Michelle Topham

You're not missing anything (except Feng Shao Feng's scenes) and I think some of those are on YouTube :)

I'm also glad I had seen Peng Xiao Ran in other dramas before I watched SJFY as, if I hadn't, I would have thought she was the worlds most actress and never watched her again :)

Yep. The editing is horrendously bad, even though they had to cut it down, you'd think they'd at least have kept in some scenes to make the later ones make some sense :)

I fast forwarded through most of the last 5 episodes, and I RARELY fast forward, just slowing it down for Feng Shao Feng's scenes :)

Just watched Shining Just For You. The entire thing is terrible and, IMO, one of Peng Xiao Ran's worst performances as she's one-tone throughout all of it. Only stuck with it for Feng Shao Feng as, even in her worst scenes, he stood out as spectacular.

This is spectacular.

And, at Episode 4, the performance of Yu Kang as The Undertaker is heart-breakingly beautiful.

I'm not sure I've yet recovered. But thankful to have saved you from the same suffering. Hahahahaha.

Sadly, this is still pretty unwatchable everywhere due to horrendously bad subtitles. Just started to watch it on YouTube and, in the first 5 minutes of Episode 1, YOUKU's garbage AI-translated subs had a General shouting "Fire", which was translated into "Fuck". I don't think so :)

Gave up. It's a complicated drama, but YOUKU obviously doesn't care if it's understandable in any other language but Chinese. A pity as it looks amazing.

Just renewed my YOUKU subscription specifically to watch The Imperial Age. Subtitles are NOT understandable throughout a good chunk of it., especially in the conversations, as they're AI-generated.

Sound cuts are so annoying. I've stopped watching most C-dramas on YouTube, unless they were just released, as half the Chinese channels remove the music, which also removes some of the conversation. Stupidity personified.

They're horrible AI-generated subtitles, so much of what's going on makes no sense. I just renewed by YOUKU subscription to watch this and they're literally GARBAGE subs on there as well. Will be nice when Chinese companies join the 21st century :)

She had nothing left to live for. No husband, no father, no money, no job. No future life. She lost everything. What else would she do? And especially in that era, when women alone had no kind of future without someone/money to support them.

Sure, Di Ren Jie figured out who the murderer was, but he did her no favors. That's the problem with legal justice, though. Sometimes, it's no justice at all. While the justice her father meted out for her was exactly what everyone who wronged her deserved.

They're super cute together on this show as well :)

https://youtu.be/rSQh6hun_yc?si=o3zTOZZYGA8kxJVd

I'm currently watching Feng Shao Feng in Shining Just For You, and while that drama is a tragedy of epic proportions as it's been so horribly butchered in the editing (edited down from 36 episodes to 25 due to censors' requests), I'm still enjoying it, but especially for his performance. He's always wonderful.

I generally don't watch the opening credits more than a couple of times in a series unless they're very well done or the opening theme is beautiful, but I've watched those on every episode so far. Absolutely gorgeous and silky smooth animation.

It's a very high-quality production (cinematography, sets, costumes, color grading etc are gorgeous), and features some of China's top veteran actors. And they don't come cheap.

Very similar to Strange Tales of Tang Dynasty, and just as interesting and as well-acted in my opinion. Just shorter episodes.

You can also tell it's non-idol. Just look at the cast.

Expect to see many more dramas like this in the future, as Chinese audiences are turning away from long dramas in large numbers (only 20% of Chinese viewers ever finish a long drama nowadays, and that number is falling all the time), so production companies will be releasing more dramas that are in the 20-25 minutes per episode length and maxed out at around 20-25 episodes going forward.

I'm all for it. It's a superb alternative when you don't have the time to commit to something that's over 30 hours of viewing time. And this one is exceptionally good so far, btw.

Perfectly said. And what I also loved about his character was that, even in the most impossible situations, he tried to find a solution that would hurt the least number of people.
And, if it involved GJZ, even before she became his wife, he would move heaven and earth to make sure she was never harmed.

That to me was so telling about his feelings from her right from the first moments when he insisted her grandmother move her to the capital. He knew he could protect her there, whereas he couldn't protect her as easily if she stayed in her home town.

Interestingly, it took him a while to figure out his feelings for her but, to me, he was enamored the first minute that he saw her. As she was enamored of him. (How many times did she go running when he asked her to meet him? How many times did she help him in quite dangerous situations that didn't necessarily involve her or her family?)

Like he said later on, when he realized he had been in love with her right from the beginning "I wish I had figured out my feelings for you earlier" :)

Sadly, if he had figured his feelings out, things would not have ended as badly for many people in his life as they eventually did, as none of those people would have had a chance to get close to her.

But again, that was also due to the way he was brought up. Hiding his feelings away from everyone, including himself.

The marriage is amazing for both of them. And some of the best scenes between them come after the marriage :) And there's nothing wrong with her in-laws. Her mother-in-law can be a bit of a pain, but GJZ knows exactly how to handle her :) Watch it. It's not traumatic at all.

It's just so darned pretty :)

It's so great, isn't it? I must have watched it 100 times.

He's from a very poor rural family, and he and his sister basically brought themselves up in extreme poverty from being very young children (grandparents dead, parents working away in a city).

I read that he had been invited to audition for the show by the director who had heard him singing but, because his voice sounds like a woman's, he turned the director down as he thought people would laugh at him.

She persisted for two seasons before he finally agreed to be on Season 3 of The Voice of China, and that audition was his first performance.

Surprisingly, he was knocked out in Episode 7, but has now gone on to be one of THE most successful singers in China, with a huge international following as well.

It's now a battle between him and Liu Yu Ning who gets a drama's theme song it seems like :)

And it was many months before I realized EVERY theme song performed by a female singer that I loved was actually him :)

I only learned that a few days ago when I was looking for info on his acting training, found out he graduated from the Shanghai Theatre Academy, and then that popped up about his marriage to Zhao Li Ying. They were only married two years, though, so not a very long relationship but yep probably explains their chemistry in Minglan :)

Yep, he was a perfect example of book smart but foolish :)