Alysha Johnson

When you in love everything that person say is special. I don’t believe no one ever ask him that, maybe he just never care enough to remember. He only rmb CSS say because she’s CSS.

Same! I was obsessed with costumes cdrama because of scarlet heart too. I even took a year of Mandarin class in college because of that show that unfortunately I have gave back to my liaoshi. Only last year I start watching some modern day cdrama but my favorite are still the costume ones. I just love the way they do it. It’s different than kdrama and jdrama

I’m so embarrassingly obsessed with this show. Wake up at 5am to watch new episode then rewatching it all day at work with my headphone on, stalking comments on here and anywhere I can find people talking about it. Then watching clips of spoilers or analysis in Chinese I can’t understand on YouTube when I get home, then happily go to sleep early (I’m a night owl) so I can wake up early to watch it the next day. The last time I was obsessed with a drama was when I was still in school in 2011 following Scarlet Heart. Now I’m a working adult embarrassingly giggling while watching and eagerly waiting for each episode to drop while replaying each trailer 10 times. What’s wrong with me? I need help!!

You finally see why Wang Lin act the way she does. What mom tell their daughter to act arrogantly outside because she has royal lineage? Why are the moms in this series so horrible.

I know Wang Lin has been annoying but I pray she is not married off to some old man far away. That is DISGUSTING!!! I really hope the drama don’t make this her karma. Despite what she done, she is just a teenager. I don’t like her character but marry her off this way is just so wrong.

Wow Wang Lin mom

You know for the banquet scene am I the only one who felt that LBY went extra hard and savage not only to “protect” CSS but it’s his way of “sharing” his power with her? I felt like he could done it nicer but deliberately went grand slam on it to remind everyone that she now share his status? So he make a big scene so people can remember. Too bad CSS didn’t see it that way abut LBY was trying his best.

Not much we know yet. In earlier episode he did mentioned he don’t want a marriage like his parents where they don’t even talk. So I think he wanted someone who at least is “interesting” to him. When they first met she was smart. Then she don’t care about him and I think he find conversation with her fun. He’s also a scheming person so he can related to her. He probably is so bored of all the ladies he met because his minds run circles around them but CSS can engaged him mentally. Not sure if he love her yet but he crushing
on her. I don’t think he really love her until much later

It’s not just him, CSS also need to learn to communicate her needs as well. He’s not a mind reader. Ofc CSS has low self esteem so she never frankly tell LBY how she wanted to be treated as a lover. LBY treat her the way he thought girls like to be treated. It’s a two way street. She need to trust him and let him know, so he can treat her how she want

I find LBY so cute at the dinner time. The domineering general with his scary guards are soooooo awkward. Someone who never have a problem speaking his mind and giving everyone savage clapback is now struggling at telling a joke he was gripping his cup nervously. How he keep calling CSS's brothers as "older brother" even when he probably older than them. He is trying soooo hard, it's so endearing LBY usually has a serious face but when Grandma came in with her embarrassing self he was beaming like a little boy because someone more embarrassing had came to save him. I find him awkward, pitiful and oh so cute.

LBY and CSS are really match in heaven. They are king and queen at giving savage clap back.
Don't forget in the same scene, CSS told Lou Yi: "If you dare, say what you said in front of your mom and see if she will slap you or not." (When CSS slapped her before, so twice the sting)

Yes he is marking territory but he is also giving “face” to CSS and the Luo family, mostly probably to the older Luo brother, Ben. This was the 2nd house engagement, having him as distinguished guest give the 2nd house more prestige. You can tell when he tried to engaged Ben and test the Tutor reaction. He is showing alliance publicly.
Second he is also protecting CSS from gossip. You can tell the blowback from the engagement is so much worse for CSS so him being there elevate her “worth” because she is not any less due to a bad engagement than. This is a side effect of a patriarchal feudal society.

It was the right thing thing to do. The whole Cheng family attended. If she doesn’t it would look bad on her. She had an admirable break up so if she doesn’t show up gossip going to fly that she still pining on her old lover. Second, attending mean giving “face” for Luo Yao. And LBY going with her mean he take her seriously. If she show up alone it will let other people know he don’t care for her. Engaged partner usually show up together for these events. LBY is doing right by CSS by showing up with her and protecting her. Although the engagement ended amicably you could see the blowback is so much worse for the woman than the man so LBY being there mean that others can’t belittle CSS because she is not”less” because she had a bad engagement.

Very well said. This is the scene from the book is what I was looking forward to. I wished they had added another line from LBY so we can understand him better.

He genuinely didn’t know why she was upset and he thought girls like to be protected. So when CSS mentioned power he thought that she was unsure of his feeling for her. He thought that since she has considered herself to be pitiful and unloved all these years, she felt trapped inside other people’s hand (I.e control). So he said why she think he isn’t in her hand? He was implying that she already has his heart and hence has control over him. But she didn’t hear/understand what he meant. And when she left, he grabbed her and say “you can’t not need me!” I think he view his power and protection as his way of loving her. He already see themselves as a unit. Whereas CSS was talking about individual power. She still seeing him as separate.

I think we have two people talking about the same thing from very vastly different POV.

Well said. The other girls “misbehave” first. As elders they should have set it straight, but they didn’t. They let their distinguished guest be shamed in their own house. LBY is “nice” enough. Ranking aside, the Tutor wife was not a good host. She deserve it. LBY did good.

You forget that CSS is different. She’s not mad at LBY, she sad because of her circumstances. She want to make her own shots for her own life. Now she just switched from being control by her mom to LBY who is even more powerful and domineering. It’s nice that he protected her but you forget CSS has pride too. She realized how weak she is, but she wanted an equal partnership. He’s too powerful for her and he don’t realize that. He just assumed it. You don’t want to be in a relationship where you feel you can’t help but be dependence on your partner. You can choose to depend on your partner - that’s different. But if you are forced to then it’s sad. You just lost any control of your own life. CSS is sad because of that. Like she said, instead of living to make herself happy, she need to live to make LBY happy because he’s her protector. If she love him then that’s different. You want to do everything you can to make your partner happy because of love. But right now CSS hasn’t love LBY yet so it’s more like Stockholm Sy drone.

Her character supposed to highlight what make CSS different. She’s CSS complete opposite. If CSS was like Yang Yang we got no story.

While I love that scene we can finally see what CSS been saying all along, how domineering LBY is and why her parents are so against it. The drama really toned down LBY character a lot, but I’m glad the scene happened because we got the conversation in the carriage. I think the mean girls scenes serve multiple purposes - it’s not about the girls, it’s about rank. These scene are the most obvious ways modern audience can see how low her family rank are without getting to the boring politics. Even her mom can’t say much, and dad can’t interfere in women’s space. Only LBY can.
Secondly it also a reminder to the audience how helpless CSS is~ she can be headstrong and willful as she has been and we enjoyed her antics but with a lack of power, she get no where. It’s not that CSS can’t stand up for herself or speak for herself, but she can be as crazy as she is but without rank it’s really meaningless. It also reinforces what her mom has been saying all along (but expressed poorly). Her mother is just as stubborn as CSS, but she is mad at CSS because she don’t play “smart”. Yes her antics are clever and witty but it only work on young girls. To be able to have such a stubborn and headstrong personality, CSS got to learn to play the game by learning. She got to read more so she can strategize better, and speak better so she can attach her enemy while protecting herself. What CSS been doing so far is attacking but she also left herself pretty exposed to retaliation. Her parents are too low rank to protect her and her mother knew this.
I feel LBY and CSS mom mirror in this point. They both want to protect her but don’t explain to her or try to understand from her perspective.

I remember having this exact opposite conversation when I saw Game of Throne years ago to a colleague. I thought it so similar to wuxia style/ ancient political style of Chinese/HK drama I watched in the 80s and 90s. I meant the storytelling, costume and music.

I’m not too sure what you mean by opening credits - cdrama used to show spoilers but they don’t anymore. Maybe that’s what you mean. Other than that, grandiose costume music has always been like this ~ people usually can tell if an ost is meant for costume drama or modern drama. The costume has improved a lot ~ probably due to higher budget (but not all though). I don’t watch too much HBO show so do you want to be more specific?

I rmb reading the novel the empress said LBY went to live in the palace when he was 8. His family got massacred when he was 5-6.

Yu chen is 21, and LBY is also 21.