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Palace Shadows: Between Two Princes chinese drama review
Completed
Palace Shadows: Between Two Princes
4 people found this review helpful
by Zii3
Jun 24, 2024
24 of 24 episodes seen
Completed
Overall 9.0
Story 8.0
Acting/Cast 9.0
Music 8.0
Rewatch Value 5.0
This review may contain spoilers

An enjoyable 3 hour romance.

Having watched a string of mini series lately, I would say this is definitely good for one watch, though I likely won't re-watch. My rating scale for mini series is more lenient, and this was quite enjoyable with no aggravations, so it merits a high score.
It held my attention, was fairly well written for a mini series, and the dynamic between the characters was fun. I was mentally invested though nothing hit me hard emotionally, so it was an easy watch.

It did require some suspension of disbelief, but I did not feel annoyed at any point while watching. The plot isn't the most intricate but that's not the focus anyway, the focus is on the relationships between characters.

Pros:
- Chemistry between the leads was great and intimate moments/scenes delivered. Desire and dominance is shown by both leads. The love scene in Ep 15 is fairly risqué for a Cdrama (and there's an extra snippet of that scene in the montage of memories in Ep 24).
- FL remained a strong-willed character throughout with great martial arts skills.
- ML is smart, also good at martial arts, falls for FL for who she is, and becomes devoted.
- Nobody was totally evil.
- Nobody acted aggravatingly stupid.
- No delusional third wheels.
- The plot/angst didn't feel overly contrived (even when some suspension of disbelief was needed).

The fighting, music, and costumes were good (the prince's costumes were especially gorgeous).


GENERAL SPOILER ON THE ENDING:

... ... ...

Ep 24: For a rock solid HE, stop at 6:08 in (as they look up at the moon).

Otherwise, the last short scene leaves things open, though a HE can be predicted because the leads love each other. It is in character and presented light-heartedly, just feels rather abrupt for a stopping point.
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