AleksandraSucur

So what? Having standardized coins doesn't mean having a central bank, it only means having a mint to coint and the force to make those coins exchangeable (=standard).
Actually, the (known) world's oldest coins go back to the Iron Age, the ancient Kingdom of Lydia in Asia Minor (1200 BCE–540 BC).
Letters of credit are not money. I merchant, lend you, a farmer, money to buy seeds (or fertilizers, or workforce) in March on condition that you sell all the crop to me exclusively, at a this (minor) price in July, which will cover your debt and assure my profit. They functioned even more to guarantee the lender. You are a rich dude who wants smth done by an artisan, but he wants an advanced payment to cover his costs, instead of giving him an advanced payment (he may fall ill, die, have problems of all kinds), you issue him a letter of credit. It's a guarantee you'll at least get back your money from his inheritors. In use maybe before the coins :)))
Maybe you confuse the letters of credit with checks, smth similar appeared probably with Knights Templar issued to those going on the crusades or pilgrimages as early as the 12th century, but they were certainly not even a bank, central banks were nowhere in sight. :)))
Actually, as Italy is considered "a fatherland of banking", there were and still are never-ending discussions among historians, if before the world-wide known "first bank" (Banco Monte dei Paschi di Siena, evolved from a pawn shop, which existed in ancient China), there was a "Bank of Venice"? The answer is: it depends on what you assume as a "banking activity". And none of these were central banks, of course

I know, but the setting follows certain patterns from the ancient China history and the remark was "they were not so primitive because they had paper money". Paper money is not related to the existence of central bank. When existed, paper money was a treasury money (guaranteed by an imperial treasury, but of a floating value according to the amount of exchangeable valuables in it), not by a central bank. It was doomed to fail in the moment the treasury was short of money, then it lost its worth.

There was nothing similar to the central bank in ancient China. The oldest one in the world is Sveriges Riksbank, founded in 1668. Modern banking was introduced in China only in late 19th century. There were "shops" which could have dealt with basic banking affairs (deposits versus bearer checks, small loans as working money, security deposits), but not long term investments in bonds. Paper currency lasted less than a century before collapsing during the Ming dynasty.

ça va sans dire, lol 😍

It's because this drama made us expect only unexpected and weird things. The thing we would normally expect in a wedding night scene of a couple in love in any other drama, such as a passionate kiss, in this drama appears so weird and unexpected...

For me, that kiss was probably the biggest surprise in the entire season, totally out of the blue, like the final stab in S1 😂

neither did I, I've checked before, that's how I've known 😂

it was not a pipa, it was ruan, Chinese banjo.
But I agree with you: that scene was very... very art

Last summer I've read The Three-Body Problem (the only novel of the trilogy), I'm not too much in that (SF) genre, but that was a truly great story

I'm glad you don't think I was rude.
I actually don't like War and Peace (if we talk about Russian classics, I'm certainly more a Dostoevskij, or even Bulgakov person, than a Tolstoy person, War and Peace was a long and somewhat boring I ought to finish only because it was an obligatory literature in classic studies). Although picky, I'am omnivourous, the only condition is: the meal (or narrative, in whatever form, written or screen performed) has to be good and contain all the necessary "nutrients" my body (or mind) needs. As I don't snub "street food" if fullfil the criteria, I don't snub popular narrative: among my 10 top readings of all times (and I was a kind of a bibliomane for the most of part of my life) is an autobiography "Open" written by a tennis player Andre Agassi, among "top 10 movies", an animation movie for children The Bug's Life and among top 10 dramas the Turkish series The Magnificent Century, labeled as a "soap-opera" in its own country. Why? Because they are GOOD, very well written and well delievered.
Any kind of narrative is "the art" if it can convey and stir up emotions, that's the purpose of all arts. I'm not in a literature business (although I can be counted as an author of narrative, too), but anyone can analyse anything, if it's based on logics. I can't tell if I'm like your mom, but you're certainly very like my son, he is an engineer, too. :))))

methane gases... I'm dying... 😂😂😂

No. We only know Dowager has the key of the weapon box. We don't know how she entered in possession of that key. The fragmented Wu Zhu's memory hinted the key could be at the Dowager's place, but he could't remember was she entrusted by Qingmei with it, or was it taken, stolen...

If we disagree on conclusion the best thing to do is to re-analyse the premises we agree upon.
1. You've said: "Fan Xian in the novel is quick witted person but in this S2 drama Fan Xian looks like a careful person..." Which one is more credible as a person with memory of our time, the cautious one or the quick one? His hastiness made him to commit crimes (eg. cleaning up the mess behind his bro Si Zhe), and this detail may be a problem for the C-censorship, yes, but moreover and above all it will be a problem for the audience to root for him. At least this detail was repaired by the scriptwriter.
2. @Kateoz pointed out the hugeness of the novel as a big problem here. You must take into account that the number of chapters in this novel is more than double than those in War and Peace, which is considered "a monumental novel". It's insanely big. But it is not War and Peace, which treats real historical events, with real historical persons and many more fictionalized dealing with difficulties which really existed at the time and in that setting - making War and Peace hardly adaptable for the screen, every effort to adapt it was criticised for "truncating the important parts", because all parts are somehow important (because they were important for understanding the course of real historical events). The events in JoL novel are set in a fictional time and fictional space. The settings of the events are pretty common in Chinese narrative, we have palace stories, court (corruption, embazzlement, upright officials, censors...), two brothel stories, murders to be solved, flower admiration (and other similar entertainment), banquets, hidden identity stories, smuggling, decentrated-local power story, bandits, pirates, mission in foreign country, spy agency story, imperial examination and so on. It's not a masterpiece, it's a supermarket of stories loosely tied together, ready to be cherry-picked or dropped, copied & pasted into a new patchwork that will do on screen. I'm sorry to say that, I know you love the novel and I respect that, but the course of the events in the novel serve as patterns which can be easily rearranged and remodelled. And the drama patchwork is very well tied together, with inevitable inserts that didn't exist in the original

2nd prince henchman who poisoned himself in prison

Emperor's goals are "unfanthomable", lol. He keep all his sons in check, balance their power by using one against another, but in a way, he also trains them. He is a ruthless autocrat, no doubt, but we still have to know him better as to grasp his entire personality

If you like GoT, I can remind you of one of its highest point, present in both the drama and the novel, which happened before her invasion of Westeros, she conquered a slave-regime city, deciding to stay and rule it: "I'm a queen and I'll do what the queens do, I will rule".
In that lucid moment, even Danaerys understood that ruling (=politcs) is harder than conquering (and how many people you've killed in the process).
You see Mao Ni as GRR Martin (I don't like either the latter, but must admit he created a totally new world), well, he isn't

Ok, now you've made yourself more clear, too. Tnx for your effort. Anyways, one doesn't need to read the novel to appreciate the drama, or understand in which genre to put it. According to darwinism, humans are "the most intelligent creatures because they are tending to adapt to whatever setting (or genre, in our case, lol) they are put in." Missducky88 is so right about it.

Don't worry, it wasn't your fault, next time I'll use a funny emoji to make my words clear. Besides, you're right: I was "venting" smth, but what I was venting has nothing to do with the right to a different opinion. I'm this reactive only if I feel some injustice, arrogance or smth similar. Don't worry, I gladly read - good or bad - comments. They help to form mine, too. 😊

Bravo!

I doubt that, because Lin was ready to offer himself as a scapegoat for the investigation on previous years' imperial examination. PM Lin trusts FX a lot, he seems he will be glad to sacrifice his position if that allows FX to rise. It was the emperor's doing, through his chief eunuch. FX can't take over Neiku having a PM as father-in-law, along with CPP and FJ backing. Too much power, from the emperor's pov, and he already shown to FX (by killing the chief censor) that he is destined to a "lonely position". Which position is the loneliest?