AleksandraSucur

Eunuch Hong is siding with FX

These people write reviews to talk - and to talk from above, as some sort of judges - about themselves. Maybe they suffer from heavier forms of narcissistic disorders than the Qing emperor in JoL.

expecting a different thing from the announced one doesn't make this storytelling wrong, it makes their expectation wrong

I can't believe there are people who write reviews of a drama before it's over. Especially I can't understand the reason of writing a negative review while continuing to watch it. Maybe one can be induced to leave down the reason why he/she dropped it, but it makes no sense to continue watching something you don't like or isn't gripping enough to invest your time.
What I also find odd is the fact these reviews are written by people I've never noticed exchanging their povs with other viewers here. This detail tells more about these "reviewers" than about the drama. At least, it tells something about their impatience.
And what are they complaining about? "I've expected..." "I would have preferred...", "im tired of honest man going through politics", or others, more attentive not to put themselves individually as subjects in the sentence, will mask "I" with "we" or similar plural indicating themselves, too ("no mystery to solve" or "too obvious solutions... for the "viewers" "). Most of them blame the bad "storyline/storytelling/scriptwriting".

S1 ended with a cliffhanger and many unresolved issues: smuggling of treasury goods, deadly animosity with the 2nd prince, who and why killed FX's mother and even FX's marriage-still-to-happen is an issue which involves politics. The creators largely announced it, too, so the only logical "expectation" for S2 would have been: it will be mostly a political intrigue. You don't like this genre? It's ok, do not watch it, don't write about your unrealistic expectations, about what you would have preferred, stop criticising arrogantly a great scriptwriter or bad storytelling (what a nonsense, the storyline is great, the dialogues even better than in S1), just write another script and make another drama of your own!!!

it depends which chapters will be included in the 2nd half of S2. The script doesn't strictly follow the order of events and chapters in the novel

I've never expected the imperial examination (usually a trope) can be this exciting...

No, it's unnecessarily long (700+ chapters) and boring imo. I wouldn't recommend it

let's wait and see, some of these secrets should be revealed in the 2nd half of S2 and might pop up simultaneously (if the crescendo rythm continues...).

It depends on our personal tastes and expectations. Dealing with different things, the plots are differently oriented towards genres in two seasons. I appreciated those "high moments" from S1 (who will ever forget that sublime poetry banquet?), but I personally enjoy S2 more, I find its dialogues wittier, political hypocrisy funnier, characters showing gray-er traits and can't complain about the development of the "course of action" either.
In a way, we can say that the "high moments" from S1 are substituted with a sort of "low moments" (lol, I mean: "morally disputable") which develop dynamically, in a sort of crescendo: "who will enter first the city gates?" in ep.6, then the "family dinner" at emperor's palace, the court debate n°1 in ep 10 (when FX manipulates censors to take over the corruption investigation), three couples simultaneous date at Wan'er's place (FX finally shows to the 2nd prince he is a person to be feared of) in ep. 12, culminating with the highest "low moment" (lol again) till now: ep. 15, court debate n°2, the emperor shows his true colors by ordering the chief censor being beaten to death.
Maybe the verb "love" is not appropriate for this darker "course of actions", but I enjoy it more than the course of action in S1.

The same for me

Agree, this high end hypocrisy is hilarious to watch

Because it is logical for Wu Zhu not to be nowhere near FX, nobody should know FX has a grandmaster-level protector, if this fact was known, FX will be in great danger, FX's real identity would be exposed and FX would certainly lose Lin Ruofu (and maybe even Wan'er), because he killed his son. When he was in the capital, they've hidden it even from CPP and Shadow: Wu Zhu doesn't remember what exactly happened to FX's mother and who exactly is involved in her murder. In 1st ep S1, he clearly said to CPP he trusted nobody, Therefore, it's only logical for WZ to travel to the places he partially remembers he travelled with his Lady and ask around people who knew her (as grandmaster Ku He) in order to remember the past.
The same is in the novel, too.

Imo, the screenwriter did an awsome job, beside proving that - when productions give them time to think over and over again - Chinese scriptwriters can do whatever other great scriptwriters can do when given time and money. I won't remember the original creator, but I will certainly remember the name of this screenwriter. And to think that I've decided to check the novel because I've found "the districation from the fake death" too long, discovering that it never happened in the novel along with almost everything which happened till the ep 10. What I've seen as a flow, was an incredibly smart, maybe even genius, decision from the aspect of story telling, serving three purposes: 1. it eliminated dozens of completely useless chapters, 2. it used and re-arranged those few useful patterns and details from the original novel (eg. the tension with the 1st prince in front of the city gate, which supports the logical clues why 1st prince respects FX and starts to develop feelings for the Beiqi princess, or the court debates), 3. it created a cliffhanger between S1 and 2. Not to mention the fact that almost 100% of dialogues were created ex novo, and the dialogues are a strong part of this drama. The strong part of this drama is also a care to deepen the characters and to modify them in comparison to the novel. One can think that the characters from the novel wouldn't pass the Chinese censorship, well, I'm a European and against any kind of censorship, and think that the problem with the characters from the novel is that they wouldn't pass the logics and sensibility of any common person: they are not gray and manipulative as in the drama, they are either criminals or covering criminals.
I've discussed these topics here with fans of the original author and of the novel, I respect their different taste and opinion (mine is that the novel is a kind of a "supermarket of mostly shabbily plots", with very few original patterns, displayed for the purpose to be cherry-picked and heavily adapted by a smart screenwriter), fans that have thought the drama and the novel share "great similarities", while I think the similarities are around 10%, at the most. I must say I haven't read the entire novel (that would be a torture for a picky person like me), but I've put my utmost effort to become acquainted with a structure of the novel, skimming through all of them and reading around 50 chapters in the middle and around 30 from other parts.
From what I've seen till now, the only possible flaw in drama's story-telling could be the lack of explaining the emperor's decisions and actions. Nothing else.

The drama doesn't follow the novel, and the plots were greatly re-written in S2.
The imperial examination took place immediately after the royal banquet with drunken FX reciting poems and humiliating famous scholar Zhang Mohan (if you remember S1). In a trailer for next eps., it looks like Guo Baokun's father is helping FX in figuring out the dynamics of the examination from prison, in the novel, it happened but minister Guo was free and still in charge, cooperating with FX. Those chapters are 163 and following.
But if you refer to court dealings in previous eps. with chief censor, that happened around ep. 273, and the drama covered even further eps., eg. CPP's luxurious mannor is shown in ep. 302. I think the scriptwriter tried to connect the examination with the Shija (or Shangjing) town massacre in order to skip immediately in that arc ("Ming" family was mentioned in the last ep. of S1 by the Beiqi commander of embroided guards Shen as people who helped Royal Princess and the 2nd prince in their smuggling affairs). That arc starts in ep 317 and covers at least 50 (boring) eps. Strongly doubt the drama will waste so much time for that arc

the nice singer from the brothel

I find that yodeling hilarious. Smart background mean to accentuate oddness, a trait which is essential for the vibe of this drama

I agree completely with your first point. As for the 2nd, actually there is a partial evidence: smuggling Neiku goods to Beiqi orchestrated by Royal Princess and the 2nd prince, which Beiqi commander Shen gave testimony to FX stating it serves for raising the army via a powerful family "Ming" from that city which was later burnt by the CP, after being evacuated first by the 2nd prince. In ep. 15 chief censor mentioned the evidences of collusion between RPrincess and the 2nd prince in smuggling (the camera caught a surprise on CP's face, too) and asked the emperor to allow him to investigate where the money was going (ie. he asked for permission to gather evidences for raising an army which stands for rebellion). And THIS investigation was refused by the emperor: he may not be interested in corruption or smuggling, but he will certainly be interested in potential rebellion. Unless they are emperor's pawns, I mean, unless they were raising an additional army FOR the emperor (eg. to be deployed in his invasion of Beiqi, which he plans in order to proceed fruther North to the mythical temple), such a decision makes no sense. And it's a potential major flow in scriptwriting of the plot so far

on point! 👌

but the emperor is also aware that this case is not only about corruption but about preparing a rebellion...

FL's father will give up his position once Wan'er and FX are married exactly for the "balancing" reason we all are aware of. In the novel, this marriage happened before his trip to Beiqi, so he wasn't present in the courtroom discussing corruption, he was already retired. Drama will likely follow this pattern, once united with prime minister, FX would have too much power and the emperor already cuts off the connections FX is trying to buid.