ShortCircuit

Regarding the number of episodes, well, now I am confuzzled too.

So I'm watching the DVD version (at 25th right now, which is the lattest subbed as far as I know). MDL decided it's going to count the TV version eps (32) of which there are already 28 raw eps released, but the timer says the 27th will be airing on March 30th?!

So help me riddle this. Why are there 28 raws and still half a day til 27 is released? Isn't that supposed to be 29th in the TV version?...

The eps are cut differently and I get a bit OCD at times, what the heck do I count now LOL? I haven't watched the whole 28th TV in sub but even if I had, I couldn't have marked it watched in this list.

Please excuse this OCD person, do.

Yes, she redeemed herself perfectly. And it all went to show she only needed to get away and clear her head. (Maybe that rebound guy she called helped, LOL).

It's interesting how her and GW's instincts to go lick their wounds in private (or almost private, in her case, if she did go to the rebound guy in the end) are so similar. He was right to say they're too much the same personality to ever click.

Edit: I got comment 11111. I should go play the lottery, what say you?

"See this cat? This is MY cat *giggle*!"

I love one of the Youtube comments to this (it's in Chinese, but WeTV who posted the BTS liked it, so I used Google Translate to see what it was about) - it said, "Okay, you can keep the cat... but you're MINE" LOL. That person was channeling all of us.

Also proud cat owner here.

What's the MOST offensive to me is that she IS acting mature all of the sudden, as if she went through some life-changing tragedy that immediately aged her, when all that happened was that Gu Wei aknowledged he's not in a position to (basically) ask for her hand in marriage or even promise he'll be everything she needs and all the rest under the sun for her... he's going through a demolition job and he doesn't want her under the rubble with him!

Yes he should talk more - but she already previously expressed to him how hard it was for her to progress in her cellist profession. What is he going to do, present her with a choice between getting a chance to start a good career and maybe experience more joy in what she loved her whole life, OR stay with him in China, facing unemployment for now or more (since the parents are probably still throwing mud at him), give up her ambitions and dreams (the dirt would stick to her too, don't doubt it), because of a new, budding love? He's being an adult here, trying not to weigh her down and influence her decisions, and she's basically proving him right with the "tough love" speech. Yes she's suffering, but is she suffering for the two of them together or for the dream of the perfect romance they had?

They're both hard hit, and they both throw up shields, what, is either of them not allowed to personal reflection time just because they're in love?! I thought that was decided with the Jin Shi/Yin Xi situation.

Gah, I'm pretty frustrated right now. I do really hope they made a good ending, not too far-fetched, and not ruin the whole story of cute love meeting some tough choices but winning through in the end.

Maybe Jin Shi should go give Gu Wei a therapy session, he seems the most clear-headed one at this point in time.

Have you seen Ji Sung saying it? :D

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ph-bwILmkJw

Edit: I couldn't wait and spoiled myself to the raw part not included yet in the DVD eps but in the TV ver.

Going only by body language, very few words I can recognize and setting, they're going to come back to character in a non-cringe way, after the hard skidding of 25DVD. I wish they chose a smoother path still.

Original comment:

Time is running short. I hope they did a good ending arc.

It feels like Gu Wei decided he won't bother with the whole patient's family debacle, just ignore it, go la-la-la-I-can't-hear-you until it all goes away. The family was extra crazy though, after setting up a nuke to destroy his career and snubbing him to his face to plead with Dr. Yan to operate on their son, they didn't even try to apologise or aknowledge much the successful operation and it's all still left in limbo. It's not like the cnets crazies will go away or that there weren't already enough black rumours in the hospital about him (and Gao Xi, and "killing" his mentor, etc). Mad props to Dr. Yan, though, I never expected him to stand up for Gu Wei, given how different they use to judge a case. There's no love lost between them, but he still completely defended him, at risk at becoming a target for the mad dad.

I'm not pleased with the hospital management here, at all, they were the ones who took his Germany option away, as if they were already finding him guilty, and then they were still appeasing the parents until Dr. Yan told it to them straight. I get that they try to keep the hospital's good name, but Gu Wei did nothing wrong, and the patient freaking survived. Why not defend him in the end?! Gao Xi and Dr. Yan did more for him in their personal names than the hospital admin. Boo.

I don't like LZX's tough love approach. Yes, he didn't tell her and they didn't get to make a decision together. Yes, he didn't tell her father what the whole family wanted to hear. But dammit, he did want to say it. And it's not like LZX's previous actions and decisions would lead him to believe she could manage the stress and not show it in her own personal ambitions. He doesn't need her to make sacrifices for him, or to suffer the public shaming beside him. He doesn't seem to have told his own friends or even his family. So what now, is Jin Shi allowed his separate space to clear his head, but not Gu Wei, to find an inner balance in the worst of times?

And even when she learns of the problem, the first instinct is to push him away and ask him to solve it, but when it's (possibly) solved, she still won't take him back, because of reasons?

I'm not happy about it, let me tell you. And I'm even less happy with his tries at appeasing her. He's still treating her as if she were a child (though admittedly, she did react as if she were in all previous instances), and she's still acting WAY too cold out of the blue, while claiming she's an adult now. What, can't adults emote as soon as they get their adult stamp on?!

There are only 4 more eps left, but I REALLY REALLY want them to separate for a (longish) while. Give him time to get his head cooled off, let her experience the real world a bit more and maybe realize what she had and is pushing away. People are allowed to make mistakes. Adult people are also allowed to change their minds and make decisions alone. They still have huge chemistry, if it's meant to be, it'll be. And this is rom-com so I know it'll happen.

Still, I'm not pleased with either of them right now.

RE: Gu Xiao, what, did his father drag him into a black hole's event horizon?! Do phones no longer work outside China? He's beeing childish too, GIVE HER A CALL and an explanation, FGS!!!!

The only one I'm pleased with this ep is Jin Shi, he's still interested in Yin Xi but won't be a doormat in front of her. I hope they keep it that way til the end!

Ep. 25 DVD, the pain is not done yet.

It was clear the censors were going to do a banning spree on explicit BL content of any kind as they do periodically (I remember Addicted Heroin disappearing in the ether out of the blue at one point just because China. And now the stricter censoring after Word of Honor slipped through the cracks and then ZZH got cancelled too). But the 227 was used as an excuse for it (ao3), and the xfx got the blame for it, at least partially. At least that's how it looked in the international side. They even made him release a formal apology for whatever his fans had done, which is absolute madness for anyone thinking like a normal person.

On the national side... yes. I mentioned the water armies and the undercurrents. Some big movers didn't like anyone stealing their deals, and I am aware of some rumours, but won't comment on them any more.

As for lost work - he was dropped from most if not all the brands he had signed with before the incident. He was invisible in 2020. He tentatively came back at the beginning of '21, did the live theatre, was rumoured to release a few of the dramas that were already filmed (including OoL, but this one's been on and off before airing for quite a long while). Only in the autumn he got back his superstar vibe when The Wolf dropped all at once, and then when DC started finally airing. And it's only since the beginning of 2022 that he's getting his brand contracts back, and there are more open rumours about new dramas he's filming.

I'm not saying he should have filmed 20 dramas at once, as I really do appreciate quality over quantity, but given any Chinese drama gets to spend a lot of time in post-production, it's normal for a big name to have 3-4 or more dramas in TBA hell. XZ has one, two at most. I used to think they're keeping them secret, but maybe there are no secrets to keep on that side. For comparison, Yang Zi, who is also a big star, has two dramas tentatively scheduled for this year (other than OoL) and 6 (six) in pre- or post-production (though The Golden Hairpin is probably either shelved by now, or will take forever). And they also do a lot of appeareances in shows and TV contests, concerts, etc. He had to be extremely careful of where and when to appear.

So yeah, it was a very serious try to remove him or discourage him from continuing. I hope now they'll leave him be, because he's a really good actor and the public (I'm speaking for myself here, though there are more like me probably) would very much appreciate to see some more of what he's able to do. Here's hoping.

Check the timing. DVD has 45+ minutes, TV version is about 35 minutes long. There should be 29 DVD and 32 TV version episodes by the end.

There's a "Where to Watch" list above - Viki Rakuten has the DVD version, for example.

To this, I can only reply to the first part of the comment. "It's never lupus".

That means, don't take a drama screenwriter's words for what happens in real life. There are no perfect medical dramas, unless they're basically documentaries, and not a lot of people watch those.

This is a rom-com and by no means intends to be taken seriously as a medical drama. Not even in the legal aspect - though I can assure you, there are plenty of patient's families who do NOT tell the patient what's wrong with them for very good reason.

Due to the immense success of The Untamed, the fans went crazy. There were three mostly separate fandoms - one for Xiao Zhan as an actor, one for Wang YiBo as an actor, and one for the "couple" of them (as real persons and/or as their characters in TU). They're not romantically involved, though they might have been friends at the time they were done filming TU. I have no idea what their relationship has become now.

Anyway, a lot of the cp (couple) fans were so involved some were writing all kinds of fanfiction (mostly BL erotica in nature) for TU. One of those stories was uploaded on ArchiveofOurOwn (a site for BL erotica and ff) and someone reported it. That led to a mass of fan wars on weibo and other Chinese social media, leading to ao3 being eventually banned outright in China. That incident happened on February 27 '20 (thus 227).

Water armies (that means, users who post for this or that person, in favour or condemning them) were involved, and most of them blamed Xiao Zhan's fans for the whole mess. He was seen as the cause of it all, the idol madness, the reporting of stories and the banning of things. The cnets basically crucified him, his dramas were postponed, his contracts for brands got cancelled, his participation in shows and TV contests (that Chinese actors and singers usually do) was removed.

And he had done NOTHING to deserve all that.

He had to stay away for about two years from c-ent. There are many, many rumours that this or that bigwig in the c-ent tried to completely delete him from the industry, in order to promote their own actors etc. That person might have been also cancelled by the CCP in the past year, which theory says lead to XZ being allowed to re-enter the c-ent world.

The fact remains - he lost two years of his most productive period, when he was most exposed after one of the best new era c-dramas ever made, all because of human stupidity and maybe undercurrents in c-ent and politics.

That's why what happens to Gu Wei in this 23rd ep is extremely painful. I can't even imagine what that would have felt like.

Anyway, sorry for the long text. There are more theories and all kinds of viewpoints all over the net, if you want more details.

Having watched 23, I'd say wait until the happy times are back (it shouldn't take long, there are only 6 DVD ver. episodes left), then power through. It hurt, and not in a good way.

I mean, I hope he got to film OoL before it all went down, because if it happened like that to him, it would have been heartbreaking.

I can't even comment on how the rest of the story went, even with Lao Lin's realisation that his little girl grew up. When the s*it hit the fan, and the internet crazies started attacking Dr. Gu / him, and basically cancelled his whole professional existence and sense of self...

I really, really do hope that at that time, 227 had not happened yet. Because to get to act it out while remembering the whole thing would have left deep, deep scars.

Keeping fingers crossed he got to move on past that and can by now look back and wonder what the hell happened, and never blame himself for anything. Because he was really the innocent one in the whole fiasco.

Jiayou, Xiao Zhan! (And Jiayou, Dr. Gu!)

Considering 227, episode 23 DVD was excruciating.

As an extra detail, he did The Untamed and Joy of Life at the same time, LOL. (There are a bunch of BTS and in one of them Wang YiBo is teasing him for being tired, and he says it's because of filming JoL, for which he had signed the contract before getting TU. ) And then there's a LOT of silliness about how much Wei WuXian has to say (that boy is a chatterbox LOL), in comparison with Lan WangJi (he's one of those I'm-a-statue-don't-talk-to-me types LOL.)

But yes, Joy of Life is a gem. Xiao Zhan's part comes in the last few episodes, so don't start it waiting for him to appear, his role is just support, though pretty important I'd say, considering how the season ends. Watch that series for Fan Xian (the MC), played by Zhang Ruo Yun. He (ZRY) is one of the gravitas actors (I'm calling them that because they seem to be the center of gravity for all things around them, in a very subtle way.) If ZRY is a focal point, XZ is more like mercury, flexible and changing and always shining.

Just differences in the auras :D

For ZRY, something more recent that's been drawing a lot of praise is Sword Snow Stride (a wuxia), and I mean to watch that as soon as I have all the time I need for it (just because I randomly watched ONE scene where ZRY's character is drinking wine with the ghost of his friend - the ghost isn't there - and I'm haunted by it. That was an amazing scene.)

Dammit with the new Chinese rules that dramas shouldn't exceed 50 eps! And also, maybe it's a good thing, since getting two seasons of 49 eps each gives people time to flesh out the story as it should be... Though it might be a long wait in-between...

He kind of was, in the beginning, anyway. And a bit of a crybaby (with reasons to be.)

The story starts (or should have started, if they followed the original plot), with him a kid, powering up through teenage years and youth, So when they decided he was going to be a teen from the beginning and then start powering up, he had to be a bit silly and unaware, etc. And they did do a lot of childish things in their beginning at the academy (it wasn't just Tang San, mostly OuSiKe was the comic relief, but they played off each other).

He did grow out of it pretty fast - but that original setting also had to suffer because of it - because when he was all protective and brotherly toward Xiao Wu, it was very hard to change swiftly into lovers' mode (which was the weakest part of the story, IMHO, and not their fault, it was just too short a season to have time to develop that change.)

I haven't even watched the donghua, either, and I got that impression of siblings-to-lovers rush.

*sigh* I guess that's another second season we won't be seeing too soon...

He can do ice-cold personas too, you should see him in Joy of Life, where he's a deeply infiltrated spy with a tragic past (that he doesn't even know about.) I had just come from The Untamed, where his smile is blindingly everywhere (no complaints from me!), but it was such a shock to see how different he can be, and how much he goes into the character. (He has a support role in JoL, and there's still a lot of doubt if he'll reprise the role in the second season of that drama, but it's a good drama, based on a good novel, and the ML and the crew about him are also great! You should watch it, if you become interested in cdrama historicals that are more wuxia (or even just political) and not xianxia (fantasy-like).

The Longest Promise is xianxia, like TU is.

He can also do silly and clumsy (like Xiao Fan in Jade Dynasty or Tang San in Douluo Continent), and playboy rogue prince (as Ji Chong in The Wolf - watch that, even if he's the SML, he gets a whole different charming rogue vibe) or become all tortured-soldier in Ace Troops.

He's annoyingly handsome too. Because that smile is nuclear and a danger to normal boyfriends everywhere :D But I'm still not complaining.

There won't be any, it's a mourning day in China (for the victims of the plane crash last week.) That's why they released two eps yesterday.

Edit I seem to have been wrong, at least 21 DVD is out, no idea how that works.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-60819760

There's a mourning day set for them.

There was a mini-theatre (AT LEAST) that was missing both in the TLed DVD version and the TV one. It was in the duboku raw, someone posted the link, I didn't mark it, just checked that there was indeed a MT that didn't make it anywhere else. I don't even remember which episode...