Kateoz

They said three months later.

Pretending to be someone's husband, especially when in reality he thought she already had one - and thus making them your mistress - is not just a lie, in that time period it would destroy any chance of a future she had. His kind offer to dump her in a buddhist temple for the rest of her life as 'compensation' doesn't really seem to me to cut it.

I don't think we can assume she would have behaved that way towards her real husband - amnesia does strange things to a person, and you will naturally pander to those who tell you they have saved you and you owe them everything...And is destroying a woman's reputation - implicitly perhaps raping her since it can't be consent if you don't know who you are sleeping with - in order to catch a criminal ever really legitimate?

Except that the 'bandits' were actually pardoned some time back and turn out to have been supporting the rightful Emperor who has now reclaimed his position...

Rubbish.

You wake up with out any memories so you adapt to try and survive. And he spun her a story about using up all his family savings on her recovery, put in place a guard to train her in 'appropriate' behaviour.

If he had told her the truth and then divorced her, she would have accepted it - instead he created another fake narrative saying he was leaving her for heroic reasons, so of course she didn't accept it and did what all the other army wives did (and more and better because she is who she is).

As for her supposed crimes, we don't actually know what they were or how serious - all we know is that there was a robin hood element to it. And given that the bandits were all pardoned (and their leader actually turns out to be the rightful Emperor and she seems to have known that), no crime at all.

Agreed. In this scenario, unless Stockholm Syndrome had set in, hared to see how you could ever agree to marry someone who did what he did to her. But in c dramaland...

I can't believe people are defending his actions or seeing ML as somehow redeemed because he wants to marry FL in face of parental opposition!

If he genuinely respected her, he would fess up and give her the choice about what she wanted to do. FL points out that what he wants to marry is not the real her, just the domesticated bird in a cage version of a doting wife he has forced her to be.

Personally, I'm hoping she turns the tables on him nicely...that said, if he wakes up to the fact that she is actually his equal in battle and treats her accordingly, there is hope!

Feeding us only one ep bites though is killing me.

But did he actually bother to tell her the situation and ask her what she wanted to do?!

This is a woman who ran away from a marriage she didn't want, and would probably have decided to do so again in the circumstances.

And given that he is the person who basically tarnished her reputation (given she was pretending to a concubine to herself, she would have been able to clear her name if she wanted until he made her play wifey).

I still don't see it.

Once it comes to the crunch he is certainly a reformed man when it comes to Sizhe, but he needs to make up for the fact that neither he nor his wife bothered to find out why Sidhe was rushing off early each morning and returning home late at night for over six months (and was actually running, albeit unwittingly, a people trafficking organisation and evil brothel)!

When it comes to FX its true that he is very supportive, going along with whatever FX asks him to do, but I think FJ acts more like a courtier to his king than a father to FX.

He certainly spouts the rhetoric about him being a Fan and his son to the Emperor at various key moments, but I think the sub-text in those cases is that it is surely mainly a reminder to the later that in fact this is the Emperor's own son we are talking about here, the product of years of effort to protect and not someone to be thrown away.

And in his various court encounters, FJ basically just does what FX tells him to (even to taking poison!), in some cases without asking for an explanation in advance.

FJ never actually works proactively for FX using his connections and networks for example, or speaking up for him in court the way PM Lin attempts to, his only recourse throughout the series has been lobbying the Emperor (or using his resources) and/or CPP. By contrast Emperor deploys his help both in hidden ways and less so (for example giving him cover for the Spring Examinations, offering him the Ye shopkeepers, then the flower viewing event to solve the deficit problem, etc etc).

Moreover at most of the crucial moments in this season, FJ has deliberately sat back and not played the father role, the most notable case being after the Chrysanthemum viewing assassination, when FJ sits at home not entering palace or allowing Madame Liu to, while emperor restarts his qi, threatens the imperial doctor, and when the girls are dithering, makes the first surgical cut!

Emperor also always tries to include FX in those 'family' events, notwithstanding the dysfunctional nature of the Imperial family manifested at those lunches and toasting the chrysanthemums while waiting for an assasination attempt!

FJ certainly presents as a more amiable father like figure, perhaps the one we'd prefer to have when there isn't a crisis on than the scary Emperor, but I think the Emperor is perhaps the more effective father in some ways.

Hmm, but FJ completely ignored FX for his first twenty years of life, and only tried to bring him to the capital at the point when he could be used to reclaim his mother's legacy - in other words all for his mother, not him. Now its true that the relationship between them has evolved into something much more since then, but I mostly think FX is the adult in their relationship, telling FJ what to do (as a proxy for his Mum?) rather than FJ.

And what about his relationship to his own son, which before FX intervened, was pretty neglectful on the face of it?

Most importantly, I'm not sure FX's analysis of the two fathers motives is really correct or fair, just his perception based on incomplete information.

First, although the Emperor does set up the Flower viewing event as a loyalty test, a royal family is a bit different to a normal family - you can't be just a son, if you know you are a son you are also a potential usurper! And notable that both CP and 2P failed the loyalty test - CP seemed to deliberately trip and fall; 2P sipped his wine and watched.

More fundamentally, I think the Emperor was reluctant (and indeed didn't know whether he ever would be able to) to acknowledge FX until he had knocked out the Temple's emissary (the WuZhu twin) because he knew if it became known he was Ye Qingmei's son, the temple (and assorted others such as Empress and her faction) would try and kill him.

Remember back in season 1 where FJ says that he and CPP feel there is a hidden danger to FX that hadn't yet been dealt with? Instead he tried to set up a career path that would have made him the power behind the throne in future by way of compensation.

Interesting analysis , thanks for sharing, but don't think I really agree with this take.

Starting backwards, hard to attribute anything to Ye Qingmei in relation to FX in particular since his upbringing is basically due to his first life (in our time) and his grandmother (where mostly pretending to be at odds with each other) plus tough love regime of WuZhu and Fei Jie. His affinity with his mother's values surely comes mainly from his memories of our time, though does grow as he becomes more aware of her history and agenda.

Secondly, I'm not sure we can assume Emperor was an entirely neglectful deadbeat dad (except for FX) - manipulative sure, but that's different. We actually heard he encouraged second prince to form his own faction and take part in politics for example. Was that purely to hone the CP's talents, or genuinely give him a chance to prove his own merits? Hard to tell.

But the comments (stated in first season and implied in second) about the respective table manners table manners, and hissy fits when people don't get with his agenda in those fabulous family meals both spoke of past occasions, and kind of reminded me of my own (slightly dysfunctional) family dynamic!

What we do hear from Emperor is that he things CP and Second Prince in particular are pretty ordinary in their talents, an assessment shared by the Northern Qi Emperor, and pretty clear when you contrast them with FX who has martial arts abilities, literary talent, ability to manage and interact well with people, a positive agenda, and actual charisma.

Moreover, his disparagement of his children pretty much parallels Fan Jian's reaction to Sizhe - its only when FX intervenes that the Fan family dynamic changes from FJ's neglect of his actual son, and Madame Liu being at war with Ruoruo and Xian because they might impact on her son's inheritance, into something much better.

Thirdly there is no evidence that Empress is neglectful of CP, quite the contrary, from this season it is clear that they interact a lot. It's true she is clearly an alcoholic with some mental health issues due to being punished by Emperor for crimes past (viz demise of Ye Qingmei) but I don't think that explains CP's incestuous relationship with is aunt, which seems anything but maternal!

And on second prince, not sure if we can assume directions of causality! Just because you read books doesn't mean you neglected your child growing up (and the consorts have to fill up there time while locked up in the palace somehow after all, books sounds more interesting to me than fishing!), but if I had a son like him (and she makes it clear to FX in season 1 that she knows his true colours), I too would take refuge in books...

Actually seems to me that Second Prince is most like his father socially. He is not an Emperor who seems to venture out in disguise to find out how people are really doing, instead streets cleared while he gets his bowls of wonton soup! And we never see him interacting with any of his consorts or relaxing really anyone at all except FJ and CPP...

Perfect timing seemed to me a bit thin.

I guess my take was that the relation ship between SYR and Wanning wasn't really a tight secret - at the very least, stupid mother and sister could easily have let something drop, but more fundamentally regular visits to her in palace or whatever are inevitably pretty publicly observable!

Moreover, if an Imperial physician (and family) suddenly disappears after visiting princess, it would be inherently suspicious (one of the reasons I was surprised she killed him).

That said, this was just one example of numerous plot holes and bits of incoherence that suddenly crept in at the end.

Others for me were, was relationship between SYR and Princess always about sex, or was he in the plot to replace Emperor from the beginning? If the latter, why wasn't Chancellor Li in the loop and using influence to get him in a more key position?

And why on earth did Granddad Xiao just imprison Duke Su for five years with no explanation and nothing to do (even if was for own protection)! And why didn't his best friend the Emperor intervene??

Then there was the whole giving the fish pendant away thing in the hope that your friendly neighbouring country will agree to rescue you (and not just take the opportunity to grab your country while at it), which surely never made real sense. Even if it was a genuinely sensible rouse, couldn't they have secretly have separated out some of the army in advance to protect the Emperor, or changed the command pendant secretly or something??

There's more, but I thought while the opening scenarios were improbable they were made plausible; the middle moves by our heroes all seemed to develop reasonably well, but at some point it went seriously off track plotwise!

Also, if he was going to knock off evil princess, why didn't he keep supporting the Emperor rather than Prince Chang, when he would likely be blamed for her death in the aftermath? Could easily have made sure Su got disposed of and gained brownie points...

While revenge/justice was certainly a key theme, seems to me the romantic relationship between the main leads (and rejection of it by ex husband) is pretty central to the storyline.

First in terms of the need for revenge, the triangle between Duke Su and murderer husband was absolutely central, with part of the justice being that she got someone who actually genuinely loved her rather than just exploited her.

Similarly the contrasting relationships of people thinking they are entitled to be loved/control others/ regardless of what they do (Princess, husband, Jiang wife ) vs genuine mutual respect and autonomy in relationships was surely just as much a key theme as revenge/justice.

Thirdly, there was some attraction between main leads from their first meeting, and the storyline showed that relation moving to an explicitly romantic one and marrying them off. Plus also had a number of secondary pairings and love triangles, so hard to say not a romantic drama in themes.

So that they chose not to show the romance on screen or just tease is a perfectly legitimate criticism.

He was actively looking for such a herb. He'd been having sex with princess for ages, why on earth would he suspect that it was a drug and not the natural consequence of his actions. Even if princess had told him she couldn't have children (and no indication that she had), medicine was certainly not to absolutely certain in those times.

And it was never obvious to me why princess losing her baby would cause Li's to be executed - women miscarry all the time!

The last set of episodes for this drama were rather disappointing in my view.

It was always mostly enjoyable, rather addictive fluff, engrossing because of the chemistry of the main leads and some good acting on part of the villains rather than anything more substantive, but from episode 35 onwards, there were more and more plot holes, compounded by a bad ending.

In terms of the ending, why do we have to send our hero off to the border, see him nearly lose, and kill off his stalwart deputies of ML? Completely unnecessary to the plot in my view.

And why do so many of the villains get off relatively lightly? Allowing evil ex to commit suicide after committing treason and multiple murders for example seems unsatisfying.

We also never got any really serious action between the two main leads, just a few seconds of a kiss before they hid it.

Worse, the plotholes were multitudinous - how and why did the ex realise that the pregnancy was fake for example?

All the same, an enjoyable ride in the absence of much else new to watch, and will certainly look out for a few of the actors in future.

Definitely put Nirvana in Fire at the top of your watch list, especially if you into revenge/thriller plots. Its probably the all time best c drama of any kind I've seen to date (though JOL gives it a run for its money. Very light on romance (ML is too busy self-sacrificing), and light on humour, but fabulous all the same.

I think we have to assume she married quite young (anything from 14 or 15 onwards was perfectly common historically) and really was a contemporary of the others - at one point she made a comment to her husband that she would have been at the school for girls has she not been married to him. That said, none of them look like teens, more early twenties!

Interesting contrast, though both seem to me to gain allies and make enemies in the process with aplomb, and it is true that both are essentially about people being used as pawns to achieve the goals of others struggling to become the players on the board.

That said, JOL is in another whole class above this in my view - The Double is really just escapist romantic fun fluff; JOL isn't really a romance at all, but a complex, multi-layered drama. I think its more interesting to contrast JOL with Nirvana in Fire - two different answers to the question of how to go about changing the world, and the personal costs of doing so.

But yes, both are great viewing in different ways...

I agree its overrated for what it is, and certainly won't have much rewatch value given hackneyed and ridiculous plot etc.

All the same, I'm enjoying it immensely as a bit of escapist fluff, and I guess many others are too for the same reasons, and that is what is driving ratings.

Its big advantage over Blossoms (and Wonderland of Love which also has strong similarities) in my view is the chemistry between the main leads, plus FL not quite as may Sueish; its not really the same genre/class as Galaxy, despite some superficial similarities.

I disagree with your comment about the female lead's age though - seems to carry it off just fine to me, with her extra bit of maturity totally fitting the characters background.