Hi everyone. So I am looking for a historical drama. Preferably Chinese or Japanese.

I have watched some historical dramas, especially Time Travel ones like "Step into the Past"(old one), "Scarlet Heart"(don't like endings in both Korean and Chinese versions), "Nobunaga Concerto"(not bad really), "Faith", "Jin", "Queen In Hyun's Man" and etc.

I tried watching some other dramas, but dropped them because of the plot. The new "Queen Dugu" was not bad though. 

The most important thing is 1. Historical. 2. No polygamy(if possible, no obvious serial monogamy either), like it was in Scarlet Heart. 3) Some chemistry between male and female leads. 4) Good ending. 5) Some politics, fights and stuff is welcome.


Thank you in advance. :) 

All Chinese 

The Rise of Phoenixes best Chinese drama in my opinion

The King's Woman

Fighter of the Destiny

The Journey of Flower

Love Lost in Time

The General and I

Sound of Desert

Ten Miles of Peach Blossom 

I'll recommend

Cruel Romance and Too Late to Say I Love You. These two are set in early 20th century, for a change of pace.

I have a list if you are interested. There are only a couple of shows on there with polygamy and I have marked them as such but you would likely enjoy some of the other ones.

Historical Romance Dramas with Happy Endings

Gu Family Book

The ending is kinda sad.  There was chemistry between the leads.  There are a LOT of fights (more like arguments). But overall it is a good drama. 

The Story of Ming Lan, Happy ending, Chemistry, No Polygamy, Politics etc. Strong, REASONABLE Fl; and a fluffy ML (give him some time)  It’s my absolute fav. historical, ever. The only complaint is that it took about 30eps to warm up to the actual marriage and stuff, so about 25 eps of slow brewed? Honestly, the storylines up to this point are entertaining and honestly kind of refreshing from all other intense historical romance dramas. On Viki. I hope you haven’t watched it yet- it's not on your completed :)

I absolutely LOVED Princess Silver.

Wasn't going to comment, but seeing that you describe yourself as a historian in your bio I have to. I highly recommend the Japanese special Li Kouran, which is the true story of Yamaguchi Yoshiko, a Chinese-born and raised Japanese actress who featured in many propaganda films in Manchukuo during World War II.

 It does not quite fit all your criteria since there's not much romance in it, but I figured I'd recommend it since it's not well known but would be of a lot of historical value since it's based on her autobiography.  I watched it on Dailymotion and enjoyed it a lot :)

 Thousand_Paper_Cranes:

The Story of Ming Lan, Happy ending, Chemistry, No Polygamy, Politics etc. Strong, REASONABLE Fl; and a fluffy ML (give him some time)  It’s my absolute fav. historical, ever. The only complaint its that it taked about 30eps to warm up to the actual marriage and stuff, so about 25 eps slow brewed? Honestly, the storylines up to this point are entertaining and honestly kind of refreshing from all the intense historical romances. On Viki. i hope you haven’t watched it yet- not on your completed.

+1 to this. #1 on my historical C-drama list.

Thanks a lot for comments. :)

Sonme 

I will check that list and hope I can something interesting.

Venus14 

I have seen Gu Family Book. Awful ending really. :)

Thousand_Paper_Cranes 

Engr Mommy 

I heard in that drama, man, who is main character, is not monogamous, in any sense of the word. So I decided to pass it.

Ariel 

I will consider Princess Silver seriously.

Pyapi 

I will keep it in mind when I want to watch a serious drama. 

mahiba 

I will check them out.

haadinet 

Some of the dramas you listed are supernatural, which I generally don't like apart from time-travel theme.

The King's Woman - Seems like it has a tragic ending. 

I will check them out better.

Story of Yanxi Palace - although there are multiple concubines he truly loves the female lead and she always outsmarts the people in the palace

Princess Weiyoung

Queen for Seven days

Legend of Hua Mulan

Desperate Love 

Nothing Gold can stay

Bloody romance

Legend of Haolan

Moon embracing the sun

Siege in fog

Empresses in the Palace

Chronicle of Life

Princess of Lanling king

Empress Ki

Rise of the Phoenixes

Legend of Yunxi

Legend of Lu Zhen

Empress of China

Legend of Mi Yue

Virtuous Queen Han

There are tons more, if you have Netflix I would suggest that you check out their international section they have a ton of new historical dramas