Ancient conspiracy thrillers are right up my alley so I looked forward to Luoyang with bated breath. This is set in Shendu (now Luoyang), capital of Wu Zetian's Wu Zhou Dynasty (690-705). As the only female emperor in over 5000 years of Chinese history, Wu Zetian remains a controversial figure - an ambitious, usurper whose exceptional intelligence and leadership is only matched by her ruthlessness against anyone in her way, including or especially her own children. She cultivated informers and multiple secret police and spy rings that gathered evidence against her detractors. and maintained a careful balance of power between the important political structures of her administration. This is reflected in the drama in the clear delineation of responsibilities between the Judiciary, Inner Guard and Secret Police (Lianfang). During this time, the Wu clan and Li clan were embroiled in a power struggle which persisted until Wu Zetian intervened and clarified her succession plans. Nonetheless it ended in messy plotting, betrayals and twists that are drama worthy in and of themselves. This is rich fodder for conspiracy plots such as this one.

The drama starts thrillingly with a bold daylight assassination of an informer and his daughter and the ensuing dizzying high speed chase through the streets of Shendu. All three main protagonists mortician Gao Bingzhu, foodie Baili Hongyi and inner guard Wu Shiyue are at the scene and invisible threads from their past pull them together to uncover a much deeper conspiracy that could rock the very foundations of Wu Zetian's empire. Clues emerge that connect seemingly unrelated cases and force the three protagonists to work together, at first reluctantly and with selfish agendas and then with growing mutual respect and trust that blossoms into deep friendships. I most enjoyed the tripartite friendship in the drama and would have liked to see it better explored rather than unnecessary romantic arcs. Huang Xuan nailed it with his cynical yet paradoxically idealistic Gao Bingzhu; whose shrewdness and insight into dark hearts of man does not extend to those he cares for. I also did not see much chemistry between him and Song Qian who impresses with her fight scenes but falters somewhat in her line delivery. Wang Yibo's performance is strong in some aspects but uneven overall with too many scenes where he is clearly unsure what facial expression to wear. This role does not elevate him for me from an actor that I don't mind watching but wouldn't seek out. That said the trio has enough combined chemistry that I am happy to watch them together again. As for Song Yi, she has gotten enough flack and her character was so poorly written that all I will say is this is a role such a wonderful actress should have just passed on.

I did not enjoy the first two episodes of the drama - too much was happening at the same time and the cameraman swung the camera so wildly I thought he was possessed. The action scenes are exciting and well choreographed enough they did not need to artificially augmented by cheap camera tricks. After the psycho camera settles down, the plot unfolds at an intense and exciting pace against a gorgeous backdrop of dazzling sets and with a deluge of colorfully garbed denizens - they must have hijacked and costumed practically every Hengdian tourist as extras on set I have never seen so many people crammed into each scene. My personal favorite set is the Unwelcome Well which looks almost too inviting to be a ghetto. While the costumes and certain props are anachronistic, everything comes together is such a vibrant and captivating panorama that it scarcely matters. This is complemented by well designed side characters that are based on well known historical figures. Hints of their personalities, scandalous affairs and alliances are quite faithful to history and add a nice ambiance to the setting. It set up for intriguing Dumas like plot twists that didn't materialize.

This drama builds to a top-notch, shocking and heartbreaking climax prematurely at episode 20 where both actors delivered standing ovation worthy performances. It achieves that perfect sequence of shock followed immediately by stunned comprehension and acceptance as all the clues rushed to the fore to blindside the viewer to the next unfolding twist. In the second half, the plot visibly loses momentum and digresses into romantic arcs that don't belong in this genre and filler maudlin flashbacks. The writing of the mini-threads in the second half is insipid with excessive gratuitous character implants, many of whom delivered cringe worthy performances.

In hindsight it would have been difficult to top the fantastic mid-drama climax but it is still extremely disappointing for the final reveal to be so bland. The hollow villain that everyone was on to as a bad guy early on but dismissed as too obvious turns out indeed to be the final villain, one that is not worthy of being called a mastermind. Both their motive and end game plot is not well articulated or convincing. Multiple clues and more interesting suspicious characters that don't play out leave me feeling like I went on a wild goose chase. I don't know if they ran out of money or wasted it on too many bodies but there is no sense of peril or excitement in the final showdown. Forget explosions or collapsing buildings, we don't even get one good last fight scene. The final insult is how unfathomably a feather brain like Liu Feng manages to find himself in the right place at the right time to deliver an unnecessary and uncalled for outcome. This is just a misguided attempt to deliver an audience shocker to make up for the nothing burger of a final reveal.

Even though this remains a very entertaining and highly recommended watch, the ending is a big let down that knocks 0.5 off my final rating for the show. I feel that an 8.0 is the best I can give to this show, which is still one of the better c-dramas of the second half of 2021.