MadelineMaureen

Spoiler tag cause long comment and mentioning other shows. Also, self-report...I'm a bit of a production snob and so that will really sway my enjoyment of an overall production.
Currently airing
Cdramas:
Guardians of the Dafeng(unsure if i'm going to drop this one or keep going),
Moonlight Mystique(Also not really vibing with this one, I just don't think wuxia is my jimjam. Also although I liked this directors work previously....I'm starting to notice a repetitiveness that feels more lazy rather than artistic styling.)
Flourished Peony...duh
Kdramas:
Namib (a bit of a rough watch because of the subject matter. Idol industry...self harm..etc.)
Motel California (Literally just started, can't even get a feel for the show just yet. And after the last MBC drama pulled the rug on the genre I was expecting halfway through I'm cautious to even attempt to explain it. Looking at you When the Phone Rings...looking at you.)
Love Scout (Somehow the lightest of the shows I'm watching...I think it's because it's your basic classic Kdrama but with a bit of a gender role reversal so feels a bit fresh and yet familiar at the same time.)
Others:
Finally finished Love Song In Winter(wouldn't personally recommend as the editing was just not very good from a production standpoint. Loved the actors, but the production was disjointed & I have serious questions for the producers/directors/editing team.)
Moonlight (I'm sipping this like a fine wine...I will not be ripping this Band-Aid off quickly...After Love Game in Eastern Fantasy I just wanted a little more time with Esther and Ryan as a CP)

Rewatching Exclusive Fairytale, The Double, & Blossom as a pallet cleansers between things or while i'm working. Aka when I don't want to have to pay attention to what's being said. There are a few shows that I can just listen to and "see" what is happening without actually looking...my flavour of nerospicy has pretty good image recall.

Flourished Peony is the best of the Cdramas that I'm currently watching. I'm not far enough into the Kdramas to really give a verdict just yet. Each one is extremely different from the other.

Most of the Western shows I'm watching are currently still on hiatus for winter or getting pushed back because of the wildfires in L.A.. So I wont include them.

That's just the currently airing ones in Asia not all the shows I'm watching...😳

Production quality is top notch. Seriously of the 7 dramas I'm currently watching this one is the best in all categories. If you like a binge watch I would save this for another week or so. Each episode ends on little cliffhangers. Highly recommend the watch. No complaints from me so far.

I was today years old when I realized her nickname Mudan is literally Peony. 🤦‍♀️I know the name Jiang Chang Yang gave her means little flower or "Jiang's little flower" but I wasn't even clocking the Mudan thing until his calligraphy gift.

How does he not realize the only reason his head is still attached to his neck is because the Prince doesn't want to make his daughter upset. Man is quickly using up all of his future father-in-laws patients & he is so close to just buying the girl a pony to make up for murdering her lover.

Similar so far. I need to see more to really judge how the director is going about things. This one isn't as...poignant, as What Comes After Love. I think we need to wait for the second time jump to get an accurate feel of what the overall vibe is.
MBC pulled the rug 7 episodes into another show that started off with a completely different vibe to the last 6 episodes, so I hesitate to remark definitively.

it's honestly my biggest pet peeve. The one that really gets me in when people talk about another show or actor using abbreviations & I'm left so freaking confused as many Chinese actors & characters go by many variations of their name. Like in dramas they have their formal title, their nickname(for close family), and then their courtesy name. So there are bound to be similar initials or ones that are exactly the same. My dyslexia doesn't help me. I always use ML = Male Lead, FL = Female Lead, 2ML = Second Male etc, but some people use different abbreviations for those same meanings. I do my best to have context within the comment. Unless I'm actively being vague as to prevent spoilers, but even then I usually have my spoiler tag activated.

Just finished episode 14. Was NOT expecting my man to also be hiding in the damn closet....Y'all I completely lost it. I had to pause and run to the bathroom. That was fucking hilarious. JCY really be fucking with this poor girl, taking years off her life with the stress, I swear. She better make him beg later on.

I'm still in the middle of episode 13....I'm guessing that Master Xu is still alive and that Jiang Chang Yang is hiding him somewhere. As JCY killed the other assassin and no one was shown stabbing Master Xu after he fell down and knocked himself out. This funeral scene has me holding in snort laughs with JCY's overdramatic ass shenanigans.

1. Around episode 28(if memory is right) the show switches to other character's POV. There is much less screentime with the main couple as we are establishing the now revealed villains. Some people didn't like this.
2. The romance really starts around episode 12/13. ML realizes that FL is the girl he's been dreaming about & met at the opera. He begins to pursue her. Prior to that there is tension & flirting(sort of) but not out right affection. They get married in episode 19.
3. No. FL has identical twin bodyguards just like the ML does. (ML in real life is the younger twin of his brother, no idea if they are identical)
I personally loved the pacing and attention to detail when it came to lighting & romantic shots. The director understands the power of holding back & showing that restraint of a character that wants nothing more than to reach out. Also the action is very well done as the ML was chosen specifically because of his horse & action/martial arts skills.
Once you finish I want to say episode 15(or even earlier) go back & rewatch episode 1 again so you can better clock which character is which from the original timeline.

I just don't know if slapstick humor is for me. I'm only two episodes in, and I'm just not sure I'm really vibing with the show on a personal level. There isn't anything egregious about the production or anything, just I'm not sure the humor is my personal taste. I like the actors in the cast so I was hoping to enjoy it, but the almost childlike humor...I don't know if I can make it through 40 episodes.
It's giving 90s Power Rangers, nothing wrong with it, just maybe a bit young for me at the moment.

maybe wait for episode 4...that way you get a real idea of what the show is & if you'll be okay with the ML. I don't have issues with him & am enjoying the show.

it's actually pretty short for a period cdrama. about the length of a 16 episode kdrama. aka 21ish hours. Also the pace is really good so far. I watched the first 8 episodes all at once because I got sucked in. There are some trigger warnings I would advise thinking about before starting. The production is really high quality & they don't really shy away from the abuses she suffers so it hits a bit hard.

Jiang's little flower 🌺😏😆

yall please stop putting the names of places we don't want taken down in the comment section. at least mark them as spoiler tag

This has extremely high production quality. so so so good. Feels more like a movie than a drama at times. The lighting has remained top tier & so has the styling. The richness of the environments & sets are above & beyond....it becomes more obvious how much better this show is made(technically) when watching multiple dramas at the same time.
This story is NOT going to be for everyone. because the production is so high quality the reality of the character's circumstances becomes even more intense. So heavy trigger warning for those who struggle with violence against women. The acting & direction are so good that you will be in your feels quickly. So please keep that in mind when starting this show. Only 8 episodes in & I'm just loving the overall quality, not only visually but writing as well.

Sorry I'm a yapper.
So the whole talking about him dying. It's only after Sun Jae says it first that she's able to talk about it and even then she doesn't go into detail. I would have been curious if she had sung his song before he wrote it if time would have stopped.
Speaking of the time stopping...my BIGGEST(that's yelling) dropped ball in the production is that she didn't use her time stopping to get out of situations other than when his dad was about to catch her in the house & I think at school once. Because it proves that when time stops she can move through the space and isn't like snapped back to the starting point. (You know what I mean?) Like I'd be saying all the future shit I could as loud as possible and Quicksilvering that shit Home Alone style. This ability is first brought up within like the first or second episode so I feel like it could have been utilized more.

Castaway Diva did have top tier OSTs and score. I think I also enjoyed the call backs to other media with OSTs/scores playing in the background or just like a quick clip of the sound. The show overall for me was very nostalgic and didn't take itself too seriously.

An aside(I'll mark the whole comment as spoiler so it can be collapsed instead of making people scroll for their life): For all the shows I watch I have a physical notebook/journal that I keep track of my progress and write my thoughts down as I'm watching through a series or movie. I also have different criteria I rate within a show. ex. Female Lead, Male Lead, Chemistry, Supporting(characters/actors), Storyline, Writing, Music/OST/Score, Hair & Make-up, Costumes, Set Design, Cinematography, Production, Visual Effects, Stunts. I have an overall score for the show and then a more "vibes" score of the show. So that I know when looking back to see if I want to rewatch or recommend to friends or family I can be specific in why I think they will or wont enjoy the show. I even have a key/ledged for my episodes (I use a dot journal so I make a grid for the episode count and highlight the ones I've watched) so I can look at a glace and remember "okay there was a murder/death in this episode" "that episode was really sad" etc. My physical copy is probably the main reason I don't have very many reviews on MDL. I think I just have 2 positive and 2 negative atm.
Reading over some more of your reviews you don't hold back/sugar coat things, but you're never cruel or dismissive so, respect.

a 2 sentence line in the last few minutes of the final episode. which if you were just listening to could be interpreted two different ways leaving it more ambiguous unlike how the translations were shown which...was a...choice...

Also after reading further into the comment section I found out that I was listening to the show and not reading the subtitles so people are up in arms about what appears to be a mistranslation...still not 100% on what sent the hate parade.

Just a reminder, caps mean italic not yelling.
1st reason: I personally never really found that to be an important detail to be filled in. I think that it kind of left it up to dealers choice. Was it a higher power, was it grandma...idk...honestly didn't even care or think about it, just the method on how it was possible.

2nd reason: (If she can't tell anything about the future, because the time will freeze, how did she manage to tell multiple people still?) She is only able to talk about it once the other person knows or comes to that conclusion on their own. Any direct knowledge about the future gets erased. So her telling the cops wear the kidnappers little murder hut is can be spoken about because she experienced it in the past already. Kim Tae Sung knows because he's actually observant and put two and two together, foreshadowing him becoming a detective in the future. He was the first to actually call out the differences between past Sol and future Sol. Everyone else she talks to about the future she is very vague with the language she uses. It's not specific just "a bad thing is going to happen. trust me bro"

Okay so the 3rd reason discussion: (Like, she never tells anything to anyone. Not even her kidnapping. How is that even possible, I don't know. I mean, the police just thought: "Let's not say anything to her family, even tho she's a minor, and a guy wanted to kill her, it's not important!")
Past Sol can't remember the abduction happening so for all they know she just got lost in the outskirts of town. When she comes back to the past now in college THAT is when the police are informed that it was an abduction and she is no longer a minor. You are right though, I would think the police would inform the family, but privacy laws in Korea are hella tight so I'm unsure if this wouldn't actually be a scenario somehow.


The only excuse that I personally came up with on why future Sol's acting the way she does toward the end of her time back in college is the built up trauma she is not processing by finding out that surprise the person that you just wanted to help not get depression and self exit is actually constantly being killed because you got off at the wrong stop on a bus and he witnessed a crime against you. (that run on sentence is a lot, but I thought it in one "breath" so it is what it is at this point.)

The dementia plot point was to express that memories don't just disappear they are still within us waiting to be remembered. Dementia can bring a person in their 80s back to a memory from when they are 5. Memory isn't a linear construct. Memory doesn't just bring back an image of something from the past, it can bring back emotions, scents, touch and taste.

What the overall take away for me was that...love, and what we experience while in love, is so powerful that even time can't completely erase it, even when our memories get tangled and you can't pull a perfect image of their face anymore...those impressions still remain a mark on you.

So yeah, a bit of fluffy bullshit, but it resonated with me as my parents get older and I listen to my father's stories from when he was a child, teen...etc. He can't remember much of my childhood anymore because of a few small strokes in my teen years. But every once in a while a sound or smell will trigger a memory from that time. So power of love yada yada...sometimes people just need a stupid show with a fanciful plot to have a good time.
PS: Also side eyeing the crap out of you for that 6 on the OST...bops sir, they are BOPS. 😆