Meh

Rated= 3~ 13/50 ~ 2.6
RPG Scene // Goblin's Swamp with only a rusty dagger. Forget it. Just Run.

I was swinging between boredom and wondering if this slightly racist.

Wealthy 'pale' Bangkok writer is tricked into going to a southern island as inspiration for his novel and conveniently doesn't believe in love because of family trauma, but continues to try and convince himself that the islander he's sleeping with is just a sugar baby.

The first 3 episodes reminded me of those tacky holiday romance novels I used to read as a teen and think that's what romance was. Then by ep 4 we switch to a contractual agreement because Rak doesn't believe in love, despite agreeing to stay on the island previously. There's also a lesbian side plot trying to happen but the assistant is just too much of a nerve grating character for me to feel anything for. The whole 'he needs to be tested for std's but I shouldn't be hearing about my boss sex life' may have made me wince like I had stubbed a toe.

Half way through 5 I realised that I don't care about any of the characters and I just wanted to join in on the chat in the BL thread.

Meh. I'll move on. It's not my kind of plot and none of the characters are appealing.

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A sensitive approach to an Old Trope

Rated ~ 9.5 ~ 42.5/50 ~ 8.5
Scene ~ Elf in Sky City with Excalibur ~ Dazed, dazzled, addicted and unable to look away.

This was a ride through the feels.
Asian media does have a habit of blurring lines between siblings sometimes, so I'm pretty immuned to that kind content. Having said that, this was very sensitively approached.

Our ML, Qian, loses his abusive mother to drugs, and is left alone to fend for himself and his little sister. Working as a cleaner for a local mob boss, he finds a homeless Yuan on his way home one night. After several times to help him, Yuan eventually follows him home and becomes an adopted brother to Qian and his sister.

While watching this, at first, it appears to be 3 young people just trying to survive in a world that isn't equipped or prepared to help. Qian works and sacrifices himself tirelessly for his younger siblings and treats them as such. Even agreeing to a boxing match that leaves him permanently injured, in order to escape the mob.
What lessens any feelings of awkwardness is when Yuan realises that he is gay and his feelings for his brother were never platonic. He has been devoted to him for years. There is a very compassionate approach to Yuan's self revelations and it draws out a lot of sympathy from viewer. He's in love with someone he shouldn't be and doesn't know how to walk away, so he resigns himself to silence but knowing that he won't be able to control his jealous.
When the emotional moment finally arrives and Yuan confesses to Qian, it is devastating to watch as Qian is understandably enraged and confused. There is a scene of the two cuddling while sleeping, so it is possible that, as Yuan later tells him, he also didn't have brotherly feelings but was afraid to admit or to even feel his real feelings.
Qian has dedicated his life to his sibling's happiness, creating the family environment they were robbed off early, so it is understandably hard to move from brother to lover.

I've found a lot of the 'adopted sibling to lover' tropes miss a very important step, which is the change it's self and how the characters work through it. Personally, I found this has been the best representation I've seen so far, where it's not a quick hop from one to the other because the writer is eager to get to the romance/sex. It's a genuine, painful questioning of Qian's real feelings for Yuan vs letting go of the life he envisioned for his siblings.
He consciously viewed Yuan as his brother, but subconsciously knew his feelings were deeper and we have to walk with him as he processes what he's never dealt with, including his mother.

I also really liked the progression of the sister. It's obvious early that she has a mind of her own and is a little promiscuous.
Much in the same manner a parent must face their child, Qian has to come to terms that his siblings are their own person, with hopes and wants of their own and Qian can't plan and control everything.

What held me back from giving this a full 10 was that I was reminded a little too hard of BL manga I used to read years ago. The older male being looked after by a younger and emotionally forceful male. It's not an issue for me and I was never uncomfortable with Yuan's motives and actions. I was just reminded a little too much a BL trope and it dampened the viewing pleasure just ever so slightly.

Having said that, I thoroughly enjoyed this and the music fit the scenes very well without being distracting. I would absolutely watch this again and it's possible that may even be a comfort series as the relationships between the characters, I found genuinely touching and heart warming.

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Human's are limited but our possibilities are endless

Rated ~ 7 ~ 28.5/50 ~ 5.7
RPG Scene ~ Mage in the crumbling castle with a battle axe armed robot boyfriend ~

I actually kind of enjoyed it. I loved the A.I film and Bicentennial Man growing up so robot love stories don't bother me lol I would have given it a 6 generally, as it was a casual watch, a little cliche but cute. It was an ok watch, at first.

But the last episode got to me, because I got the old Momento Mori feeling. A friend of mine had an asthma attack at a halloween party and died. She was 23. I have not celebrated Halloween since. Human's are limited. You aren't guaranteed tomorrow, and if you knew you were dying, what would you do for your loved ones? Terminally ill people often prepare mementos for their family.

That's how I felt watching the final episodes. Although it gets rounded out at the end not to leave you too depressed, it's a story teller's way of facing human mortality through a fluffy, cute story of a robot falling in love.

And although the 7 year gap is cliched and kind of cruel in this plot, it also makes sense because the uncle admits to himself that he'd make the same decision. He wanted his nephew to be with a real person and ultimately was just forced to give in because Chu won't move on with his life, and Ever 9 gave the ultimatum to either let him keep his memories or destroy him so, after 7 years, with neither letting go, what was he do?

Overall I rate it a 7. I probably wont be rewatching it but still enjoyed it for what it was.

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Short and Sweet

RATED = 7.5 ~ 28.5/50 ~ 5.7
RPG Scene // Two confused homosexual Mages separated in the crumbling castle and it's pesky moving corridors, and using their magical glowing battle axes to find each other again.

There's not a whole lot I can about this one other than I enjoyed it. It's just a short, sweet and fluffy BL about our ML Daonuea who confesses to his crush before he is to study in Germany for a year, and is awkwardly crushed. They coincidently meet up again a year later in University, where both have been selected for a 'Freshy Boy' contest. This all seemed like a beauty pageant to me honestly, where the boys have to live together in a dorm while the competition takes place. This is only half of the show while the boys grow closer, and the second half is to allow for some truths to reveal themselves.

Overall, it's nothing complicated, nothing major intense. It's just a sweet afternoon watch. Dunk and his adorable little face gracing the screen for a few hours.
Acting did feel a little 'stiff' for me. I don't know why. Maybe for the more emotional scenes, it felt a little held back? But nothing too major.

The side characters did make me laugh though. Between forcing the two leads together, being over with the drama and the two Moment Killers of the show and, damn....those....phones.... LOL

You'll either like it for what it is or just move on. I suppose I could watch it again just for the fluff.

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A Speed Run BL LOL

Rated= 7~ 26.5/50 ~ 5.3
RPG Scene // Mage trying really hard to fix the Crumbling Castle. No magic, just an Axe

The biggest thing I can say about this series is f**kin LMAO
Dear jeebus, what just happened, and what makes it even funnier is that whoever subbed the show on iquyi clearly hated us all LOL
This is probably more for fans of the the actors because the average watcher will probably just be left wtf-ing into the night.
To be fair, if it was fully developed into 12-14 episodes, it would have been a really sweet series.
It's pretty light hearted, fluffy and the humour is there. Having said that, I still enjoyed this for what it was. It was like watching a really sweet island BL at twice the speed LOL They just made sure to hit all the major points to get the plot across and nothing more.
There was obviously something happening in the background for it to have lost half of it's time but whatever, I came for Boun and Prem and wasn't disappointed. I've been distracted by Boun in Between Us, and both guys were support characters in Until We Meet Again, so this time, I got to see Prem in a more adorable light this time and he's gone up the rankings of my favourite's list <3

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The Soul's Journey & the Characters it Plays <3

Rated= 8.5~ 36.5/50 ~ 7.3
RPG Scene // Mermaid's Invitation for tea in the Enchanted Forest. Staff summoned all the Food

In my usual awkwardness that has plagued my life, I watched Between Us first, UWMA's sister story showcasing the side couple's journey. And honestly, I actually think I prefer Between Us over this one but that's more to do with it being closer to my own personal tastes. I rated this one slightly higher, so my own personal aesthetics do not take away from how touching the plot is for Until We Meet Again.

The show opens in 1988, with the tragic ends of two lovers, Intouch and Korn driven to suicide by their domineering fathers determined to separate them.
In modern 2019, we meet our MLs, an extremely petite and delightful little cinnamon roll Pharm, a first year at University, and our tall, dark and brooding Dean, President of the swim club. The two connect instantly and slowly begin to piece together their tragic past lives while falling in love.

I usually don't like the constant flashback style type of plot flow. It's too much of an info dump and I find it jarring but they managed to keep it's consistency by being relevant to what was happening to our modern MLs. So it didn't bother me as much.
I absolutely fell in love with Pharm in Between Us and he was just as adorable in this series. Both ML's were very stereotypical however, their relationship was, I found, surprisingly healthy as my usual experience with BL's is very sex driven. This wasn't. The characters started off already with a deep unexplained connection and it was allowed to slowly unravel. Dean was a green flag most of the time and I almost take offense to Pharm being tagged as 'a crybaby male' as his reasons for crying were pretty legit. He was however, a little babied by Dean but I didn't find it too much and it suited the characters and situations.

I did feel like it followed the kind of Japanese BL I would have loved as a kid, and the show's consistent nod to Japanese culture feels like I may have picked up on those vibes a little.

As reincarnation is a theory that I personally believe in, this one hit more of a spiritual cord than my heart strings. A little detail that I really loved was Pharm's signature colour was yellow (one of my favourites too) and Korn is wearing a yellow shirt the night they die. Another detail is how confident and pushy Intouch is vs how soft and meek Pharm is, yet both characters have a generally cheery disposition, or his love for cooking & baking Thai desserts, and how the first thing he ever cooked was an omelette. It's those little details that tie back into the reincarnation belief, that our soul's carry little things from one life to the next, like picking up it's favourite things to bring with it into it's new life. The mind forgets, the body dies but the soul goes on and it takes some of it's memories with it. I personally loved that little touch.

My foresight was strong with this one. I absolutely called those twists LOL because it allows, not only for the ML's to finish their karma but also the family as a whole as well.
I was a little stumbled on how easily the surrounding characters believed in Dean and Pharm being reincarnated loved ones but I suppose it allowed for some healing for those characters, so it's a minor complaint. I would have loved to have seen an outcome for Intouch's bestie who, although only seen 3 times, clearly cared a lot about him and I would have liked to have seen him appear somewhere just as a conclusion for that character.

As for side characters, I think if I had watched this one first, I would still have been in love with Win's character. In fact I actually found him funnier in this one but that's usually the job of the support leads lol

The acting over all was pretty good. It wasn't too over the top despite some of the scenes, and the crying felt natural. Surprisingly, it was actually a scene at the end, when Korn's brother finds his candy in the fridge. That one little scene hit me the hardest perhaps because it was simple. It was a reminder for the viewer, or perhaps just for me as a viewer, that it was those little things, that even though Korn has been reborn and is alive as Dean, Korn is still gone and he left behind two little brothers who had to continue living without him. It's a sad truth within my own spirituality. I may go on to where ever I need to go, but I'll never be me again.

There is, and will only ever be, one of you <3

I have to confess though, that I didn't really like the music. I'm finding that those vocal tracks over emotional moments are the norm for Thai dramas but I found it a little cringey at times with this one. But again, that may be just down to personal tastes as I didn't like the music in general in this show.

Overall, I would have no issue watching this again. Often BL's seem to focus on the BL aspect and everything else is an add on, but this time, it actually focused on the plot, which was reincarnated lovers, and the karma is that they are two men, and I really appreciate that for the genre.

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Well, now, that was just Fricking adorable

Rated= 8.5 ~ 34.5/50 ~ 6.9
RPG Scene // Mermaid Vibing in the Flower Meadow. Sword Dancing practice.

I was having a drama slump and my years on the internet have taught me that when I feel like that, bored and restless and searching for something to die for, just randomly start clicking on things. It's like pasta on the wall. You will absolutely find something. And find something I did.
First 2 seconds I fell in love with Boun who plays Win. Daaaamnn, that man is FINE with extra emphasis on the F. God damn, I think I drooled through the first few episodes LOL
Unbeknownst to me, thanks to my randomly clicking, I have learned that this is a sister story to the original plot which follows Dean and Pharm, who are featured as a side couple in this one. I did find it hilarious, since I havent watched the original series, knowing that there was a whole drama happening in the back and I know nothing about it LOL I can just feel that the heat happening off screen LOL Having said that, Pharm, for his little appearances absolutely stole my heart and I feel like I'm about to lay down my life for him when I start watching his series, which is definitely coming next. No question. When I sit my butt down next for a series, I am clicking for Pharm and Dean LOL

Anyway, back to this series. This show follows Win, a punk'd out Vice President of the swim team and Team, initially a very innocent and sheltered young swimmer with a tragic past. Since I havent watch the parent story, Win seemed liked the kind of guy who had his eyes on Team previously and when he finally gets his moment with Team, Team jumps head first into bed with him, much to his delight.
It's a casual fling which naturally develops into heavier emotions, which casual sex usually does, for at least one of the people involved. That's how the brain works. We like to get attached to things lol
Overall, I found the couple pretty cute. The consistent nod to consent for me, was very sexy. Boun's acting is pretty piercing. He says a lot with his eyes. Prem, I felt was a little off at times but that may have just been me. He had a lot of very emotionally powered scenes and I think he did well through most of them.
His character has a legit tragedy in his past and his reactions and behaviour are very understandable for someone who has to carry that for the rest of their life. Normally, I would find the tsundere types annoying but I actually understood his moods here. I did really feel for his pain and felt the relief with him when Win comforted him.

As for the other couples, wow, there were so many.
Pharm and Dean, for what I seen, looked very stereotypical but were nonetheless adorable. 8/10
Bee and Prince - I actually really loved this couple. They seemed very genuine and Bee was an absolute sweetheart. 9/10
Win's Brother and Tol - I felt like this one was a little random. Like they had to squeeze some more gay in but I went with it. 4/10
Manow and Pheuk - this seemed like a really sweet and genuine straight couple in a BL and Manow was adorable and kind of funny. They looked cute together. 7/10

Overall, it's not a tense show despite it's content. It has a very warm and heartfelt BL that deals gently with life's more serious questions but doesn't leave you feel empty or hopeless.
I left with a big smile on my face for everyone. Definitely worth a rewatch.

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Hide's Art Student Film For His Fans

Rated= 7 ~ 33/50 ~ 6.6
RPG Scene // Mage having weird dreams in the Flower Meadow. Sword might have become sentient.

I didn't know this was on here LOL
There's a certain kind of person who loved/s the bisexual disaster that was Hideto Matsumoto - HIDE.
This was a short art film by HIDE that honestly to me, was just a representation of hide as a man. Confused, overwhelmed and over-sexed, if not really struggling with his sexuality but seems very likely.
I watched this a few years ago on youtube. From what I can remember, it has an alien-esque visual to it of 2 'angels' or other worldly creatures would rebel against their 'God' and are sent to earth as punishment, where, as a fan, I really felt like was just a glimpse inside the man's head.
There's no talking, it's just 'babble' speech, running around Tokyo with a lot of grainy footage and symbolism, with a scene of sexual assault that turns a little homo-erotic. The characters are attacked and abused into suicide where they return to their God and abandon it entirely for it's cruelty.
It makes me think of the kind of films I would have made as a student. It's more of a self expressive visual piece that set the stage for hide's solo music.
R.I.P Hide ?️

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Le Sigh Part 2 - The Power of Love

Rated= 4.5~ 21.5/50 ~ 4.3
RPG Scene // Troll stalking me through the Mountain Pass. Not sure the short sword is enough.

My original review 27th April 24 -

Le Sigh

I really, really wanted to like this but I just couldn't get into it. I tried 3 times but my brain just won't let me accept a romantic relationship with a lead who basically acts like a child. If it was meant to be friendship I'd be fine but I'm expecting romance from a character who is basically a 5 year old in an adult body and I just can't move past that. Also, the harem of fairies. Oh please. My first, 2 months now as of writing this, adventure into chinese dramas, I'm starting to see a pattern of shows that just aren't for me.

Visually, this show is stunning. A lot of green screen LOL The sets are glorious. It even just looks like a chinese fantasy. Palaces floating in the sky. Ornate head pieces etc The opening credits were actually my favourite thing LOL the artwork had my mouth open and I think that's why I just really wanted to like this.

It's one of those shows, I think this is my 3rd one now, where everything looks so grand but I just don't like the characters. This time I at least liked the ML but that was it. You can't force yourself to watch a show that you're just bored to tears watching. It's like a christmas cookie. All visual, no flavour.

My updated review on 15th June 24

I wrote the above review after I had initially dropped the show but because I can't write two reviews, and people had like the previous review, I just had to delete and write this instead.

At the time, I was fairly new to c-dramas in general so I was just going on instinct at the time. I have now, thanks to Immortal Samsara, have learned that Xianxia's spend a lot of time laying out groundwork for the world building and characters before they give you the plot, which seems to be happening around episode 7 or 8. I dropped this show in the first minute or 2 of episode 8 and realised that I had probably dropped this minutes before the plot arrived. So out of curiosity, I went back to it, and if I had kept watching for another 5 or 10 minutes, I'd have seen the FL's bully get a glorious smackdown LOL
And I was right. The plot arrived with that event.

So I said, ok, I will give this one more chance. For the most part, my original review still stands. It was like Harry Potter all over again. The logical part of my brain can see why this is popular. It looks good, the characters, most of them redeem themselves, really love that Danyin's conclusion, that's awesome. It's a pretty cohesive plot through out, no major plot holes, all the characters had legit reasons, even if it was just obsession and had a really sweet message under it all.

But I just didn't like it. There was a cog in brain refusing to move and unfortunately, there's nothing I can do about that. I just didn't like. It was boring. I think it was around episode 20 when I really started to skipped scenes. I just wanted it to end.

Like I said in my first review, the ML made this show for me. He was the only one I was interested in. I love an anti-hero and to be honest, even as a villain, I loved him, he was hilarious. Everyone else who might have had a reason to stand out to me just faded into the background as the plot hooked them up in a side pairing I didn't care about.
That dragon. My man. How they wronged you by dampening down your potential.
And once again with Xianxia Immortals, the Emperor is the biggest A*hole and everyone is so self righteous without logic they make me support the villains.

My original rating was -
story -3 moved to a 7. I don't think the writing was too bad. It flowed well, it was understandable, the characters had their reasons and the narrative was very plain and simple - the power of love and obsession, and what it does to us.

Acting- went from 2- 6, this all because of Dylan Wang's portrayal of the ML. That's literally, he was the only reason I managed to finish the show. This was the Moon Supreme show for me. He gave good passionate kisses. I appreciate that for a chinese show that seemed to be scared of showing any lip movement whatsoever.

Music- 2-3 -Not much change to the music, I didn't really care for it and found it a little intrusive and loud over romantic scenes.

My rewatch remains the same though, at 1. I am unlikely to watch this again.

Overall, I can only give this one extra point simply because I loved the ML character. Everyone else, meh. I just didn't care.

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Wibbley Wobbley Time Wimey with several shots of Caffeine

Rated= 6 ~ 25/50 ~ 5
RPG Scene // Fairy buzzing around my head on the Mountain Pass. Trying to swat them with an axe.

For my review of White Cat Legend, I hated the cgi cat face and paws and gave a description of what I would have preferred, and damn, I love being right ?I got a little bit of it in this one. He looked great ?

Plot - I find some people hate the Immortals going to the Mortal realm plot so the creators of this one laughed and added several mortal realm journeys as the entire point of the plot lol

We open with the story of a great evil empress, Cang Hai who was defeated by the God of War and now there is a prediction that she may return. Our God of War, the ML, is isolated and moody. His primordial spirit was damaged in his battle with Cang Hai, and he suffered memory loss, and has gone to the mortal realm for numerous different trials in an effort to heal it but nothing has worked. With the prediction that Cang Hai will soon be resurrected by her vengeful clan, he agrees to the trials he hasn't tried yet. Love Trials.

Enter our FL. Once a cloud, she was brought to form and raised by the Red Thread Master, the master of the Marriage Pavilion, responsible for match making in the human realm. Our FL is coerced into taking on the responsibility of finding a woman to go through the love trials with the God of War or the Marriage Pavilion will be destroyed. She auctions this role off to the God of War's many admirers to raise funds and in the process of tying the red thread of fate to the sleeping ML's wrist, accidentally gets tied to him as well, thus beginning the trials.

The first trial is accidental, short and funny as they take the form of a tiger and a pig, which becomes a running theme throughout the show.
Each life is different, furthering the romantic plot. The 2nd life or the first 'official' life is the longest running, starting in childhood and going through to the characters eventual deaths. Each life gets progressively shorter in episodes as we start building the momentum.
Back in the Immortal realm, the leads eventually find out that by the FL sacrificing her life for the ML, she is giving him her own primordial spirit as they share the same origins. This leads us back to discovering what actually happened in the famous battle with Cang Hai and who the real villain is.

There is an interconnectedness that I really liked within the plot. As some characters keep reappearing in different lifetimes, casual mentions of previous life characters to give us a sense of time between each life, as well as a side plot unravelling with a secondary couple. It feels like one big web and I like when writers do that as it creates connections between the different segments and helps the flow of the story telling when you are using several very different characters, environments and backgrounds.
We see an array of sets and designs in each life, from middle class life, sects, royalty and demons. And each one with it's own aesthetic that mirrors the lifetimes of the characters.

Unfortunately, I found at times, the plot dragged. The thing is, I felt like the pacing was fine. The first life had to be the longest because it was the one that built the feelings the ML had for the FL. But every time we got back to the Immortal realm, I felt like the writers had hit a wall. There was a sudden drop in momentum. That's the problem with using several different stories to create one larger one. The viewer spends time getting wrapped up in the mortal realm arc that when we go back to the 'real' plot, we almost feel like what we just witnessed didn't matter. Although there is some essence of history repeating it's self, there's nothing more than the romantic element. In one life, the FL commits suicide knowing that the ML won't be returning from battle and decides to just say 'hey, I'll see ya back at home'. This hurt my feelings a little bit. The first one dealt with this well, in that yes, they return to the Immortal realm but the mortal lives they lived will be forgotten. The body dies, the person ceases to exist ever again. There is importance placed on their earthly lives but then after that, they just forget about it. Afterwards, there was perhaps too much of a casual approach to the mortal lives.

There was also a joke about cooking a pet pig for dinner. Not cute. I was very annoyed. The little pig lived but was forgotten once that life ended.

Another reason for the drag brings me to my next point.

Acting - Ding Yu Xi has beautiful, cat like eyes, and a very expressive face. Unfortunately his co star, our FL, is not quite on the same level. I only call out actors when they stand out specifically and I'm afraid Yang Chao Yue stood out for all the wrong reasons. Her character started off with that really annoying, pouty, childlike voice that Chinese actresses are sometimes made to do. Thankfully as the character evolves, she loses it but she is severely lacking the 'umph' to pull off the emotional scenes. I was actually skipping through her death scenes, scenes that were meant to be emotional, were just really grating my nerves. She was more annoying as an actress than as a character, and that doesn't happen often. I was drama kid, I can give actors some room to grow but wow, this just felt awful to watch. I haven't seen any other work from this actress so I'm willing to make it a directional problem but there were just too many times where her portrayal just felt so wooden and dry, like she was on her 100th night of a touring show. The emotional crying scenes were painful, like a child pretending to cry for attention. Ding Yu Xi managed to counteract this with his own quips and quirks to keep me watching but he shouldn't have to and that's just sad as a performer.

Music - I quite enjoyed the music to this one. There were two specifically that stood out. The dramatic one and the bah dah bah one that played during the cute moments.

Rewatch - The romance in this isn't particular intense and the kisses are simple, which may have contributed to the feeling of drag for me, when we returned to the Immortal realm. It feels as though, even though the leads have had lifetimes together, the romance never leaves that teenage phase of hand holding and promising to be together always. It is however an enjoyable watch but I did skip scenes so I'm unlikely to watch it again.

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"When they carry out the punishment, look away, don't be afraid"

Rated= 9 ~ 41.5/50 ~ 8.3
RPG Scene // Elf Prince breaking hearts in Sky City. Sword a swinging and a gleaming

Karma waltz in and laughed HAHAHA Puny Mortal. BOW TO ME!
LITERALLY in my last review, for Ashes of Love, I had a whole damn rant being like, yeah, no, Xianxia and me aren't going to me friends, we dont jam, we're different elements, blah blah blah, unless Cheng Yi is involved I'm not interested.

Karma came for my ass so damn hard in this show, I'm going to be reborn bruised. I am speechless at how much I enjoyed this show and I can see from the reviews, that it's a show with a lot of criticism, especially with loss of plot and drag so of course me being me, my soul got sucked into this show and I binged it all weekend. My eyes are red, my head hurts but damn, what a ride LOL

I dropped this at episode 2 a few weeks back thinking, eh, I'll probably hate it but decided I had to be a good wife and watch Cheng Yi's parts. It was around episode 5 when I started to get interested so, yeah, it took a while to get going but I feel like that's very common with Xianxia. At ep 7, during a big battle, I knew stuff was going down. You don't introduce a big battle at episode 7 without it being a big plot device. From then, I was absolutely hooked.

Keeping this as short as I can, character wise, I loved most of the characters, and that rarely happens and that the fact that this is a xianxia, this was the Immortals sucker punching me into Monday with bloodshot eyes and getting drunk at my misery.

Cheng Yi - my man. This is why you are my bias. He has mastered how to speak with his eyes. Definitely prefer this to Love and Redemption, all though L&R is growing on me. He's a lot more 'fluid' in his acting here. I felt like perhaps it was just just how he was directed in L& R but he seems so much more comfortable here, so much so that he plays 3 different characters. Our 'original' ML, the Heavenly Emperor, Ying Yaun who is very tight lipped, straight collared and by the book. His mortal incarnation for his mortal realm trials, Tang Zhou who is much more playful and ambitious, and Ying Yaun's father, who pretty much starts everything with his ambition to rule all 3 realms, which by the way, Cheng Yi needs to play a villain. Like. I NEEED the man to play a villain because holy hell, I was not prepared for crazy eyed and silver wigged Cheng Yi.

Our FL, although played by the same actress, thankfully was not as dense as her Ashes of Love character. I actually fell in love with Yan Dan myself. She's pretty bright and playful and honest. And there were times when her reactions made me laugh or I said 'ohh cute' out verbally. So this is a first for me so far in all c-dramas I've watched, I usually never love the FL. Yan Dan I loved. I don't mind if the FL is a little weak. I prefer brains over brawn and as she's a lotus spirit who cuts out her own heart to save Ying Yaun, twice, it's perfectly reasonable that she's going to need some physical protection. And when you like the FL, I can walk her highs and lows with her rather than just watching for Cheng Yi.

I always feel that chemistry between leads is up to the viewer and personally, I felt the love and the heartache. Xianxia strikes me as a genre that you either love or hate and one of the most common criticisms is jumping between worlds. I understand that can break the flow for the viewer but this didn't for me. I followed the whole way. It is a little slow to start, the plot hits us in episode 7 and then the love actually starts to build afterwards. When everything reaches a pressure cooker pain, I was jumping off the cliff with Yan Dan. It's around episode 16 when we go to the mortal realm and we stay there for a good 30 episodes but I didn't feel disjointed. It felt very natural. Yan Dan was turned into a demon and just drops out of the sky having had her memories erased by a traumatised Ying Yaun and returns to her playful and spirited self. Ying Yaun inflicts the mortal trials on himself and as his childhood is mentioned, I believe he was actually reborn as human.
The relationship then repeats it's self but only this time, there's lessons learned. Yan Dan learns more about what it means to be in love and Ying Yaun, as Zhou, chooses his heart over his responsibilities. So when we get back to the Immortals, those lessons are pretty engraved in the characters as their love cements in the middle of the actual plot.

I understand how a lot of people can find this boring or draggy as the mortal realm and most of it's characters have very little do with the actual plot. There are villains but only temporary. They are easily dealt with and yet I was never bored. I was invested the whole way through and I have no idea why. I liked the little side quests and characters. I liked the relationship building between the leads. My only defence is Cheng Yi's eyes hypnotised me through the screen and I plead innocence because, I should have lost interest but I didnt. I couldn't stop watching.

Yumo was a very a satisfactory character to watch. He started off almost like a teenage boy who develops feelings for Yan Dan but it never embitters him. It's this love that pushes him to the mortal realm where he travels for 800 years looking for Yan Dan, unaware that she's stuck in the limbo river because she can't let go of her memories. So he has all that time to travel and cultivate so when we see him again, he's a very experienced and mature man and honestly, he was a little sexy to me. What was really lovely was although his feelings for Yan Dan were strong, and there was a little back and forth with Zhou, he never left Yan Dan's side. He was never cunning or deceitful. He was a true friend. And accepted in the end that he wasn't for her but chose to protect her nonetheless. That was very mature and sweet and appreciated the groundedness of the character.

Another character I want to add briefly is Fairy Ying Deng. She was set up to be the usual, obsessed with the ML bully but she gets shot down very early. Beautifully might I add, by YY, and instead of lashing out in the ridiculous way that these characters always do, by blaming it all on Yan Dan, she lashed out at Yan Dan and Ying Yaun equally. There's a nice cathartic downfall before she returns in the mortal realm and I'll be damned, I felt sorry for the girl. Again. I shouldn't have but I did. She just seemed so pathetic, I couldn't help it. She also made a gorgeous demon and I wish she had always been a demon. She looked way better with messy hair and red eyes than in all the pearled garbed of the heavenly realm.

Part one is 38 eps. Part two is 21 - 59 eps. Thankfully, I watched it on viki, so I seen early that there were 2 specials. If I had felt that 59 was the end, I might have been physically sick. How dare they. But I'm learning how common this seems to be with c dramas. Almost like a sneaky way of keeping people paying for a subscription. But keeping the 2 specials in mind, I found the true ending to be very fulfilling and satisfactory. Both YD and YY get the life they wanted together, the son they had dreamed off and YD gets to be a writer. Meeting up with her friends, taking in demons to build a theatre group and getting to see the reborn friend she lost earlier in the mortal realm arc. Whether or not they are mortal isn't answered but it doesnt seem like they were physically reborn as they live in the house they meet up in after their deaths but I honestly dont mind it so much, I was just happy to see them together and getting to live out the dreams they wanted.

One massive plot hole though was Lu Ming not recognising Ying Deng in the mortal realm, and felt that he was kind of brushed aside a little too easily having been killed off screen. I honestly didnt believe he was dead. But as he didn't play a huge role, I can forgive this and appreciate that it's mentioned at the end that he's in the mortal realm growing his favourite watermelon.

As for the music. That flute did not have to come for my heart the way it did every time it started to play. The instrumental music in this show for me was a 'where can I buy this' kind of background music.

Overall, I'd give this show a very solid 8.5 but I boosted it to 9 because the sister's death pulled a tear out of me. I can be critical but I always give credit where it's due. Watching the sister be defeated by her pride, get revenge for YD, redeem herself and then give her heart, and then her life for the love of her sister, really pulled on my heart strings.

I am in actual shock that I enjoyed this as much as I did and it has to go on my favourites list now. It's a long one but I do feel I could rewatch it again and still enjoy the romance as much.

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"When they carry out the punishment, look away, don't be afraid"

Rated= 9 ~ 41.5/50 ~ 8.3
RPG Scene // Elf Prince breaking hearts in Sky City. Sword a swinging and a gleaming

Karma waltz in and laughed HAHAHA Puny Mortal. BOW TO ME!
LITERALLY in my last review, for Ashes of Love, I had a whole damn rant being like, yeah, no, Xianxia and me aren't going to me friends, we dont jam, we're different elements, blah blah blah, unless Cheng Yi is involved I'm not interested.

Karma came for my ass so damn hard in this show, I'm going to be reborn bruised. I am speechless at how much I enjoyed this show and I can see from the reviews, that it's a show with a lot of criticism, especially with loss of plot and drag so of course me being me, my soul got sucked into this show and I binged it all weekend. My eyes are red, my head hurts but damn, what a ride LOL

I dropped this at episode 2 a few weeks back thinking, eh, I'll probably hate it but decided I had to be a good wife and watch Cheng Yi's parts. It was around episode 5 when I started to get interested so, yeah, it took a while to get going but I feel like that's very common with Xianxia. At ep 7, during a big battle, I knew stuff was going down. You don't introduce a big battle at episode 7 without it being a big plot device. From then, I was absolutely hooked.

Keeping this as short as I can, character wise, I loved most of the characters, and that rarely happens and that the fact that this is a xianxia, this was the Immortals sucker punching me into Monday with bloodshot eyes and getting drunk at my misery.

Cheng Yi - my man. This is why you are my bias. He has mastered how to speak with his eyes. Definitely prefer this to Love and Redemption, all though L&R is growing on me. He's a lot more 'fluid' in his acting here. I felt like perhaps it was just just how he was directed in L& R but he seems so much more comfortable here, so much so that he plays 3 different characters. Our 'original' ML, the Heavenly Emperor, Ying Yaun who is very tight lipped, straight collared and by the book. His mortal incarnation for his mortal realm trials, Tang Zhou who is much more playful and ambitious, and Ying Yaun's father, who pretty much starts everything with his ambition to rule all 3 realms, which by the way, Cheng Yi needs to play a villain. Like. I NEEED the man to play a villain because holy hell, I was not prepared for crazy eyed and silver wigged Cheng Yi.

Our FL, although played by the same actress, thankfully was not as dense as her Ashes of Love character. I actually fell in love with Yan Dan myself. She's pretty bright and playful and honest. And there were times when her reactions made me laugh or I said 'ohh cute' out verbally. So this is a first for me so far in all c-dramas I've watched, I usually never love the FL. Yan Dan I loved. I don't mind if the FL is a little weak. I prefer brains over brawn and as she's a lotus spirit who cuts out her own heart to save Ying Yaun, twice, it's perfectly reasonable that she's going to need some physical protection. And when you like the FL, I can walk her highs and lows with her rather than just watching for Cheng Yi.

I always feel that chemistry between leads is up to the viewer and personally, I felt the love and the heartache. Xianxia strikes me as a genre that you either love or hate and one of the most common criticisms is jumping between worlds. I understand that can break the flow for the viewer but this didn't for me. I followed the whole way. It is a little slow to start, the plot hits us in episode 7 and then the love actually starts to build afterwards. When everything reaches a pressure cooker pain, I was jumping off the cliff with Yan Dan. It's around episode 16 when we go to the mortal realm and we stay there for a good 30 episodes but I didn't feel disjointed. It felt very natural. Yan Dan was turned into a demon and just drops out of the sky having had her memories erased by a traumatised Ying Yaun and returns to her playful and spirited self. Ying Yaun inflicts the mortal trials on himself and as his childhood is mentioned, I believe he was actually reborn as human.
The relationship then repeats it's self but only this time, there's lessons learned. Yan Dan learns more about what it means to be in love and Ying Yaun, as Zhou, chooses his heart over his responsibilities. So when we get back to the Immortals, those lessons are pretty engraved in the characters as their love cements in the middle of the actual plot.

I understand how a lot of people can find this boring or draggy as the mortal realm and most of it's characters have very little do with the actual plot. There are villains but only temporary. They are easily dealt with and yet I was never bored. I was invested the whole way through and I have no idea why. I liked the little side quests and characters. I liked the relationship building between the leads. My only defence is Cheng Yi's eyes hypnotised me through the screen and I plead innocence because, I should have lost interest but I didnt. I couldn't stop watching.

Yumo was a very a satisfactory character to watch. He started off almost like a teenage boy who develops feelings for Yan Dan but it never embitters him. It's this love that pushes him to the mortal realm where he travels for 800 years looking for Yan Dan, unaware that she's stuck in the limbo river because she can't let go of her memories. So he has all that time to travel and cultivate so when we see him again, he's a very experienced and mature man and honestly, he was a little sexy to me. What was really lovely was although his feelings for Yan Dan were strong, and there was a little back and forth with Zhou, he never left Yan Dan's side. He was never cunning or deceitful. He was a true friend. And accepted in the end that he wasn't for her but chose to protect her nonetheless. That was very mature and sweet and appreciated the groundedness of the character.

Another character I want to add briefly is Fairy Ying Deng. She was set up to be the usual, obsessed with the ML bully but she gets shot down very early. Beautifully might I add, by YY, and instead of lashing out in the ridiculous way that these characters always do, by blaming it all on Yan Dan, she lashed out at Yan Dan and Ying Yaun equally. There's a nice cathartic downfall before she returns in the mortal realm and I'll be damned, I felt sorry for the girl. Again. I shouldn't have but I did. She just seemed so pathetic, I couldn't help it. She also made a gorgeous demon and I wish she had always been a demon. She looked way better with messy hair and red eyes than in all the pearled garbed of the heavenly realm.

Part one is 38 eps. Part two is 21 - 59 eps. Thankfully, I watched it on viki, so I seen early that there were 2 specials. If I had felt that 59 was the end, I might have been physically sick. How dare they. But I'm learning how common this seems to be with c dramas. Almost like a sneaky way of keeping people paying for a subscription. But keeping the 2 specials in mind, I found the true ending to be very fulfilling and satisfactory. Both YD and YY get the life they wanted together, the son they had dreamed off and YD gets to be a writer. Meeting up with her friends, taking in demons to build a theatre group and getting to see the reborn friend she lost earlier in the mortal realm arc. Whether or not they are mortal isn't answered but it doesnt seem like they were physically reborn as they live in the house they meet up in after their deaths but I honestly dont mind it so much, I was just happy to see them together and getting to live out the dreams they wanted.

One massive plot hole though was Lu Ming not recognising Ying Deng in the mortal realm, and felt that he was kind of brushed aside a little too easily having been killed off screen. I honestly didnt believe he was dead. But as he didn't play a huge role, I can forgive this and appreciate that it's mentioned at the end that he's in the mortal realm growing his favourite watermelon.

As for the music. That flute did not have to come for my heart the way it did every time it started to play. The instrumental music in this show for me was a 'where can I buy this' kind of background music.

Overall, I'd give this show a very solid 8.5 but I boosted it to 9 because the sister's death pulled a tear out of me. I can be critical but I always give credit where it's due. Watching the sister be defeated by her pride, get revenge for YD, redeem herself and then give her heart, and then her life for the love of her sister, really pulled on my heart strings.

I am in actual shock that I enjoyed this as much as I did and it has to go on my favourites list now. It's a long one but I do feel I could rewatch it again and still enjoy the romance as much.

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Thank You Cheng Yi.

Rated= 7 ~ 37/50 ~ 7.4
RPG Scene // Mages falling in love in the Enchanted Forest. Staffs summoning cherry blossoms

*edit*
Rewatch Value Rating has changed from a 1 to a 7
I am now such a kiwi that not only did Cheng Yi get me to watch this show for him, I have now found myself rewatching it because of him as I understand that a lot of his characters are tragic with sad endings, whereas this one is a satisfying conclusion. People are more than their face. This was his breakthrough role and I can see why ?
***

I was told that Cheng Yi is still alive at the end of the series so I made it to the end alive with him but feeling just as comatose.

I am starting to pick up on cues in the first few episodes that tell me whether or not I'm going to like a show. This is one of those shows. I initially dropped this at episode 3 but Mysterious Lotus Casebook is defeating every other C-drama as my favourite C-drama right now and I'm a little in love with Cheng Yi and I wanted more of him so I picked it up again just for him. I was honestly not interested in any one else. I was skipping the sister (I found her very annoying) and 6th senior scenes loads of times before I was interested in them. I skipped a lot of side stories. It was around episode 21 when Cheng Yi starts getting tortured was when I finally stopped skipping and paying attention.

The FL not having her 6th senses didn't make a lot of sense to me because she could still see and hear and smell etc so she technically still had them but a minor thing I could overlook. The one thing I had a big problem with was the cheesey battle moments. I found this very cringey at times when Xuangi would unleash her powers and you would get this Power rangers style level up. I would burst out laughing when I was supposed to be cheering her on. She starts off as the typical FL in too many asian dramas. Naive, childish and a little stupid passed off as innocent. Listen, I get that she doesn't have her senses and doesnt feel the same way as others but she falls face first into Cheng Yi's lap while he's sitting in a bath and just continues like, oh, wait, I dropped something and just smiles happily while she gropes around the tub, and my sweet boy is just sitting there, cupping his manhood, speechless. I mean, I laughed but really? That's not innocence, that's just dense.

This pretty much continues until she realises that she's the reincarnated God of War. After that, we lose the naivety, and we get a deeply manipulated and emotional FL instead. Again. This is where Cheng Yi saved me because I would give up with this kind of character and would make jokes about taking a shot every time you hear 'Si Feng'.

But Cheng Yi. I like his work. I like his face. I like his voice. He calms me and I was able to find my grounded centre every time he appeared. He did the best with the character he had been given. He does seem a little bit more stiff in this series but that may be how he's was told to play the character, who's whole purpose is to get beaten and abused through out most of the series. His whole purpose is to love and redeem and the FL which can feel a little flat after a while. But again, my bias saved me here. If it had been anyone else or if I didn't know Cheng Yi, I'd have dropped this series really quickly.

Another notable mention is Liu Xue Yi. This is the 3rd series I've seen with him and he's creeping up beside Cheng Yi in my favouritism. If I didn't know this actor, I would have been wanting to rip his eyes out but I actually enjoyed watching him play an incredibly hateable villain, which makes it easier when you are faced with a character like Hao. He's the worst kind of villain because he's obsessed with his own self righteousness and he's a little psychotic, that I honestly found it a little strange at the end that everyone felt sorry for him while he just faded into dust to be reborn as a mortal, WHILE MY BOY is lying fricking bleeding and dead for the 100th time.

The Jade Emperor is probably the most useless, all powerful character I think I've ever seen.

By episode 40, I was back to skipping again. It lost it's momentum for me and as per trend, the last stretch of episodes just went off the wall crazy that I was rolling my eyes at just how ridiculous and off the wall the plot got. It wasn't enough for Xaungi to be the God of War, she's the Devil Star as well. And was a man. So I can imagine a lot of people just being like huh? by the time they get to those episodes. The ending was also ridiculous but at least it was a happy conclusion. Cheng Yi was Momma while Xuangi ran around drinking and enjoying her mortal life, seeming to have reverted back to her old clueless self. AKA. Si Feng continues to get walked over but this time it's in the name of having fun.

I really loved the characters Teng She and Liu. If I had seen more of them earlier on in the series, I'd paid attention quicker. They were great to watch.

An unexpected big hit of this show is the soundtrack. I am absolute Si Feng in love with the song Love like Coloured Glass. It was ep 28, with a scene on the bridge when I suddenly clicked on the song. If it played before I hadn't noticed but that's what happens when you're not fully invested in a show. You miss things. I immediately stopped the video to look up that song and it's been played ever since.

So again, thank you Cheng Yi. I enjoyed watching you and I got introduced me to a new favourite song.

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Tries to be deep but fails

Rated= 8 ~ 27/50 ~ 5.4
RPG Scene // Mermaid stranded in the Crumbling Castle. Axe is blunt.

This is my 3rd series with Li Hong Yi where I feel like he's played the same character. I definitely feel like he's been type casted now as this silent and brooding mystery guy, and if it's a romance, he'll utterly adore you type of character. Whether this is a deliberate play on his good looks or he just likes these characters, who knows, but I hope he gets a different kind of character next time. I feel it's a shame as a viewer to see an actor just play the same character over and over, just in a different story so I can't imagine how frustrated the actor must feel at not being allowed to stretch their wings and see what they can do in their craft.

This story starts of on a very unusual note and then it just kind of forgets about it. We start off in the future with our FL telling 'the system' what she wants in her partner, then getting into the machine and waking up in her new reality as a girl with amnesia and in the middle of a crime scene. Since we never go back to this future life, there's no mention of her life there, family friends, there's nothing, so I can't help but feel like it was a little unnecessary. I understand it's the opening to the show and the reason why this girl is dropped into a mid-plot story, but I feel like there could of been other ways of conveying that without giving you visuals of a future reality and then dropping you back into ancient China because I then spent the rest of the series thinking all the other characters were other people within the system and everyone was just hooked up to a machine like a sleep project. It was very disjointing for me but that may just be me.

FL is in this reality because she gave up her immortality to find her idealistic version of true love, hence the title but funny enough, the whole basis of the plot is a supposed 'fruit of immortality' that we spend the whole series watching all the righteous sect leaders massacre each other in search of.

In the midst of this we have our FL, and 2 ML. I opened this review stating that I hope Li Hong Yi gets a different character next time but in this show, I feel like he carried most of the weight here. If it wasn't for his character, I would rate this show more around a 5 or 6. But I've given it an 8 simply because I love anti heroes like the one he plays and he kept me watching.

Qui Yue is scheming, suave, very powerful and a little unpredictable. I really hated his main wig. They have it brushed back and tight to his head which kind of gave him a slimy, creepy vibe. I much preferred it parted in the middle that we see for a while later on. He also was very bent over in this series as well. I don't know if is bad posture for Li Hong Yi because this was 2019 but it was giving Severus Snape LOL Hard to see Li Hong Yi's beauty kind of spoiled a little by bad styling.
From the get go, we know that Qui's wants our FL, badly, and apparently has already had a love affair with the owner of her body. This, much to my disappointment was never really explored and really wish they had, to give some sort of weight to the drama that Hua wakes up in. But it was left open and just kind of brushed away, only brought up when it was convenient. He's clearly seen her body but it's later, with one sentence, Qui says that she took her clothes off in front of him. She liked him but he didn't like her but from the start was clearly a little obsessed. That was very confusing for me which is why I wish the 'affair' had been explored more because it was almost like baiting you with complicated entanglements and then the writers chickened out and focused on everyone killing each other instead. Qui's character is the reason I finished this series because he's my favourite kind of character and I kept waiting to get more about his background and the complications that have made him the way he is, but I only got crumbs. So as much as I loved the character, I really hate the writers for not giving me what I wanted.

Our other ML is Xiao Bai and he's your typical lawful good character. He was another character that the writers tried to be deep with and then they just kind of give up. Once we get to the what I call 'breaking the ego' scene that you get with very stoic characters, he becomes possessed randomly and then once the star item is returned, he goes back to normal. Once again, a plot device that just kind of falls away. The writers were trying to do something here and it never works out. Why did that happen? Was he being poisoned or was this a type of curse from the ice star thing? I was a little confused because they never really explained it.
I did feel kind of sorry for XB though because he was guarded from the start against Hua, who just throws herself at him and between his friends, eventually develops feelings and then is left to look like the villain because he stuck to his values when his values have always been apparent. At least to me, this not a choose his lover type of man. He's the son of the head of chief of all the clans, he's going to pick his responsibilities first and expecting anything else is a kind of unfair.

Poor CaiCai gets cast aside as a love rival but quickly shows herself to be very compassionate and emotional mature, in comparison to Hua, and I'm disappointed that there was no real ending for her. We got baited again that perhaps XB would recognise her feelings but it's made out that it's because he's possessed, he's rebounding and she's just kind left at the end with no real closure on anything. I wish there had been some sort of understanding between them in the end rather than just leaving her with the knowledge that her father was a crook. We don't know what happens to her after that and for such a supportive character, who doesn't act vindictively towards the FL, which is highly unusual for c-drama romances, I'm kind of angry on her behalf that she wasn't given a conclusion.

Our secondary couple are a sweet breath of air amidst all this confusion. They are sweet and funny and for me personally, both give off a little BI vibes and perfectly OK with that LOL And we get a brief conclusion for them thanks to the chopping editing, which becomes increasingly more choppy half way through. It's very apparent at times, that a lot of scenes are being cut to fit into the time frame. Which is sad from a story telling pov. The audience is not meant to see that. It breaks the flow of the narrative.

The music and sets are pretty regular for these types of shows and honestly, my favourite set was the flower field.
As the styling, OH. MY. GOSH, was it a failure like I have never seen before.
I could see the wig lining to every single male character's forehead, just caked with makeup. And at times, Li Hong Yi's eye make up looked smeared. I don't know what happened there but what on earth was hair and make up doing?

Li Hong Yi is a gorgeous young man to look at and I've never been so distracted from a beautiful face, with cakey flour make up, smeared and sometimes uneven eye liner with a wig line in full view. It would seem all the men had the same problem yet the women looked nearly flawless. I don't understand what happened there.

As for the ending, I'm satisfied with it. It was an emotionally mature approach to the series of events and I guess for our FL who starts off like a love-struck pre teen with a very idealistic expectation of love and romance and ends much humbler and confident in her choices.

Overall, my full rating should be a 6 but I'm giving it an 8 simply because I also include how I feel watching a show as well as the logical breakdowns. And I was pretty invested and at point, did feel emotional. If I wasn't so interested in Qui's character, and for that one scene that had me misty eyed, this absolutely deserves a lower rating. I probably won't be watching it again but I enjoyed it for what it was.

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Accidental Hilarious Fluff

Rated= 8 ~ 33/50 ~ 6.6
RPG Scene // Mermaid making flower crowns in the Flower Meadow. Sword used as dart practice

After a long deep dive into more serious 40+ ep c-dramas, I honestly think I enjoyed this more than I would have because it reminded of the kind of manga's I enjoyed as a teenager and it was only 22 episodes.

Plot - The overall story is of a Ginseng fairy who keeps finding herself believing in the wrong men while her 'true love' is standing on the outskirts protecting her in secret. We go back and forth, back and forth uncovering the mystery of the past for the first half of the series before moving forward towards a conclusion.
I personally, don't like this method of story telling. I prefer one long flashback and then move on, whereas this one flashes back a few times. That can be a bit disjointing for me as a viewer but I kept watching because, and here's the kicker, I found the whole concept accidentally hilarious. The whole idea of dying and resurrecting without your memories to find a few men who are full blown yandere for you kind of funny. I shouldn't have and I'm pretty sure that wasn't the idea but I'm me, and I did.
Another aspect of the plot is the yearning. There is a fine line for me between unnecessary angst and understandable silent yearning, and I feel like that's really up to the viewer to decide which side they're on. For me, I understood Bai Lu's silence this time. It made sense to me and it was pitiful so for me, it's a silent yearning. I didn't feel stressed or annoyed with characters while watching. The bad guys did bad guy things, and the good guys did good guy things.
As for the ending, if it had been 40 episodes, that last little dilemma would have been a whole new arc LOL The big problem is quickly solved and it's Happy ever after manga ending. I would have liked to have seen Bai Lu's promise to Xi but maybe it has to be skipped now? I wonder how this reality deals with that final reveal which is not really a final reveal. If anything it just cemented that shoujo ending that the clueless, innocent lead had to be told LOL

Characters - The FL might be a character who could easily annoy you though. I viewed her almost like a perpetual 15 year old. Flighty, impulsive and in love with life. The only character she actually falls in love with is our ML. The other characters she's just trying to be a good person to in accordance with her beliefs. However, I didnt feel like she was childish. Just free spirited. She had her own morals and held to them in however she was treated.
Our ML is the glorious Li Hong Yi. I stated in my Blood of Youth review, I would be happy to look at him all day and I didn't lie. That man is Fine. He held a similar vibe as his character in Blood of Youth though. I don't know enough about him or have watched enough shows to say if he feels a little type casted but it kind of suited his character Bai Lu. Just brooding in the background added to his 'tortured prince' sort of character. If that's a character he gets a lot of or is something his good looks plays on, I felt it in this one.
As for the side couple, I'm not normally interested in the side couples because they often feel forced but because this one developed off screen, by the time we get back to them, they're just being cute, so I didnt mind them so much.

Music and Set - The music and set were nothing to stand out to me. I feel like we were outside a lot for this one, but I did love the set pieces for the Valley, Bai Lu's house. It looked very spacious and zen. I think it was the high ceilings. So far, a lot of chinese interior for these types of show tend to be more horizontal and low. Whereas Bai Lu's house seemed to have a lot of open space and breathing room. It looked like something I would live in, here in Europe, only with chinese furniture and decor.

Overall, I think it's one of those shows you'll either enjoy the cuteness or will just feel annoyed. I might be a little biased with this one because it really did feel like a fluffy, romantic pining for you forever kind of story that I used to love as a kid. I didn't feel like there was unnecessary drama which these kind of shows often use. There were a few guys after our FL but it's pretty clear she has no romantic interest, and she stands her ground when she does make up her mind, and the other female character is friendly without any jealous plotting. She's pretty supportive of our FL. There was nothing that created an annoying love triangle arc. Just the usual randomly obsessive characters you get with this sort type of FL character.

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