HOP2020

🥺

That was weird too. It felt like an unnecessary decision. But I guess they need to create friction for the personal relationships in the drama.

I am rooting for Qin Jun Jie’s character to be with the FL. But, knowing C-dramas, I’m sure it’s a tall dream and won’t happen 😭.

I need C-dramas to please make their female leads look like what they’ve been through.
At least in this show, the male casts look like what they’ve been through. If they are hurt, they look so, if they fall inside water they look it. Unlike the female lead.

Another drama that I had great hopes for but was let completely down. Only good thing for me, was the veteran actors who portrayed their characters with class.

From the first couple of episodes , I already knew that 30 episodes was simply too long for the drama. This contributed to how bad the drama turned out for me.

Then don’t get me even started with all the illogical plot lines and scripting of the drama.

Of course classic C-drama pitfall, the try-hard emotional set-up. A good drama should be able to naturally make the audience feel sad and teary easily. You don’t force it by trying to put supposed cliches and those sanctimonious monologues (super unnecessary in the last minutes of the show and didn’t accomplish its goal).
An example of how it’s done from something I just watched simultaneously with this show, is the two episodes before the last episode of the drama, “When life gives you Tangerines”.

Too long for the scope of the story they wanted to tell and because of that introduced unnecessary drama and somewhat went in circles too. Only to actually tie up the drama in the last few episodes.

I became confused if it was a revenge drama or a finance drama or a love story.
Also, the idea of a psychologist stalking and going outside his scope of work with his patient, didn’t sit well with me (this was even before they told us he knew her from earlier own). Still, in mental health, that will be very wrong and can even amount to taking advantage of your mental health patient.

This was another issue I had, the metal health theme was not professionally dealt with.

Show is so good so far. Please don’t ruin it midway. I’m still suffering from Her Blaze

Thanks for the recommendations 😊

Actually I don’t have preferences. I often just pick up any drama and give it a go for a couple of episodes to see if I will like it. That’s how I discovered this drama 😁.

I will check it out. Thanks ☺️.

This show was a really great surprise. I picked it up randomly as I waited for new of Pursuit of Jade, and then I got blown away by how good it was.

Funny thing is that I can’t even describe (even now after finishing it) what makes it so good. I just kept coming back to watch new episodes and hooked to the story. It superseded other similar shows (even with more prominent actors ) that I was watching simultaneously with it.

I definitely wouldn’t mind a season 2 to see how the couple live their new found lives in the present reality.

Just also found out the FL, is also the FL for the Female General C-Drama. Honestly, I love her here. Detested the way they wrote her character in the General’s drama and dropped the drama.

Kudos to all the casts and crew members of this series. You delivered a gem.

I need to hunt for my next C-drama now. Current airing costume dramas are not my cup of tea.

Agree 💯

Having watched and finished the drama, I understand you perfectly now. The show is trash!

They didn’t go further to actually explore the topic and just seemed to have just slapped it on.
Also, I didn’t even know the rich guy even has a family of his own already. They introduced as some older single guy. Meanwhile, he is a married man with a family. Disgusting plot that was just added for the sake of it. They didn’t add anything extra to it by the way.

This show really disappointed me. I had great hope for it. But then it seems the screenwriter, producers, and directors are schizophrenic, because why did the last 10 episodes turn into a completely different drama. Jeez! 🙄

It fell off badly and unnecessary plots were added (plots that were supposed to be used to flesh out what they already had).

Time wasted!

Ah! This show! I was giving it the benefit of doubt, but the last last 10 episodes or so feel like I’m watching a completely different drama. It seems the drama showed the casts entered into the year 2000 and became completely different human beings, and the worse part, no explanation or foundation was provided for this travesty.
The show went from youths pursuing their dreams before year 2000 to business drama and suspense, LOL 🙄. Also, C-dramas need to seriously stop introducing new plot lines in the last/last 2 episodes before a drama actually ends. That’s terrible production work, jeeezzzzz!

Also, they magically did away with the pregnancy plot and not even telling us what happened to the so called pregnancy and why they moved to France. You then wonder why they even wrote such a lot line in the first place. Contributed nothing and was just stupid writing.

But this is actually reality. People trade things to get even a blick of chance. Just look at the Weinstein and Epstein situations in the US. That tells you just how much people get taken advantage of and some even willingly offer themselves for this type of opportunities. The casting couch is a famous phrase in the U.S and applied to both men and women. Even Justin Bieber had such stories following him. Let’s not pretend. Very few people in the entertainment world these days make it without sponsorship or trading something.

Yep, he’s is just the right amount of cruel for a wealthy tycoon. Just like the FL mentioned to his father on why he gave Du Zhaohui the 5% shares, DU’s brother has no line he won’t cross just to win unlike Du Zhaohui.

The time she could have noticed him was when she was bullied by some girls in school and a boy helped her pick up her books and told her something like “if you’ve already felt the pain then it doesn’t matter anymore “ something like that. They didn’t mention the boy’s name but I guess it was the young Zhou Cheng since the show made it a duty to point to him.

In 2025, I saw this show trending all over SM, I didn’t want to join the hype (thought it was another tropy love story).
Also, I have moved to watch almost exclusively C-Dramas and sparingly watch K-dramas.

I finally bit the bullet and watched it. OMG! I balled my eyes out in the last two episodes. The emotions were overwhelming.

The love story was definitely told from a very different perspective. Couple’s love, parent’s love, children’s love, family love, all of it. Made me think so much of my own parents and acknowledge that I am being too hard on them without even knowing that. And how hurtful it actually is.

Or even relationship with kids, and viewing things from the kids point of view.

There are some parts in the middle I did find a bit too long and over drawn. But all in all, a good drama.

We have to see. I do think the SML was terrible in pushing her away. If he had just confessed his feelings and confirmed their relationship, she would not have gone to the older guy. But each time to moves close to him, he pushes her away because he feels he is too poor for her and does it want to hold her back from her dreams.