs who are cold-blooded, but despite the fact that I occasionally found him annoying, I like his character even though we was in they descent of a cold blodded male lead he was potrayed a little different and I believe he complements the female lead. She was intelligent, which some people found boring, but I liked how she was portrayed as a cute girl who is also intelligent, especially in earlier times when women were thought to be less capable than men. I believe they are rumoured to be in another drama because their on-screen chemistry is so adorable. I hope it is true because I would definitely watch it.The acting I think is good from both sides sometimes I do get what people are saying that the female lead will overeact. I honestly did not notice that the male lead was dubbed it took me by suprise. I could also talk about the villain, and how I expected better from their and more of a conclusion to them but I was still suprised at the plot twists, enjoyed them and they weren't too completely unoticable. I've never felt unitrested when they were on scream, or had the need to skip the sceen. 

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Warm, enjoyable, and well-cast (plus you get to hear Dongfang Qingcang's voice again)

I quite enjoyed this one, even though I never felt the uncontrollable urge to binge it. I really liked the cast, sets, costumes (I loved Chi Lan's gorgeous hats), and overall story, even if some of the execution could have been better.

I am normally indifferent to love triangles, but found this one really entertaining, funny, and endearing. Chen Heyi has really matured as an actor and was immensely likeable and believable in his role as the innocent and earnest prince. He Ruixian was very compelling as Chi Lan and I hope to see her take on more lead roles in the future. Bi Wenjun and Li Yitong did a solid job with the material they were given. Their characters could have easily been off-putting if the casting had been different; instead, they made them quite likable despite Han Zheng's cranky personality and Su Jiu'er's pouty moments. The ending could've been even just a few minutes longer -- to flush out what happened between the Qi and Qian people, and bring more complete closure to some of the story lines and characters -- especially given how much time they spent on each case throughout the series. Even so, there was a lot that I loved about the ending and it didn't feel rushed in the typical sense where everything suddenly wraps up in the final two minutes.

Finally, a shout-out to the voice actor for Han Zheng -- Wang Baoshun, who also voiced Dongfang Qingcang in Love Between Fairy and Devil. I am normally not a fan of dubbing and will always prefer live audio, or at least dubbing by the actors themselves, but if they were going to use someone else's voice anyway, I'm happy they picked Wang.

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What the effity eff!!

Well, I was bored and did not have a show to watch and I found this. Started out slow but picked up pace. This is a murder mystery with a dash of fantasy and a sprinkle of romance and a layer of small comedy if you squint your eyes enough to find it. The story line is not the best or the most captivating but E for effort!
I think this is the first show I have not detested any character as much even the annoying ones, and that is a testament to a show I do not know if that is a good thing or a bad thing. But, that means it's either the script was just below par and the actors themselves did not bring out what the characters should portray...
Had high hopes for the eldest prince not as Muyan(wen ying)and the general (chilan) but that was a bust , I had deduced he was the villain of the show early on which ruined the surprise as it was delivered in a vanilla like manner.
The good thing about the show is the friendship btwn the characters, the chemistry btwn the leads and even the relationship between mother and daughter and godfather and jiuer...
The OST wasn't as memorable but it wasn't bad either...
At least the effects weren't as bad and I finished it unlike song of the moon.. so that is a good thing..
Rewatch value? I can't rewatch it but worth passing the time...
If you want something to pass the time and enjoy a nice steady paced show then this is fine

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2 PRINCES & 1 AVERAGE GIRL

An average looking sickly girl landed 2 handsome princes from Qian and Qi tribes, how could they be? By solving mystery of crimes, 1 Prince came to be her assistant and the other Prince interested in writing a scrip by learning her technique in solving mystery, and top of that the 2 Princes wanted to take her as partner for life. It's rather unusual story taking advantage of ridiculous fantasy world, the portrayal of her getting supply of energy was like 'orgasm'. The best character was her God Father; he's loving, accommodating, funny, loyal, protective, and cute. Their relation is best as father/daughter than God Father should be but too bad he's died - here it went the 'fun' character, the only character that worth watching.

Nothing really stood out on any episodes. Nothing memorable in acting (& all female were acting annoying). Lousy costumes. Colorful palace & houses interior/exterior which no particular dynasty representation. Cheap story. None literary mentioned. Seems like a contemporary ancient C-drama.

Liu YuNing sound tract song is always beautiful. I dropped this drama...I want something else better!!

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