The mistakes that made KMLM sink

WARNING: some content may contain spoiler

Romeo and Juliet took place at the Theatre in London in 1597. For 497 years, it has filled theaters and inspired filmmakers and writers. I can name two great successes based on Romeo and Juliet: West Side Story (1961, directed by Jerome Robbins and Robert Wise, remade in 2021) and Love Story (1970, directed by Arthur Hiller)

Everyone knows how it ends: it didn't shake its success. Endowed with great beauty, the plot has logic and coherence as basic principles, the characters are consistent, with solid characteristics, poetry has a place of honor. So, the problem with KMLM is not the SE: it is the betrayal of logic and coherence, it is the suppression of the consistency and characteristics of the characters. I read, I watched Romeo and Juliet in the theater, in the cinema, COUNTLESS times. As for KMLM, "half" a time would have been enough to not watch it again. It attacks our intelligence and abuses the tolerance we have with a plot that began spectacularly and from the middle to the end turned into a cheap Mexican melodrama.

 SnapDragon:

Yeah, I feel the show just didn’t know when to quit. The revenge plot wrapped up nicely by episode 23, but then the writers decided to introduce a whole new storyline. Suddenly, we were dealing with Xiyan issues instead of Yan issues. And Mei Lin’s death saga was something else. First, she dies, then MJH goes on a tragic journey with her corpse, reminiscent of “Weekend at Bernie’s.” Just when you think it’s over, she comes back to life only to die again, shortly after, for real. And the fumbling of the antidote to save her was just too much. 

Hi, Snap Dragon! I read your excellent analysis in the comments (from 4 hours ago) and I was the first to give it a heart: accurate, fair, perfect, exactly like your comment here. I commented during the week that all kinds of suffering were imposed on good people, villains died quickly. Writers killed off beloved characters like Big Guy (Wei). We suffer the many deaths of ML, transformed into a sick and empty woman. Very funny when you say she died and revived "many times" only to actually die: wonderful critical description! MJH lacks virility: he cries too much, for a prince/general he is weak and has no pulse. The scenes with ML's supposed corpse are unpleasant and implausible, not even the physician notices that the "body" does not stiffen or stink. LM attacks and shames our status as women. Writers condemned those who should be heroes, we would all be avenged, but no!, they vandalized ethics and morals and crowned the villains with love and quick deaths. We don't have a moral to the story, we have an immoral story. We are at a crossroads: between the enchantment and tears, at the beginning, and the laughter that we now have with what was supposed to be a drama and turned into an "Opera Buffa". Thanks a lot for your excellent comment. I would like to invite you to read the article: The Presence of Arts in The Double. I sign the text and Cho Na, MDL writer, signs the wonderful visual design and the competent preliminary edition.

https://mydramalist.com/article/the-presence-of-arts-in-the-double

I think I would have been ok if:

After her fake death, the maids and the big guy decide not to body-snatch her. Instead, they tell MJH everything, and he gets to be there when she wakes up. This way, they don’t have to be apart. Their separation after her fake death annoyed me so much, I couldn't understand at all why she was hiding from him. 

Instead of going to war, MJH and ML head to the mountains where the special flower grows. MJH takes care of ML and becomes her blood slave (she goes along with it because he volunteered himself, it would relieve some of his guilt and he feels like he owes it to her), while he and his bodyguard keep looking for the flower or more seeds. They eventually find some seeds.

Then the war comes into play, and MJH has to go. While he’s away, ML looks after the flower. The war ends, and MJH comes back injured but just in time to see the flower bloom. ML takes the antidote, and the story wraps up with them taking care of each other, leaving the past behind.


All in all, some of the arcs really dragged on and seemed pointless, like the Emperor and Concubine Yan, and Xiyan arc.  Her fake death would have been more meaningful if the writers would have kept the novel ending and she had a chance to live. Making her die for real, shortly after MJH already with through all the grief and suffering with the fake death, was over the top. 

@SnapDragon. 

Yes I was pissed when they snatched the corpse too. And I did not like the separation either. Maybe the writers wanted to coincide with the novel. Because MRJH was carrying someone else's rotten corpse and tried to feed this corpse as well. But at that point of time Mei Lin was in coma. 

I really appreciate these thoroughly detailed comments about the problems of this drama. I was very disappointed that a show I was so much looking forward to turned out to be like this.

It makes me wonder if the writers have heard or seen these critical discussions about their work, and if it will make a difference for future shows. I'm not really encouraged that we'll get better writing. But what does everyone else think? Do you guys think these endings (in particular) reflect the appetites of a Chinese audience or is it just bad plotting and writing?

 Olive4213:

I really appreciate these thoroughly detailed comments about the problems of this drama. I was very disappointed that a show I was so much looking forward to turned out to be like this.

It makes me wonder if the writers have heard or seen these critical discussions about their work, and if it will make a difference for future shows. I'm not really encouraged that we'll get better writing. But what does everyone else think? Do you guys think these endings (in particular) reflect the appetites of a Chinese audience or is it just bad plotting and writing?

No, the Chinese audience themselves have been complaining all over their social media as well. The reason why there are so many BE/SE in cdramas is because the scriptwriters, producers, and actors prefer them. 

@fancy

 fancy:

No, the Chinese audience themselves have been complaining all over their social media as well. The reason why there are so many BE/SE in cdramas is because the scriptwriters, producers, and actors prefer them. 

Do you think these mid-progress  show derails and bad endings have anything to do with complying with government requirements? (I think this may be far fetched, but I'm trying to also figure out why writers, producers, actors are deaf to what the audience tell them they want. How can they be successful if they piss off their audience?)

 fancy:

Lmao, I changed some things before submitting my 'outline' to this forum and forgot to change how the attempt was made and how many witnesses were there. It's so funny now that you point that out. I meant that the assassination attempt would take place, but not at the banquet. It would be similar to what she tried to do in episode 1 but instead of letting her go, she ends up in jail for interrogation.  The banquet for the princess would come later or just be taken out/offscreen. See ep 9 - 11 comments. 

Hi, dear friend Unbeliebubble. Thank you so much for always exchanging your insights with me. All points of view are welcome, I'll not laugh at the interpretations, as expressing ideas is, above all, exposing feelings that are in the heart. I don't intend to refute the interpretative questions you raise, because they are based on a personal vision that I respect, we can love whatever we want, even if it doesn't have the seal, the stamp of quality. It'll be more dynamic for our dialogue to address technical issues of building a narrative, with its arcs.

You say that the writer has the right to give his message: I haven't seen anyone contest this, the contestation takes place within the scope of the quality of the form of this message, in this case, the narrative and all its arcs.
You also said that the series imitates life: fortunately the world has rules, norms, laws that regulate conduct. But we are not talking about current times (you mention D.Trump), but about the Tang Dynasty (618-907 AD), a period that marks the creation of the Tang Code, still active in today's China. It was the apogee of the rigor of the law, even more so for the powerful who frequently betrayed the emperors. I open quotation marks:

"The Tang Code (Chinese: 唐律; pinyin: Tang lǜ) was a penal code that was established and used during the Tang Dynasty in China. Supplemented by civil statutes and regulations, it became the basis for later dynastic codes, not only in China, but in other parts of East Asia. The Code synthesized legalist and Confucian interpretations of law. Created in 624 CE and modified in 627 and 637 CE, it was promulgated in 652 CE with 502 articles in 12 sections and enriched with a commentary. (the Tánglǜ shūyì 唐律疏議) in 653. Considered one of the greatest achievements of traditional Chinese law, the Tang Code is also the oldest Chinese code to be transmitted to the present in its complete form."
As we can observe, we did not see the laws being applied to anyone, neither the poor nor the rich. The writers chose to manipulate facts in favor of the absurd, disproportionately punishing the righteous (rich and poor) and sending the message that crime pays (for rich and poor). If the world were like the world of KMLM, we would be a generalized anarchy, kinda Mad Max world.

What gives value to a work, whatever it may be? What made Molière and Victor Hugo reach our days as heralds of theater and literature? What makes Bach and Mozart still revered today? Why have Greek tragedies been alive for more than 2,000 years? There are aesthetic criteria combined with technical criteria that add value to a work, its historical importance, originality, its significance for society.
There are those who don't like Mozart, but that doesn't change his value to humanity. There are those who give KMLM a 10 and that also won't change its status as a series that had everything it needed to be a hit and sank into a mediocre narrative, abandoning sacred and consecrated technical criteria in works that make humanity proud. Below are some of these technical criteria:

1 Abuse of clichés (I'll mention just a few of the completely predictable facts):

●The repeated death of ML (and resurrections...)
●Use of incense/poisons for all types of narrative manipulation.
●Reappearance of LM as "savior of the homeland" (Two scenes. MJH's image becomes smaller, even though he was crucial in defeating CP and facing the final battle)
●YQ's appearance in the battle, giving him credit for the victory. MJH becomes secondary in this context.
●Forced deaths of beloved characters (Big Guy and Qing Yan)

2 Lack of internal coherence:
●KMLM left poorly developed situations along the way, circumstances that were poorly named and not clarified, and corrupted the texture of the text. The narrative is not believable, which is why it is not convincing. In the imitation of life or ultra-reality, the text is fragile, it did not resist the continuity of the arc, it died along the way. We don't know what MJH and ML's revenge plan was, hatched over 10 years.

3 Absence of character characteristics:

●Key characters were disfigured beyond recognition
●MJH, ML, LM and even the Emperor lost the strong, typical, particular features, which should consolidate their meaning and significance in the sequence of the narration. This was not a twist, but the deliberate "death" of the character in its original conception.

4 Circular writing:

●The narrative went in circles, nothing new or surprising was added, the series invested in unimportant situations/characters. We didn't see new actions being chained towards a climax, nor the peripety of events, the sequence that would allow a good closure, not necessarily a HE.

5 Forgotten Characters:

●Master of Shadow: so essential to the plot, as soon as he appeared, he disappeared.
●Consort Yin simply disappeared. Initially she had a role in the CP plot.

6 Regarding aspects that transformed the drama into a melodrama (in general, melodrama exaggerates everything, is sentimental, aims to bring tears and exacerbate emotions):

A-The fading of the virile characteristics of MJH, a warrior prince, hero of his kingdom, reaches its limit when it transforms him into a passionate teenager, a man with a fragile emotional state (embodying the Master of Shadow required coldness and vigor), he was subject to paralyzing depressions, MJH became excessively emotional to the point of having several crying spells. We are made to feel sorry for him, when we would like to feel proud.

B-The scenes with ML's supposed corpse are not convincing. You defend a realistic message, but a body doesn't stay like a puppet, it stiffens, releases fluids, starts to stink in 2 days. And no one suspects... It's an unpleasant scene, hard to believe and melodramatic to the extreme.

C-LM and CP in prison. The scene uses the classic image of La Pietà to create an aesthetic atmosphere with the clear objective of softening our sense of ethics and justice, involving us in an emotional trap: it is an aberration, an unreasonable scene of support and compassion towards a criminal.

I believe I have addressed the basic errors of KMLM in the light of technical and aesthetic criteria: it has lost value as a serious work, but can please as a mere distraction.