KiKo Tsukino

Over the years of watching Chinese Xianxia(Fantasy) Drama's, I have come to the point, where, I prefer the male lead to be from the Demon Realm (like a Demon God, or Demon Lord) rather than them being an Immortal Lord/or from the Immortal Realm in general.

It is much more interesting to have a Male Lead, who is a grey character (or morally gray character), since these type of characters is rare to have in a story for the Main Leads, and if done right, their romance is very appealing to me.

So, this leads me to why I want to write this review (haven't done one in ages), to show my appreciation to this drama "The Eternal Fragrance". Thank you, for coming into my life when I was in that phase of couldn't get into any new drama, no matter how hard I tried, oh trust me, I've tried, there are many drama's like "Whispers of Fate", "Love beyond the Grave", and "Zhan Zhao Adventures", where I started watching it, but then I suddenly just placed it on hold, despite I love the male actor in those respective dramas. But none of them hooked me into them the way "The Eternal Fragrance" did.

I guess, I have my parents to thank for introducing me to this Drama because they were watching The Eternal Fragrance, and when I saw some clips of it, this looks appealing, so I decided to check the drama out and then before I knew it, I just became absorbed into the story. Mainly because I enjoy the male lead acted by Song Wei Long.

New to this male actor, haven't seen him in any drama's before, but just like my mum found him handsome, I too, found him handsome, in a charismatic way.

I've read that this was his first Xianxia drama, so no pressure to him, because he played a very convincing role (for me at least) as Ye Cha(Demon Lord) and Lei Xiu Yuan.

Thank you, Song Wei Long, for bringing out the character to life, and made me come to appreciate your character in this drama (The Eternal Fragrance). You look cool/handsome as the Demon Lord, and I love your golden eyes, and I also found you cool/mysterious with that half-mask on as well!

I love Xiuyuan love/devotion towards Jiang Li Fei, although sometimes I felt that he have every right to be upset with her - for some of the things that she did, because fine, I won't hold her accountable for "killing" Lei Xiuyuan the first time, but when she went to see him again, I was expecting some heart-felt touching reunion between the two when Xiuyuan was lying unconscious on the stone bed. But I didn't expect Li Fei to did what she did. That whole scene didn't made sense to me, because I didn't understand what lead her to feel that way towards Xiuyuan (when she sees him again), she said she trusts Xiuyuan, but her actions contradicts it... How can you expect me to believe that it makes sense, when Xiuyuan "died" in front of her, she was grieving but when she finally saw him again, she treated him like her enemy, and she have no reason to feel that way! Can she not be happy that he is actually alive?! I mean the man she "loves" is still alive, but unconscious, but she still did that to him, what she did to Xiuyuan there and then and sided with Tongzhou IS a betrayal of Xiuyuan trust for her!

For me, I didn't like that scene from Li Fei on my side. Honestly, a part of me still haven't forgiven her for what she did in that scene, and I honestly wish Lei Xiuyuan will stay upset with her for her to work for it and earn back his forgiveness. It's only fair right? Afterall, it took her a very long time to forgive Xiuyuan for what he did when he chose to save his brother.

Another scene I didn't like coming from Li Fei is that she can agree to get marry to Tong Zhou on her side, and she was the one to suggested that despite she "loves" Xiuyuan, that honestly is another negative plot-point from her side for me on this pairing, because her reasons was because she wants to fulfill Tong Zhou wish to make him happy -_- but when she agreed to marry Tong Zhou, this is her choosing Tong Zhou over Xiuyuan and this is in betrayal of Xiuyuan trust/love for her, because Xiuyuan would never did what she will do by agreeing to marry someone he doesn't love/hurting Li Fei in the process. When Li Fei agree to get marry with Tong Zhou, did she not ever consider about how Xiuyuan would feel when he found out about this news?! Yet she wants to fulfill and make Tongzhou happy yet she can hurt Xiuyuan like this by denying his feelings?! That is some twisted nonsensical logic there!

But too bad, Lei Xiuyuan is too forgiving when it comes to her, this is why despite I like the pairing (for Lei Xiuyuan) but I never really came to love the pairing in that sense, because it's not equal (in their display of love/affection). I guess this just makes his love for her is stronger than her love for him in that sense (in this current life time). That's what I didn't like, and I will blame the bad post-editing by chopping off so many scenes for the later part of the story, since I've heard this was intended to be a 40 episode drama originally, but in the end, this was reduced to 33 episodes. In the end, Xiuyuan heart to forgive her doesn't make me stop loving him as a character, it just shows me that Jiang Li Fei is lucky to have him being so devoted to her in this relationship.

So in terms of the couple/pairing-wise, while I did like the main pairing Lei Xiuyuan and Jiang Li Fei, but I don't love them if that makes sense, this is mainly because I failed to see the equal input from Jiang Li Fei side. I felt like in the end, I am just happy they end up together, because this will make Xiuyuan happy, and since he is my favourite character in this drama, I want to see him happy. I am glad he got his wish in the end, because his wish has always been just her, where he can live happily with her together, but due to his curse in the past, their ending was tragic.

From my side, all I saw in Ye Cha and Divine Tree past was only very little and only a glimpse of their past, and from what I understood was, they both loved each other, and yes, Ye Cha unintentionally killed Divine Tree (Li Fei past life) because of his curse, and he did tried to fight against his curse, that's why she told him "it's useless to fight against it", and yes, I gathered she is willing to sacrifice herself for Ye Cha in her past life, but if Ye Cha did not lose control of his curse, then their past will not end tragically, so is this hinting to some sort of 'karmic relationship', where in the past, Divine Tree (Li Fei past) sacrificed so much for Ye Cha, and in this present life time, it is Lei Xiuyuan's turn to do the same? But come on Youku, you cannot expect us to piece the puzzle together by your bad editing because when you delete important scenes, it cancels out the flow of the story for any 'effective story telling' for any viewers to understand (from both characters point of view etc) or grasp the flow of the story, and 'why' it lead to these scenes. Because of this bad editing, all I saw was Xiuyuan in the present life sacrificed more/gives more into this relationship than Li Fei and this is why it's bad because it cancel out this whole equal love/input between them.

I really want to say that Youku should NOT have deleted so many scenes, because anyone with eyes can see the second half of the story towards the end, is heavily edited, and I just wish that there were more scenes that was explained and doesn't felt like it was removed/deleted as I felt some scenes wasn't connected smoothly towards the end, e.g. I never get to see how Hu Jia Ping revealed himself to Lei Xiuyuan as his "Guardian" of Ye Cha (that confrontation), since he is among the guardian, but that scene seem to be deleted so I didn't get that which is a shame. And honestly, Hu Jia Ping never really acts like his guardian despite he knew all along that Xiuyuan is Ye Cha, but I felt like he treated Xiuyuan as someone he doesn't like/like an enemy more than his lord/master that he respects. So I was waiting for that confrontation between Hu Jia Ping and Lei Xiuyuan, but the post-editing was done so poorly that it felt like slap of scenes just deleted and Youku just shove it in your face like hey they reunited and there, that's all you ever get and I am like: "???"

In terms of acting, I didn't mind the acting, I felt that each actor did a great job playing out their roles, but the biggest flaw was the post-editing of this drama, which is a shame seeing how this drama could have been so much better if the scenes/story would flow more smoothly in the later half...

Anyways... With all that being said, despite how I feel about the post-editing on those scenes, I won't lie that this drama got me hooked, and I will love it for the positive. As for The Eternal Fragrance, some may not like it, different tastes/preferences, but for me, I personally like this drama, and my overall rating is based on how I feel for the characters (where this drama got me hooked) when compared to the other dramas I tried to get into, but couldn't. This overall high rating has nothing to do with Youku choppy editing, since I wish there was more to this then just 33 episodes. I would really love to see more of Ye Cha/Lei Xiu Yuan past as the Demon Lord, but I am glad he got his happy ending that he wished for. Overall it is a conclusive ending in my opinion.

Will I watch this drama again? Yeah, I will, but only for my favourite scenes.

After watching The Eternal Fragrance, I have checked out his other dramas: Shine on Me, and Love for you, both are very great as well. Although if I have to choose between the two, I prefer Shine on Me > Love for you (due to my preference in terms of the setting etc), but both stories are still great as well. Just the latter, I keep fearing anything happening to his character, so that kinda ruined the enjoyment for me a little. So for this drama, I love it for Song Wei Long, and his character, and I've come to appreciate through the Drama "The Eternal Fragrance", thank you for coming into my life, and playing a wonderful character that appeals to me!