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2. Nope.
It's a household-heavy drama aka slice of life. Like Story of Minglan
1. However, while it's the men and their achievements that mostly confer status on the whole household, the main wife of each nuclear family (1st madam, 2nd madam etc in each generation) are actually in charge of domestic management. This includes the family's finances, shops, farms, accounts, servants, and anything else.
It's a serious and taxing responsibility, like being the actual CEO of a small company. For example, you saw that ML needed his wife's signature to get some money from the family's account since she's in charge. Of course they often used capable assistants (like the literate maid) same way a modern CEO has a boatload of executive assistants and such.
So, it's inaccurate to say the women are just there sitting pretty and fighting. The problem is that during those periods there was no role equality: the serious things women did (and they were serious things) weren't valued as much as what men did. In actual fact, the only truly "useless" people of that period were the young sons and daughters.
2. Regarding the families' ethics. Sure, the Lin family MiL did shitty stuff towards that maid. All I'll say is, it's complicated and there was no way to please all sides. Someone had to be sacrificed and she choose the most disposable person.
3. As for maids being weak. It's really not a women thing. All the slaves whether male or female are weak and at the complete mercy of their masters. Remember what happened to Lanxiang's neighbors? Everyone was sold, including the men. Also, when the ML former maid returned, her husband and FiL were sold off. So you see, it's a "servants are weak" thing not a "maids are weak" thing. It's just that we see more of the women because the story is focused on women.
4. Of course the rich women have some agency within the strict patriarchal structures of this story, which is based on the Ming Dynasty. It's not just the kind of agency you want to see. 😁. Even if they can't go to court themselves or appear in public often they wield enormous domestic influence simply by managing the family's wealth and having the power of their maternal family behind them.
He can't expose the dude without exposing her too.
More importantly, HER family would never allow him divorce her or send her away. Because they are more powerful than his own family and they need the marriage to continue for their own goals.
He had to orchestrate it in a way where her family had no choice but to agree. Hence the expose.
And no, he couldn't have acted a fake death or whatever with her because they don't trust one another and there's zero chance she'd trust him with her life in that way.
You do make some good points and I see where you're coming from but I think I disagree with some of what you said.
1. First of all the women are certainly not weak. Choosing to die is strength too when the alternative option is being made prostitutes. THAT is why the females decided to die, it's not just because they're to be made slaves. It's because they'd also have to sleep with guests. Even if the show framed it as because of ancestral honor, it's still an act that takes immense courage.
2. Whether the ML family informed the FL family would have made zero difference. Canceling the bethrotal is the betrayal, NOT the failure to inform them. Both the FL and the ML patriarch knew what they needed to do. The ML family did, the FL family didn't. And the ML family had to distance themselves from the FL family since the latter wouldn't do what was necessary.
3. Regarding the ML's wife and mother in law dynamics, you're focusing on money and stuff rather than the rigid social heriarchies of the time. No matter how rich or independent she is, she's still below her MiL in power UNLESS her husband also sides with her (which he certainly doesn't). All it takes is for them to nail her with some nonsense charge like "lack of filial piety towards the husband's family ' and she'd be ruined in the public's eyes and likely abandoned by her own family, too.
AFAIK the Lin family didn't sell out the Shen family.
Both families already knew what the king wanted (a memorial stating that the former king wasn't any good). The Lin patriarch complied while the Shen patriarch refused, preferring to die with his conscience intact (naturally, those old men never ask their family members' opinion before taking such drastic actions).
Anyway, the point is had the Shen patriarch done as asked the whole family would have been just fine. The Lin family has zero fault here.
The FL didn't really do anything for me but this drama's political machinations are definitely top tier. TBH the ML & FL were politically outmacheted by that Yu couple. What a beautifully evil tandem.
Didn't really feel much chemistry between the two leads. Which makes it a good thing the drama isn't heavy on romance.
As for how he reacted to knowing she had a crush on someone else, it's called a weakness. Which made his character more relatable. Who can truly identify with a ML who is perfect in every way? Moreover he didn't question her or threaten her or give her an ultimatum. He simply stayed away to process stuff, which, not ideal but not some unforgivable sin either.
And calling him someone with low EQ despite his extreme levels of understanding towards FL in literally every other matter makes me believe you're seriously projecting.
We don't tend to like them in real life just like we don't tend to like them in dramas.
But not liking them does not mean they don't deserve to be represented in movies and dramas. Not liking them does not mean they are poorly written.
And she grows too, at her own pace.
Excellent news for me regardless. Do you have any idea if they completed volume 1 at least, on wattpad?
1. Most of the scenes he talked his way out of the Marquis suspicions are really weak. Especially after the banquet fight with the Cao dude. If the younger son can see through his scheming right away, it's beyond belief he's been able to deceive the father, who's supposedly smarter, for that long, and with explanations that amount to "I don't know" .
2. The younger's son rise from weak to strong is simply not believable. Cuju master after two months of training. Squad leader in two months after being the most useless recruit in his set. Holding his own in the martial arts tournament against lifetime martial artists. Nah. There's no reason they couldn't have advanced the time by 6 months or a year each to make his improvements more believable each time.