Alchemy of Souls Season 2: Light and Shadow
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Honestly One of The Best Drama In The Industry
I think this drama is going down in history as one of the best drama ever damn! Where should I start......First of all, The people who are frustrated with the dragging of the plot, having 2 seasons annoyed a lot of netizens, and the switching of the female lead also made a lot of people so frustrated to the point of dropping this drama, accusation of weak female main lead/weak female leads in general, This are all the and..... I quote "the only frustrating/cons bits inthis drama" and I agree half-heartedly BUT have u seen any other masterpiece in the history of film/series that is without a single mistake? As they say, it is always easier to find the small mistakes than to appreciate the actual good parts
lemme tell you
Watching this drama I realized that there might be a lot of dramas/shows/series/movies similar to the concepts of alchemy of souls, the ones that came to mind rn are all the Chinese "wuxia" dramas/movies like Ashes of love, word of honor etc.... they all had this kind of visual effects and similar romance/swordplay.BUT the execution, the plot, the chemistry not just between the main characters but all the secondary couple leads also, the acting, the light-hearted comedy, the ost and the production WERE ALL JUST *chefs kiss* and THIS drama really left this feeling of watching an original fr
-STRONG(at heart) female leads LMAO
I was also a frustrated netizen with the switching of the female lead since we are attached to our gurly Mu Deok/Jin Bu Yeon(Jung So Min) ,her astonishing acting and her freaking adorable face but being real we are all just attached to the character of naksu inside of mu deok and we are afraid of seeing a new character take that place even though logically the new actress (Go young Jung) is the actual main lead it is not replacing but rather going back to the right owners .Also the new fml is as good of a actor and have another adorable looking face but watching this second season really showed me the THE BIG PICTURE and fill in on the confusions, Miss Naksu / Cho Yeong (Go Youn Jung) is the main character of the whole series no matter how you look at it story and the character in general , our gurly mu deok/Jin Bu Yeon was the bgm character for a reason (a lot people did not like the fact she was bg character 4/5th of the show) as u all know in the season 2 it is portrayed clearly that Jin but yeon (trying not to spoil) is a reincarnation of a character and she was not an individual who had only one purpose (can't spoil) that is saving from something ahem ahem... yeah so obv we can understand that she is a being who clearly didn't give 2 f**ks about who is in her body or whatever ppl inside her body is doing π she is a deity for a reason and a powerful one for that matters. And for our actual fml naksu/chae yeon there is a point in this season where we can see the starting character naksu is clearly a revengeful person made up by jin min(villain guy) but chae yeon is a soft-hearted,cheerful,delicate girl and yes even if they are the same person and that strong naksu was someone we all thought was cool but our fml becomes a person who stopped being naksu who was rebellious and liked being always on her own, didn't care who,what,why and just revengeful towards the world in general Turned into this healing person and started being a person who slowly fully depends and rely on jang UK like relying on a shoulder to cry so we can all guess that she did not do any acting/fighting in season due to her finally finding her self and healing .Also prehaps came to a point she didn't want to hurt more people around for her selfishness like she technically stole Jin buyeon's body but thankfully our gurl don't give a sh*t π
now for the all the other female supporting characters i think yes it is disappointing some times when they are showing way too much weakness (like towards the plot we can see they don't show the same amount of physical magic power same as the male leads and tends to "sacrifice" their self π which is so furstrating like gurl UR A CLAN LEADER USE UR DAYM POWERS..ETC..) but i think they were all kind of strong in their own ways (mentality?lmao)
-The Acting and The CHEMISTRY *Chef's kiss*
these 2 things in this drama is just so good to the point it's just crazy like jang UK( the lucky bastard) had the luck to make out with both the female leads (Go young Jung and Jung so min ) my guy don't discriminate (I wouldn't either π) i have to say the chemistry between them ( Jang UK and the both fmls)is just none better or worse than the other its so crazy to me How his eyes are so much in love and how much the female actors feel like they're the same person,The biggest acting plus point i saw that was common in all the characters is the rawness of emotions in everything they did ,And the eyes! man looking at their eyes there's so much going on there its way too good and enjoyable on a deeper level
-The unhinged humour (LMAO)
bruh I'm bawling my eyes out and then I'm laughing with a runny nose jeez the execution of humour of the drama made me look past the dragging plot
1 thing I'm pretty sure about is there is more to this drama than it meets the eyes and all the furstrations can be explained if U pay attention to the smallest details
Now for the cons that I say poke out like thorns in this perfect field of a master piece "IN MY OPINION"
-The female lead not having a fight after getting all her powers in both bodies, In both the season I was hoping to see more of the little action that was shown in the first EP into something bigger and exciting, I really expected at least one of the FML will show us a real good naksu fight with the villain πand that left an empty space in me seriously! I wanted chae yeon in season 2 showing it off with her naksu blade from season 1 but instead we see Jang UK π taking the sword as a souvenir this made me(a horrible feminist for female leads) very disappointed...i think we def should have given a chance to see our naksu+che yeong+mu deok+jin bu yeong powers all mixed and executed beautifully into an K.O fight with SOMEBODY ya know maybe even showing she is more powerful than jang UK ahem..ahemm
-The dragging of the plot is honestly just unnecessary towards the ending but season 2 did add so much closure like it is the big picture
-Maybe too much about romance(I'm talking about the screen play not story or characters ) and less about the main lead's past/future/present the romance and the repetition of all the already done romantic scenes were literally the 2/5th of the drama
and it gets annoying seeing the same romantic scene from like season 1 played like 50 times in season 1 and 2 LMAO
THATS PRETTY MUCH IT ITS JUST A MUST WATCH KDRAMA !
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this drama is definitely a must watch for anyone
hello, everyone, this is my honest review about this drama story of yanxi palace coming from a person who has watched 100+ cdramas and 100+ kdrama no kidding I stopped watching cdramas as frequently as I used to in 2021 and became a die heart kdrama fan only becoz cdramas are way to cliche and drag nowadays and I already watched the best of the best in cdrama but I still try to come back and try one out and this is the drama I saw in 2023 that brought the teenager who loved cdramas in me back hehejust finished this drama btw so a bit biased rn so bear with me
I personally really appreciate this drama first of all I have to say they did the best job at casting and OST it's so perfect, I can't even imagine other actors in the main role. Also, there is something about the ost from the intro its exciting and builds up nostalgia in a way, overall the actors are super iconic but the king sometimes(rarely)does cringe in my opinion. the story itself is made up so beautifully with the history itself as a base It is interesting. the strong female lead gives relief from the desperate, always in misery female lead in most period dramas, it's quite refreshing and satisfying to see a strong-willed character always getting her revenge and making the villains come down call me petty lol but I'm so sick of seeing fml always so miserable and just idk helpless and they do unbelievable bs stuff out of nowhere if u look at most period dramas this is common also the beauty of this drama is just pure eye candy you can just melt away looking at the attire, As someone who has seen my share of traditional clothing in dramas this one did stood out a lot in the traditional cdrama world. this drama gives you the enemies-to-lovers romance effect and also a big 2nd lead syndrome don't want to spoil but it gets interesting and as the story goes on you develop a lot of character attachments get ready to ball your eyes out! the only annoying part I feel is the feeling of a jump cut or that some more story is missing from the drama, I felt like I missed something for sure, As in they should've added a bit more info on some characters to build more character info for the viewers.
As this drama is based on history we can assume they did not want to over-fictionalize the actual history, you need to be a bit mature to understand this drama. overall this drama is better than most of the weird overly dramatic and dragged period dramas today and one of the few traditional clothing non-fantasy drama that any type of viewers can enjoy (coming from someone who hates political dramas)
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It is a mid drama that feels like the best drama at first 20 or 30 eps
I just finished watching this drama and I feel a lot of emotions rn but I will try my best not to be biasedcoming from an experienced drama watcher I will tell you all about this drama in a way without spoilers (if ur lazy to read just skip to the last paragraph)
okay so first of all this drama is very appealing to the eyes and has very good actors especially our girl "the princess" Zhang Zi Yi I can see a lot of people criticizing her becoz she is a 44yr old actress playing a"16" yr old princess from the start and yes I do agree when I start watching this drama I had this feeling that the female actor looked older than her parents and her uncle and aunts lol and it was very clear she does have a older appearness BUT! after completing this drama i think she was a very strong and perhaps only likable character except her mother and the ml and also becoz of her and the ml i did not drop this drama in the middle.
I actually was hooked at the first episode and I binged watched like 16 eps in a day this drama surely brings up excitement and curiosity,As an experienced drama watcher myself most of the time I was trying to guess what would happen next becoz when u watch a lot dramas u know there is always a pattern. but jeez this drama script is so weirdly good at some places and so horribly cliche and confusing at other places it was still pretty predictable towards the end but at the start I have to give them the credit for making it pretty interesting
another good thing about the drama is the ost It is pretty nice and nostalgic lmao
And i think the title really suits this drama becoz if u look at all the political drama and the 5/10 romance and the weird plot we can see that our princess is pretty rebellious becoz she is the only woman who do not want power and is always love sick for her family most of the time and try to "fix" the bad doings of almost everyone in the palace. that's why she is rebellious becoz she is different from all the women in the palace but she is way too soft-hearted and confused most of the time lmao
now for the romance, some people said it was a slow-burn romance lol full bs i think it was way too rushed and they stay in that same romance stage for the rest of the show its weirdly good and satisfying at first but let me tell you you it was so frustrating towards the end
let me tell u about the story It is all boring politics played by beautiful people with beautiful clothing and almost everyone switches from absolutely selfish power seekers to absolutely miserably apologetical,regrets everything and some characters switch between these 2 characteristics or stays in 1 and almost everyone dies that at end u don't care who dies at this point.the romance in this drama is like not there most of the time and all the characters are indulged in everything but romance
the romance showed in this drama was 35% in 100% and the other 65% was political drama and the plot the 20% was the romance between the fml and ml and the 15% of the other romance is by the side characters like emperors,second leads yeah all the side characters almost had the same amount of romance between them than the actual main leads .
IN ALL HONESTY, this drama is fr a 7/10 only becoz of its good main leads and really good acting and the costumes are 10/10 everyone was eye candy to watch but is it worth a watch in one word NO but it does depend, big no for students, hard-working busy lads who likes to watch drama in free time, people who rarely get time to watch dramas but wanted to give this drama a chance, if u belong here in anyway if ur okay to spend ur time and really wants to give it a try go ahead its ur choice at the end of the day.If u are a starter in watching dramas, if u have a lot time in ur hand like if ur young then yeah/MAYBE .i deff wasted my time in this drama, especially becoz its so long there are much much better dramas to watch in the industry so yeah . its a good drama to understand whether u like this type of palace political stuff and drama. the main problems about this drama is the bad plot and a lot of characters turn unrealistically evil and horrible characters, there is not even a single character in this drama with character development its annoying, frustrating . almost too cliche and too many unneeded killings of every good characters
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simple enjoyable drama
this was the first ever cdrama I ever watched in my life and now in 2024 i have finished over 100+ cdramas and kdrama and a handful of jdramas and Thai dramasThis drama is worth a watch for every beginners. The main thing I loved in this drama was the acting and the sort of enemies-to-lovers situation and the main frustrating part was all the cliche struggles they go through and the ending is very frustrating as well, the production did a great job the cast, acting, clothing looked astonishing and also the story is cute and unique on its own. overall it could be not everyone's cup of tea but if u look past the cliches it is a decent drama
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the reality check in life
Honestly, I was skeptical of this drama at first but oh wow,this drama gave me such a reality check in my life that it is embarrassing now. first of all the cameo's in this drama made it so interesting and literal eye candy to watch and the love, family relations, and all the frustration the main lead goes through portrays a big slice of life, honestly, I agree with the fact this kind of dramas answers to the questions we don't like to acknowledge in life, the drama is well written with binge-worthy thriller, romance, action, drama. they round up the best cast for this show . It's such a short but meaningful drama that everyone should watch
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must watch for Xianxia lovers
I didn't plan to watch this drama becoz of the unfamiliar cast but its honestly one of the best xianxia romance series I have watched I think the ending is definitely a work of art, The execution,acting,music everything is just so beautiful in an unexplainable way. My fav characters that stood out from the cast is Bai Shu the Lord Flying Snake and Li Xin Ze theRahu Ketu idk why but they have some specialty about them. Character arcs that actually is satisfying!
Disclaimer if you don't have patience to go through frustrating romance I won't recommend since it could take a toll on Ur mental health if u not mentally prepared lol.
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