Man this drama is taking rating hit every day guess viewers dont like the direction lately?
I'm not really liking the last couple of ep tbh, i think the writing tanked and I think the editing is all over the place, but there's a lot of drama coming up so hope it rounds off well. As for the rating lol, i don't think it ever helped me much, there's too little people rating it anyways.
ZAR lied time and time again and he always puts himself first. He lied to make himself look better with the booklet…
You might want the spoiler the comment.
YY is working hard by herself and she'll come to terms with herself. I don't think she needs SS's help, and I don't think SS like her much, considering the whole situation, it's nothing personal but that's how circumstances goes.
NS doesn't have a trust fund and her trip to italy, aside from trying to start a new chapter of her life + working through her grief, is her goodbye trip with her mum, her aunt specifically asked her. She will be back working to repay debts soon?
both the FL are unlikable; how can the FL blame her BF for rejecting to loan her gambling addict dad his hard…
ZAR lied time and time again and he always puts himself first. He lied to make himself look better with the booklet thing (WYZ put JNS' name there, not him, JNS knew and brushed it off because she didn't want to make a fuss). He didn't come clean about his ex. JNS specifically told him that she doesn't think it's a good idea for YY to stay over, he agreed and then he turns around and put her on the spot so she'd say yes, what the fuck? Could have argued about it? Or you know, could have actually pony up and find her a hotel? Also note that he repeatedly say he does all these things for JNS when she never asked for it and told him to ignore her dad being hella rude, he's doing a lot of things because he feels he's never good enough, that's a him issue, not her issue. This is all background stuff.
When the debt thing blew up, he didn't want them coming over, that's fair. In fact, most of his actions make sense. But he didn't want them going to the place HER MUM rented, it has nothing to do with him. So when she asked if he can loan some money, it's because he was specifically worried about himself, how he'd look, what other people would say. She was sorely disappointed that he wouldn't just say "i can't possibly shoulder that massive debt", but he used the "we have to think about us" excuse. Nobody actually expect him to shoulder the debt. You can contrast it with Suosuo, I mean normal people wouldn't try to shoulder the debt, but she considered renting a big place, she thought up excuse for them to move in with her. When shit goes down, you take care of people actually in trouble, not just yourself, yknow? and you definitely don't use "i'm doing this for you", which makes it extra gross.
All the characters are pretty flawed but they have their shining moments too.
True about him. I love LSS but I feel like her character..... Unlike Ni Ni's character who works LSS doesn't seem…
lss does get a lot of criticism, but she got them before as well. she actually got fair amount of praise for this drama because I think she fits the character. her character def was meant to be trying to hold everything together till someone else could come and handle things (she had that crying under the sheet scene). Ni Ni excel in crying scene and suosuo tends to show her emotion much more, so it's a big contrast.
True about him. I love LSS but I feel like her character..... Unlike Ni Ni's character who works LSS doesn't seem…
she's been sheltered all her life and she's still in school. I actually like nansun more than suosuo, because the scriptwriter didn't smooth out suosuo's part, so her part have all these issues even though her personality is more my type. I like the way Nansun handled the Yuan yuan situation. While she has been disappointed time and time again by ZAR, she didn't make a big deal out of things, she brushed off the little lies he said to make himself look better. Then after Yuan yuan, she tried to have pretty calm talk with him, and ended things pretty swiftly once she felt she had enough.
I'm so excited we are at major turning point of the story. also BYE ZHANG ANREN, good god i hate his character. I know a lot of his actions make sense, and I'm happy the writer didn't make him one dimensional but I still really really dislike him.
It's a terrible mock up of another photoshoot, Wu Junmei and Chen Chong's figaro cover shoot. I think the initial poster for this drama look better than this one tbh.
I'm aware, but that show is different because it's practically an original show despite being technically a gossip girl remake. This one has a source novel, while cdramas tend to make lot of changes when adapting, it's usually towards the other way, not towards GL. Production team is very different too, dear missy's will specifically tailor their shows to cater to certain markets. (my huckleberry friends got its ending re-edited after it was terribly received, hikaru no go‘s ending was filmed specifically for fanservice). I'm happy someone is taking a step towards it, but that's not this show is all I'm saying.
1. Timeline for the drama (mostly death dates, but sometimes certain important events too, not all events were…
1. Rumour has it Lao Ai was gifted to Zhao Ji because he had a big *ahem*. Big enough that he could put it into wheels and spin them. so u know that awkward juggling scene at his introduction, lot of people took it as euphemism for this.
2. Lord Long Yang is a lover of the previous Wei King, who died in 238 BC, so a couple years before he appeared in this drama. People remember him because one of the phrases/euphemism for gay (especially in historicals) is lit "long yang hobby/kink" (long yang zhi hao/long yang zhi pi), there's like two other phrases like this (duan xiu/fen tao)
Story has it that one day, Wei King and him went fishing, Lord Long Yang started crying after catching 10+ fish, he was really happy at first, but as he fished bigger fish, he'd throw away the smaller ones. He's afraid that the king will do the same to him since there's lots of pretty people in the world. In order to comfort him, the King ordered no one should talk about pretty people or they shall be executed.
1. Timeline for the drama (mostly death dates, but sometimes certain important events too, not all events were…
At the start of warring states (400ish BC), only Chu had a king, all the other states had dukes. Qin got their first king in Qin Empire 2, so Qin Shi Huang's great great grandpa. By the time this drama started, all the states have kings 王 (wang), their first person pronouns is this lonely person 寡人 (gua ren) in the drama, the Zhou King is a king of heaven 天王 (tian wang), pronoun is alone 孤 (gu). Qin Shi Huang later specifically created the emperor title 皇帝 (huang di), first person pronoun 朕 (zhen). Huang & Di existed before, from mythical times (and in Shang dynasty, it's Di), Ying Zheng combined the two because he thinks he's as great as "three huang & five di" from the myths, and all the emperors followed him.
1. Timeline for the drama (mostly death dates, but sometimes certain important events too, not all events were…
Qin: Ying + Zhao or Ying + Qin (debatable) Zhao: Ying + Zhao Chu: Mi + Xiong Han; Ji + Han Wei: Ji + Wei Yan: Ji + Yan Qi: Gui + Tian (Jiang + Lv in Spring & Autumn) Zhou dynasty: Ji
One of the two surnames are xing 姓, which started from matriarch society, you can sort of see it as people from the same "tribe". Widely used xing at the time such as 妫 gui, 姬 ji, 姜 jiang, 嬴 ying all have the character women 女 in its character. In Warring states, it was used to figure out who you can't marry (can't marry someone that share the same xing). It's generally not used, unless you are a woman or getting married.
Side note, apparently they could also add characters in front of xing to note you are first son, second son, third son's daughter. So Meng Jiang Nv 孟姜女's last name is Jiang, meng just means she's the first son's daughter? That's not necessary how the legend goes, because when it got to late Warring States, it was all messed up, which we'll get to. I'm just using it as an example because I always forget her last name is Jiang. Married women might have their husband's fiefdom or posthumous title added in front of their xing (I only recall Spring & Autumn ladies as example though.)
shi 氏 came into play because once population got big enough, people wanted to differentiate themselves, so they used their fiefdom, rank, position to say ok my branch is different from all those other people, thus it's to denote their nobility and heritage. Poor people don't have them. Men generally use shi + name or titles.
BUT, if you are royalty (within 3 generation of the duke/king), you don't use shi. You use kingdom + duke/king/prince/king's grandson + name. so technically Ying Zheng is Qin King Zheng (and the drama's chinese subtitles does do this). Ji Dan is Yan Crown Prince Dan. Han Fei can also be Han Prince Fei. Shang Yang from Qin Empire 1 is actually a prince from the country Wei 卫, not to be confused with 魏 Wei Kingdom, so he's called Wei Yang initially, Shang is from his fiefdom that he gets later in the drama. 卫 is a small kingdom, by the time our drama started, it's a vassal state of 魏. 卫 have two other very notable people, Jing Ke (the assassin) and Lv Buwei (also judging by his Jiang + Lv, his ancestors were from Qi I guess?)
Ji is an incredibly huge xing, apparently Zhou dynasty had 71 countries/states, and 53 of them were Ji LOL. Han + Wei + Zhao used to be one kingdom, Jin in Spring & Autumns, and basically the three families had a coup and killed royalty + other powerful families at the time which marked start of Warring States, and they just used their own shi to name their country.
Qin actually got its fiefdom not long after Zhao got theirs, so in some historical text, Ying Zheng's family have Qin as shi. By the time Zhao family got shi, Qin's branch were already 5 or 6 generation away, so totally unrelated. The reason everyone think it's Zhao is because....Sima Qian's Record of Historian (90 BC, so 100ish years later) called Ying Zheng "Zhao Zheng", thanks a lot dude! Ok granted, apparently Qin ancestors insisted their shi was Zhao for awhile, I guess Qin wasn't spiffy enough at the time. But they had a notable duke in Spring & Autumn, long before Zhao had a notable duke, so you'd think Qin would be good enough to be shi? Interestingly enough, Sima Qian doesn't call anyone else from Qin "Zhao + name", so plenty people don't think Qin's shi is Zhao. There's some speculation that Ying Zheng needed a fake name while he was still stuck in Zhao, or because he's 4th gen royalty while in Zhao, he needed shi, and they just used where he was born/living, then people sort of extrapolated his shi and backtraced his ancestors when they shouldn't have. It's all a mystery and not very clear.
As for why we call him Ying Zheng now, it's because Qin dynasty started merging xing + shi (xing shi is what surname is in modern chinese, just like ming + zi, name + courtsey name is given name in modern chinese). Of course, nobility still used shi, but by late Western Han (200 years later), people start mixing them up, so everyone is all oh yeah Qin Shi Huang is called Ying Zheng. I have NO idea what Ji Dan is about, so I'm going to handwave it. Qin Empire 2 & 3 had Qu Yuan, a well known poet, but he's named Mi Yuan in it, and I looked it up at the time, but only understood they were the same person and he had two last names. Now I get it, Mi Yuan is totally wrong for the time period! Lord Changping/Mi Qi is also wrong, drama!
1. Timeline for the drama (mostly death dates, but sometimes certain important events too, not all events were…
ep 1: 259 BC, Ying Zheng born, start of Battle of Handan ep 1: 257 BC, Ying Yiren/Zichu escape Handan with Lv Buwei ep 4: 256 BC, Western Zhou lost in battle against Qin, end of Zhou Dynasty ep 4: 251 BC, King Ying Ji (Qin) dies at 75 ep 6: 251 BC, Zhao Sheng/Lord Pingyuan (Zhao, four lords of Warring States) dies ep 7: 250 BC, King Ying Zhu (Qin) dies at 54 after only 3 days of reign ep 8: 249 BC, Lv Buwei becomes chancellor ep 9: 249 BC, Qin conquers Eastern Zhou ep 13: 247 BC May, King Ying Zichu (Qin) dies at 35 after 3 years of reign, Ying Zheng ascends the throne at 13 ep 15: 245 BC, General Biao Gong kills 30k people during battle, gets stripped of his title ep 16: 246 BC, start constructing Zhengguo Canal ep 20: 245 BC, King Zhao Dan (Zhao) dies
ep 22: 241 BC spring ep 24: 239 BC, completion of Master Lv's Spring & Autumn Annals ep 19 ~ 26: 248 ~ 243 BC, Lord Chunping (Zhao) was held hostage in Qin ep 27 ~ 28: 241 BC, last time of five kingdoms fighting together against Qin (Qi isn't part of it because they were attacked some decades ago by other kingdoms together, and it's also geographically most far away from Qin) ep 30: 240 BC, General Meng Ao dies, Queen Dowager Xia dies ep 33: 239 BC, Cheng Jiao's rebellion fails and dies ep 36: 239 BC, Lao Ai gets promoted to Duke Changxin ep 38: 238 BC, King Xiong Wan (Chu) dies, Huang Xie/Lord Chunshen (Chu, one of the four Lords) murdered ep 45~47: 238 BC, Lao Ai's rebellion fails and dies, King Ying Zheng gains control of the court at 22 ep 48~49: 237 BC, Lv Buwei demoted and leaves the capital
ep 50 ~ 51: 237 BC, Ying Zheng kicked all the foreigners out under pressure from all his relatives/nobles, then recalled the order after Li Si submitted a brilliant argument, 谏逐客书 (jian zhu ke shu) could be required readings for kids in Chinese schools (not at all schools though) ep 53: 237 BC, Mao Jiao risked death to ask Ying Zheng bring his mum to the capital ep 58 ~ 60: 236 BC, Zhao and Yan at war, Qin went to "help" Yan and grabbed bunch of cities ep 60: 236 BC, King Zhao Yan (Zhao) dies ep 64: 235 BC, Lv Buwei dies ep 64: 229 BC (drama says 233 BC), General Huan Yi (Qin) dies ep 65: 236 BC (roughly), Zhengguo Canal complete ep 69: 233 BC, Han Fei (Han) dies
ep 69: 230 BC, Han King surrender to Qin, Han Kingdom conquered ep 71: 229 BC, General Li Mu (Zhao) dies ep 72: 227 BC, Zhao lost its last battle against Qin, Zhao King surrenders, Zhao Kingdom conquered ep 72: 227 BC, Queen Dowager Zhao Ji dies ep 73: 228 BC, Xiong Fuchu kills King Xiong You (Chu) and replaced him as King ep 74: 227 BC, Jing Ke fails to assassinate Ying Zheng, Ji Dan (Yan) dies to stop Qin's constant attacks ep 75: 225 BC, Qin floods Wei's capital Da Liang, Wei King Jia surrenders, Wei Kingdom conquered ep 76: 225 BC, Qin lost against Chu's army led by Xiang Yan (grandpa of later King of Western Chu Xiang Yu), Mi Qi/Xiong Qi betrayed Qin ep 77: 223 BC, Qin conquered Chu's capital, captured Chu King Xiong Fuchu, Mi Qi/Xiong Qi became Chu King but dies when Qin attack again, Xiang Yan (Chu) dies, Chu Kingdom conquered ep 78: (completely skipped over lol) 222 BC, Qin captured Yan King Ji Xi, Yan Kingdom conquered ep 78: 221 BC, Qi King Tian Jian surrenders, Qi Kingdom conquered, Qin ends Warring States, starts Qin dynasty and Ying Zheng becomes an emperor at 38
1. Timeline for the drama (mostly death dates, but sometimes certain important events too, not all events were dated though, mild spoilers) 2. Warring states nobility and their two surnames + why is Ying Zheng called Ying Zheng? 3. King's first person pronouns 4. Stuff the drama doesn't tell but cnetizens might have picked up (not really spoilers, just interesting trivia) re: Lao Ai (ep 20+?) & Lord Long Yang (Wei, super minor character, he's usually talking to the Wei King, ep 30+?) 5. Pacing comparison: partial relevant timeline taken from 1, [] is Qin Shi Huang (filmed in 2001, broadcasted in 2007, 33 ep) featuring Zhang Fengyi which covers Ying Zheng's entire life, first 2/3 of the drama (ep 1~22) overlaps with ep 1~78; [[]] is Legend of Lv Buwei (2001, 29 ep) featuring Zhang Tielin and Ning Jing, last 2/3 of the drama (ep 7~29) overlaps with this drama from ep 1~64, largely fictionalised so not a lot of check points.
I had hilarious hard time figuring out what Wei King's last name would be because they had two at the time. I…
Yeah I'm referring to the 2010 drama. I specifically watched the beloved 93 (?) version first because cnetizens consider it as a classic and I actually don't like it as much, partially due to me not recognising all these bearded men and they didn't label them! They refer to each other by titles or courtesy names so it was a Real Struggle. It's a closer adaptation to Romance of Three Kingdoms, so the characters are more black and white and there's some blatant dramatised bits. Anyways, I liked 2010 ver more even though some of it was paced little slower, I just love the characterisation and some of the acting. Cao Cao in both AA and Three Kingdoms were amazing so :D
As for why they don't make dramas like this, well it's huge production, that might not sell, and might not be even well received. Around 2014ish, the drama industry had a flood of internet giants investing that lead to more reliance on big data + using popular actors regardless of ability or affinity with character + messing up plot because they *think* it'd appeal to the audience more or shoving people in where they don't belong.
I have some bad news for you, the headwriter/creator of Young Blood is the scriptwriter for Joy of Life, and Snow Sword Stride and Dou Luo Da Lu. SSS and DLDL finished filming (s1, both novels are long enough for multi-season), JoL he should be done writing s2 but it's little up in the air. I'd hope he finish writing s3 soon as well since it's the one with season pre-planned and guaranteed success. There's other writers for Young Blood, but s1 he went over and edit them iirc, so he's fairly tied up atm. If he's done with s2 of JoL (filming is probably March, i heard May start date, several cast are tied up in something else), and YB have investors (they said they'll do s2 but it's mangotv, not tencent so this is more up in the air), he can probably do that now, I'd say half a year + filming, and if all goes well, we'd probably see it late 2022. His original plan for the story looks like it's tied to some historical events that might be annoying to get pass NRTA, and it looks like it might be a tragedy mhmmmmmmm.
Yeah that happens. i'm usually more wary of cdrama plagiarism issues, it's why I started peeking into douban, since popular dramas frequently have those issues (or they bomb the ending = =) They produce fair amount of xianxia every year, so you'll probably get them :D
I had hilarious hard time figuring out what Wei King's last name would be because they had two at the time. I…
They don't feel like a proper review though :( Criticisms are good if they are constructive, but I think only about half my criticisms are constructive LOL, the rest are just "well that didn't work for me and idk why". If I posted it to your review, I'd still get credit so I think it works?
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1 
YY is working hard by herself and she'll come to terms with herself. I don't think she needs SS's help, and I don't think SS like her much, considering the whole situation, it's nothing personal but that's how circumstances goes.
NS doesn't have a trust fund and her trip to italy, aside from trying to start a new chapter of her life + working through her grief, is her goodbye trip with her mum, her aunt specifically asked her. She will be back working to repay debts soon?
When the debt thing blew up, he didn't want them coming over, that's fair. In fact, most of his actions make sense. But he didn't want them going to the place HER MUM rented, it has nothing to do with him. So when she asked if he can loan some money, it's because he was specifically worried about himself, how he'd look, what other people would say. She was sorely disappointed that he wouldn't just say "i can't possibly shoulder that massive debt", but he used the "we have to think about us" excuse. Nobody actually expect him to shoulder the debt. You can contrast it with Suosuo, I mean normal people wouldn't try to shoulder the debt, but she considered renting a big place, she thought up excuse for them to move in with her. When shit goes down, you take care of people actually in trouble, not just yourself, yknow? and you definitely don't use "i'm doing this for you", which makes it extra gross.
All the characters are pretty flawed but they have their shining moments too.
2. Lord Long Yang is a lover of the previous Wei King, who died in 238 BC, so a couple years before he appeared in this drama. People remember him because one of the phrases/euphemism for gay (especially in historicals) is lit "long yang hobby/kink" (long yang zhi hao/long yang zhi pi), there's like two other phrases like this (duan xiu/fen tao)
Story has it that one day, Wei King and him went fishing, Lord Long Yang started crying after catching 10+ fish, he was really happy at first, but as he fished bigger fish, he'd throw away the smaller ones. He's afraid that the king will do the same to him since there's lots of pretty people in the world. In order to comfort him, the King ordered no one should talk about pretty people or they shall be executed.
Zhao: Ying + Zhao
Chu: Mi + Xiong
Han; Ji + Han
Wei: Ji + Wei
Yan: Ji + Yan
Qi: Gui + Tian (Jiang + Lv in Spring & Autumn)
Zhou dynasty: Ji
One of the two surnames are xing 姓, which started from matriarch society, you can sort of see it as people from the same "tribe". Widely used xing at the time such as 妫 gui, 姬 ji, 姜 jiang, 嬴 ying all have the character women 女 in its character. In Warring states, it was used to figure out who you can't marry (can't marry someone that share the same xing). It's generally not used, unless you are a woman or getting married.
Side note, apparently they could also add characters in front of xing to note you are first son, second son, third son's daughter. So Meng Jiang Nv 孟姜女's last name is Jiang, meng just means she's the first son's daughter? That's not necessary how the legend goes, because when it got to late Warring States, it was all messed up, which we'll get to. I'm just using it as an example because I always forget her last name is Jiang. Married women might have their husband's fiefdom or posthumous title added in front of their xing (I only recall Spring & Autumn ladies as example though.)
shi 氏 came into play because once population got big enough, people wanted to differentiate themselves, so they used their fiefdom, rank, position to say ok my branch is different from all those other people, thus it's to denote their nobility and heritage. Poor people don't have them. Men generally use shi + name or titles.
BUT, if you are royalty (within 3 generation of the duke/king), you don't use shi. You use kingdom + duke/king/prince/king's grandson + name. so technically Ying Zheng is Qin King Zheng (and the drama's chinese subtitles does do this). Ji Dan is Yan Crown Prince Dan. Han Fei can also be Han Prince Fei. Shang Yang from Qin Empire 1 is actually a prince from the country Wei 卫, not to be confused with 魏 Wei Kingdom, so he's called Wei Yang initially, Shang is from his fiefdom that he gets later in the drama. 卫 is a small kingdom, by the time our drama started, it's a vassal state of 魏. 卫 have two other very notable people, Jing Ke (the assassin) and Lv Buwei (also judging by his Jiang + Lv, his ancestors were from Qi I guess?)
Ji is an incredibly huge xing, apparently Zhou dynasty had 71 countries/states, and 53 of them were Ji LOL. Han + Wei + Zhao used to be one kingdom, Jin in Spring & Autumns, and basically the three families had a coup and killed royalty + other powerful families at the time which marked start of Warring States, and they just used their own shi to name their country.
Qin actually got its fiefdom not long after Zhao got theirs, so in some historical text, Ying Zheng's family have Qin as shi. By the time Zhao family got shi, Qin's branch were already 5 or 6 generation away, so totally unrelated. The reason everyone think it's Zhao is because....Sima Qian's Record of Historian (90 BC, so 100ish years later) called Ying Zheng "Zhao Zheng", thanks a lot dude! Ok granted, apparently Qin ancestors insisted their shi was Zhao for awhile, I guess Qin wasn't spiffy enough at the time. But they had a notable duke in Spring & Autumn, long before Zhao had a notable duke, so you'd think Qin would be good enough to be shi? Interestingly enough, Sima Qian doesn't call anyone else from Qin "Zhao + name", so plenty people don't think Qin's shi is Zhao. There's some speculation that Ying Zheng needed a fake name while he was still stuck in Zhao, or because he's 4th gen royalty while in Zhao, he needed shi, and they just used where he was born/living, then people sort of extrapolated his shi and backtraced his ancestors when they shouldn't have. It's all a mystery and not very clear.
As for why we call him Ying Zheng now, it's because Qin dynasty started merging xing + shi (xing shi is what surname is in modern chinese, just like ming + zi, name + courtsey name is given name in modern chinese). Of course, nobility still used shi, but by late Western Han (200 years later), people start mixing them up, so everyone is all oh yeah Qin Shi Huang is called Ying Zheng. I have NO idea what Ji Dan is about, so I'm going to handwave it. Qin Empire 2 & 3 had Qu Yuan, a well known poet, but he's named Mi Yuan in it, and I looked it up at the time, but only understood they were the same person and he had two last names. Now I get it, Mi Yuan is totally wrong for the time period! Lord Changping/Mi Qi is also wrong, drama!
ep 1: 257 BC, Ying Yiren/Zichu escape Handan with Lv Buwei
ep 4: 256 BC, Western Zhou lost in battle against Qin, end of Zhou Dynasty
ep 4: 251 BC, King Ying Ji (Qin) dies at 75
ep 6: 251 BC, Zhao Sheng/Lord Pingyuan (Zhao, four lords of Warring States) dies
ep 7: 250 BC, King Ying Zhu (Qin) dies at 54 after only 3 days of reign
ep 8: 249 BC, Lv Buwei becomes chancellor
ep 9: 249 BC, Qin conquers Eastern Zhou
ep 13: 247 BC May, King Ying Zichu (Qin) dies at 35 after 3 years of reign, Ying Zheng ascends the throne at 13
ep 15: 245 BC, General Biao Gong kills 30k people during battle, gets stripped of his title
ep 16: 246 BC, start constructing Zhengguo Canal
ep 20: 245 BC, King Zhao Dan (Zhao) dies
ep 22: 241 BC spring
ep 24: 239 BC, completion of Master Lv's Spring & Autumn Annals
ep 19 ~ 26: 248 ~ 243 BC, Lord Chunping (Zhao) was held hostage in Qin
ep 27 ~ 28: 241 BC, last time of five kingdoms fighting together against Qin (Qi isn't part of it because they were attacked some decades ago by other kingdoms together, and it's also geographically most far away from Qin)
ep 30: 240 BC, General Meng Ao dies, Queen Dowager Xia dies
ep 33: 239 BC, Cheng Jiao's rebellion fails and dies
ep 36: 239 BC, Lao Ai gets promoted to Duke Changxin
ep 38: 238 BC, King Xiong Wan (Chu) dies, Huang Xie/Lord Chunshen (Chu, one of the four Lords) murdered
ep 45~47: 238 BC, Lao Ai's rebellion fails and dies, King Ying Zheng gains control of the court at 22
ep 48~49: 237 BC, Lv Buwei demoted and leaves the capital
ep 50 ~ 51: 237 BC, Ying Zheng kicked all the foreigners out under pressure from all his relatives/nobles, then recalled the order after Li Si submitted a brilliant argument, 谏逐客书 (jian zhu ke shu) could be required readings for kids in Chinese schools (not at all schools though)
ep 53: 237 BC, Mao Jiao risked death to ask Ying Zheng bring his mum to the capital
ep 58 ~ 60: 236 BC, Zhao and Yan at war, Qin went to "help" Yan and grabbed bunch of cities
ep 60: 236 BC, King Zhao Yan (Zhao) dies
ep 64: 235 BC, Lv Buwei dies
ep 64: 229 BC (drama says 233 BC), General Huan Yi (Qin) dies
ep 65: 236 BC (roughly), Zhengguo Canal complete
ep 69: 233 BC, Han Fei (Han) dies
ep 69: 230 BC, Han King surrender to Qin, Han Kingdom conquered
ep 71: 229 BC, General Li Mu (Zhao) dies
ep 72: 227 BC, Zhao lost its last battle against Qin, Zhao King surrenders, Zhao Kingdom conquered
ep 72: 227 BC, Queen Dowager Zhao Ji dies
ep 73: 228 BC, Xiong Fuchu kills King Xiong You (Chu) and replaced him as King
ep 74: 227 BC, Jing Ke fails to assassinate Ying Zheng, Ji Dan (Yan) dies to stop Qin's constant attacks
ep 75: 225 BC, Qin floods Wei's capital Da Liang, Wei King Jia surrenders, Wei Kingdom conquered
ep 76: 225 BC, Qin lost against Chu's army led by Xiang Yan (grandpa of later King of Western Chu Xiang Yu), Mi Qi/Xiong Qi betrayed Qin
ep 77: 223 BC, Qin conquered Chu's capital, captured Chu King Xiong Fuchu, Mi Qi/Xiong Qi became Chu King but dies when Qin attack again, Xiang Yan (Chu) dies, Chu Kingdom conquered
ep 78: (completely skipped over lol) 222 BC, Qin captured Yan King Ji Xi, Yan Kingdom conquered
ep 78: 221 BC, Qi King Tian Jian surrenders, Qi Kingdom conquered, Qin ends Warring States, starts Qin dynasty and Ying Zheng becomes an emperor at 38
2. Warring states nobility and their two surnames + why is Ying Zheng called Ying Zheng?
3. King's first person pronouns
4. Stuff the drama doesn't tell but cnetizens might have picked up (not really spoilers, just interesting trivia) re: Lao Ai (ep 20+?) & Lord Long Yang (Wei, super minor character, he's usually talking to the Wei King, ep 30+?)
5. Pacing comparison: partial relevant timeline taken from 1, [] is Qin Shi Huang (filmed in 2001, broadcasted in 2007, 33 ep) featuring Zhang Fengyi which covers Ying Zheng's entire life, first 2/3 of the drama (ep 1~22) overlaps with ep 1~78; [[]] is Legend of Lv Buwei (2001, 29 ep) featuring Zhang Tielin and Ning Jing, last 2/3 of the drama (ep 7~29) overlaps with this drama from ep 1~64, largely fictionalised so not a lot of check points.
As for why they don't make dramas like this, well it's huge production, that might not sell, and might not be even well received. Around 2014ish, the drama industry had a flood of internet giants investing that lead to more reliance on big data + using popular actors regardless of ability or affinity with character + messing up plot because they *think* it'd appeal to the audience more or shoving people in where they don't belong.
I have some bad news for you, the headwriter/creator of Young Blood is the scriptwriter for Joy of Life, and Snow Sword Stride and Dou Luo Da Lu. SSS and DLDL finished filming (s1, both novels are long enough for multi-season), JoL he should be done writing s2 but it's little up in the air. I'd hope he finish writing s3 soon as well since it's the one with season pre-planned and guaranteed success. There's other writers for Young Blood, but s1 he went over and edit them iirc, so he's fairly tied up atm. If he's done with s2 of JoL (filming is probably March, i heard May start date, several cast are tied up in something else), and YB have investors (they said they'll do s2 but it's mangotv, not tencent so this is more up in the air), he can probably do that now, I'd say half a year + filming, and if all goes well, we'd probably see it late 2022. His original plan for the story looks like it's tied to some historical events that might be annoying to get pass NRTA, and it looks like it might be a tragedy mhmmmmmmm.
Yeah that happens. i'm usually more wary of cdrama plagiarism issues, it's why I started peeking into douban, since popular dramas frequently have those issues (or they bomb the ending = =) They produce fair amount of xianxia every year, so you'll probably get them :D