PeachBlossomGoddess

He will never forgive himself either.

even though he shouldn't have killed Zhang Mo.

No, he's my favorite character

My current guess is the Mysterious Man is a Tiemo spy who infiltrated the Xiao court as the Royal Tutor or something and destabilised it. His schemes instigated among other things the rift in Huben, different factions at court and the power struggle between the Wuyang and Wenjing. He is not exactly on YFS's side although he may have helped him seize power bc at the end of the day they are rival kingdoms. I think Huai'an final play will be to pit the Mysterious Man against YFS. He won't care that much who wins, with the caveat that the kingdom doesn't fall to Tiemo. He will deal with the last man standing. This is just my guess.

I will also say to me this is just as much Xiao Weijing's story as it is Xie Huai'an's. He will end up making a good emperor as Han Ziling predicted and Huai'an and/or Gu Yu will be his greatest protectors. I am personally far more interested in Weijing's story than Huai'an's but they should both go through a growth and redemption arc together.

My speculation only. Not from random online spoilers.

The idea that a vast enough army to overthrow the imperial troops can hide in a guarded and impenetrable fortress like Hidden Soldier Valley right smack in the middle of Changan is kind of absurd. But I am suspending disbelief on that one.

As for Bai Wan cooperating, its possible but if that were the case, they have to show/tell us why. She can't be that dumb that she would just docilely stroll into the city as a decoy just bc YFS threatened her with something. I don't think we the audience should have to resort to make up excuses or fill in the blanks to cover what are clearly plot holes. That whole arc is about Huaian grossly underestimating YFS. I do like that he makes mistakes and hopefully he learns from them.

Indeed he is mostly a movie actor.

Yeah once they go big screen, best case is they do 1 drama every few years.

He said that his character is guilt driven but would go through a lot of development that he would be a different person at the end. Suggests he survives.

That's possible but Gu Yu's men were the ones who reported that someone entered with that pass. That's why I wondered when he was missing whether Gu Yu had turned. It seems improbable that YFS had to flee if his Huben army had literally infiltrated so much of Chang'an and in that case, he wouldn't need to fake a pass. That is also kind of convenient. This part of the plot is just not so tight - they figured they could get away with fudging it bc audience would be too sad at what happened to Bai Wan they won't pay attention. But didn't care that much about her so I paid a bit more attention.

Hopefully it comes together. Cheng Yi himself more or less spoiled the ending already.

Ah yes, Zhu Yilong has the best biggest eyes for those kinds of emotional scenes. Haven't really seen him in dramas for a long time, he has graduate to the big screen.

I believe it was always YFS's plan to lure Bai Wan to the city and use her as a decoy. He triggered her memory first by planting a story of a ferryman (Huai'an) who spent 7 years watching over his sister without her knowledge. That set her off to the temple to try to recover her real name and then to return to Chang'an to reunite with Huaian. The irony is that the forged travel pass that Huai'an/Wang Xing prepared was always meant for her. Idk how YFS managed to put it in her hands so that she used it though - that part seems a bit of a plot hole. In addition to the fact that as others have observed as well - Huaian really didn't protect her that well that she can be running all over the place all by herself. He should have changed her face and kept her under close watch as he did the deposed emperor.

It was all psychological warfare. That made it short and tight but also hard to follow without paying very close attention.

He is a good actor but he mostly does fantasies. I kind of find it hard to relate to his characters.

It was a good strategy plot arc, probably the best one so far.

Here:
https://mydramalist.com/769667-chang-an-er-shi-si-ji#comment-24505048

He's not the only one. Its become such a trend these days to cry your way through these roles. Everyone (male and female actors) want to make the next NIF but its very clear they either i) didn't watch it or ii) didn't get it. Hu Ge never wept - at most there was literally 1 barely discernible teardrop. But he made audiences bawl in the moment and left that long lingering ache long after the show ended. In the last year, only Wang Yinglu managed to really impress me with her sad scenes in Twelve Letters. IMO, Cheng Yi did deliver one good sad moment here - and there were no tears.

Yeah its still not fully revealed yet exactly what happened. But Liu Ziwen only killed people for the greater good while Liu Ziyan killed people to not be killed. Something along those lines. It was when Ziyan was washing the mysterious person's feet (his teacher).

Yes I agree - Gao and Wuyang let YFS back into the city AND they invited the most powerful 4 military commanders back in with him even though they suspected they had defected. It was dumb, dumb, dumb. I don't even feel bad for Gao bc he was so stupid. And XHA also knew about it and he went along with it. OMG! So whenever everyone starts going on about the brilliant baitou is coming for them I just roll my eyes like its a bogeyman myth. I think some of the plot arcs are good. This one was not.

I blacklisted AvenueX after she did her hatchet job on ZZH. NIF is the only c-drama I consider to be a masterpiece - most revenge dramas try to be the next NIF. Its not in and of itself a bad thing - it just means they are aiming high. But the similarities are superficial - like Cheng Yi is styled a bit like Mei Changsu and he can't really fight. They did cast some of NIF's top cast members (Wang Jinsong, Liu Yijun etc) in this but their roles are quite different. The plot itself is not that similar, his connections with the past not as well established. But overall its a good drama although not all the plots arcs are tightly written and there are holes. It doesn't have to be NIF to be enjoyable. As for Cheng Yi, I could do with less waterworks but his lines are alright. I wouldn't say they are among the best in the business but most of the time his lines are clear enough that I don't have to read subtitles to understand him and that is good enough for me.