Skibbies

He doesn't have a choice. Qin at the start of the drama was already at the point of easily overpower any kingdom. They have to band together to even fight against Qin, but they keep failing because everyone have their own agenda and they don't have an awesome strategist that could convince everyone to really push Qin back. Battle of Chang Ping cost Qin a lot of people, and they lost an incredible general Bai Qi because he refused to listen king Ying Ji's orders. Anyways. even with that, Qin was fighting just outside of Zhao's capital, thus Battle of Han Dan.

Qin specifically asked for crown prince, so mhm. Although the Zhao King is hilariously flip floppy in this drama, one minute it's all YEAH LET'S HIT THEM while they have a kid on the throne, then the next it's all, u know what, let's wait for all the other kingdoms too.

Idk what's up with Mao Sui LOL, I guess he was promised awesome power or something. i only know him from the proverb....LOL

I'm glad your mum loves it :D this whole series deserves more love.

i only remember two of his kids LOL. but yeah his mum messed him up, I think power struggle early in his life didn't help either, since it's not just his mum but grandma and father-figure Lv Buwei too.

I'm guessing they are, but just as super side thing, there's no other reason for her to be there, unless she's like a spy? The previous installments insert romance here and there, it's common in drama as well, but they are not going to be central to the plot. They might just need a little romance to spice it up a little, and his two kids does need mother lol.

I get the impression she's fictional. Ying Zheng never had an empress or favourite lady or something.

Watch Qin Empire; alliance on netflix sometime, I think that excelled in showing several POV. It's the second installment, about Ying Zheng's great great grandpa.

Yes that entire sequence. You are right there's number of questionable lines but I brushed them off, but that sequence just looked like someone lifted it from an idol drama. I have no idea what were they thinking. Could have rewrote it in so many ways to get the message across.

Oh yeah the local one make you pay for more for TV. I'm surprised airplay doesn't work smoothly though? I think the few times I used it, it was alright? They should optimise it more mhmm. I've fallen behind on the episodes, but I'm going to watch it with my mum and I think she's behind anyways lol.

do you have iqiyi vip? cos it's on there as well. otherwise it updates at 12am following the cctv 8 broadcast, which is little rough mhmm. I can think of gazillion child actors/young and upcoming that could handle the role reasonably well. They could have have ZLY play post time skip Ying Zheng, when he's 21 or 22? and actually have power to the throne.

Did you see the really questionable dialogue in ep 11!!! I want to throw lego at whoever wrote it!

Take it easy if work is too busy! 3 ep a day is hard to keep up all the time lol. My knowledge of chinese history is super spotty too, I only have general vague impressions of things most of the time. it's usually because of dramas that i read a bit of actual history LOL.

Dowager MI was the de facto ruler for early part of his son's reign (the old king at the start of this drama), so she put in a lot of her own people. The king later removed fair amount of them but they still have influence, especially since another lady of Mi is a favourite. Mi a huge family though, the Chu king at the time + Qu Yuan (the poet! the guy we remember on Duan Wu!) were both from the Mi family. But Dowager Mi was actually a lowly status noble's daughter, because no one wanted actually marry to Qin since they were poor, far away and sort of seen as barbaric back then. /stuff I learnt from the previous two Qin Empire dramas lol.

Anyways, Hua Yang is a proper noble, distantly related to Chu King, judging by her surname. 芈姓，熊氏。Her influence is not just Mi family, it's also anyone with ties to Chu I'm guessing. The drama is actually a little weird in that Hua Yang shouldn't be backing Lady Han & Cheng Jiao, that's historically Lady Xia's alliance (Zichu's birth mother). IDK where they are going with this. Historically, Ying Zheng formed an alliance with her during his early reign I heard? He has it rough, 3 Dowagers (Chu/Hua Yang vs Han/Xia vs Zhao) + a fake dad.

oh oh someone on c!net commented the Han army wears purple, I don't remember if they appear in ep 8 yet, but it's minor. That was 250 BC, why are they wearing purple!!!! Purple isn't a easily found dye, it's expensive!!!

Well the drama kind of made it that great grandpa wanted Ying Zheng, so Yiren/Zichu was partially lucky due to that. She's a favourite despite her being barren, so she definitely have her ways. She also comes from the Mi family, and they are fairly established in the Qin court I think? Because of Empress Dowager Mi (who's...her...grandma-in-law?) As for the open challenge, i think it's partially exaggerated, and partially zichu (?) isn't strong enough to fight back, both personality and influence-wise. I think her level of importance is overstated in dialogue in ep 11? (there's some really questionable dialogues here and there.....)

Yeah, I think he should have been around for few more episodes, I think they wanted ZLY to do the more dramatic/intense scenes in ep 11 (the string of events start at 10). There's a number of scenes that totally doesn't work because he doesn't look under 20, let along 13. I don't like teenage Ying Zheng much but he doesn't pull me out of the drama.

in what way do you think she's powerful? I mean it's true that it's with her help that Yiren could be crown prince. She also helped Ying Zheng to the throne/hold it steady? She was always an important part of history, but she's nowhere near Empress Dowager Mi though.

Ying Zheng died too young!!! His great grandpa died at 75, that would have been great. Liu Bang is only younger than him by 3 years, can you believe this? (ok some say he's younger by 12 years, but still)

ahahahha your math is entirely correct. the child should be 3, 9, 13 when they switch actors, but the drama....cast people way older, i just mentally age them up. the drama sometimes kick you back into reality though, it's awkward.

I see zhang luyi and i keep mentally upping his age so my brain doesn't scream at me, but then the dialogues remind me he's a literal child, and his actions ONLY make sense as a kid. draaaaaaaaama!

hey!! don't insult Lv Buwei!

I rather like empress hua yang too, too bad her husband/son died too fast :P help me, i can't stop questioning the drama's timeline LOL. why does ying zheng look 15 when he's 9, maximum 10 when he first appears. grandpa also stayed alive longer than I expected/they travelled faster than I expected XD

it depends what version of history they decide to follow I guess? this makes me want to watch *other* Qin Shi Huang dramas to compare lol. I liked ZLY in his previous role, he's just...really far away from everyone's impression of Ying Zheng, even the previous Qin Empire kings are suited for the role than him. ahhh.

idk maybe? Empress Dowager Mi had lover in Qin Empire 3, but it was mostly a super minor side plot, so maybe? I don't think they would focus too much on it unless it's relevant to the power grabbing?

I was also wrong, douban tells me Zhang Luyi shows up in ep 9 apparently. why so early. THIS is the drama that could have used 6 Ying Zheng, instead we got 3. Zhang Luyi really doesn't look like a teenager.......you can't do this to me drama........

It's finally here, I'm so excited!! the update schedule is 3 ep per day, 7 days a week ;D so we'll finish all 78 ep in a month. cctv 8 for life! it was 2 ep yesterday because the previous drama had a last ep that aired first, both tencent & iqiyi vip are ahead by 4 more episodes (probably because they paid lot more :P)

I watched the first two episodes and first impression is holy shit this drama is made of money. There's finally epic battle scenes!! i think that's the most epic I've seen in a cdrama? it starts off with action and pretty dangerous situation, so so far so good. I rather like Lv Buwei & Ying Yiren/zichu. I'm still worried about Zhang Luyi as our protag, but he probably won't be out till idk ep 20? (definitely not in ep 10, Ying Zheng is still a kid).