metrikfire

A lot of people on MDL are not used to Chinese drama romances about really terrible people having really shitty and toxic romances. Especially not Zhang Linghe who is peak husband material in PoJ.

Man whaaaat the fff is going on LOL everyone is such a hot mess in this story I dont understand how they have such a lovely warm filter and fuzzy blur on some INSANE ass scenes like making it look soft and fuzzy it doesn't make the characters any less insane!!

Yeah forreals. I cringed so hard when Qing Yi forced a kiss on his "sister in law" in the bathroom like in that instant, I knew. I knew it would be a full blown makjang style dumpster fire romance.

I know quite a few really dumb AF red flag girls that I can easily list off the top of my head. They're red flag because they dumb AF and they're dumb AF because they never confront their red flags.

A lot of women are just shitty people or behave shittily and sometimes we see shitty selves in these red flag girls. The main demographic watching asian dramas are women so like, yeah, it's a lot more common to hate dumb red flag girls cause we probably are them and see ourselves in their stupid behavior.

I actually don't understand the hate for this drama. I mean... the main couple don't have a good relationship folks. It's not that kind of romance lol
I also find both of them to be frustrating. Their romance is very push and pull and not in the good way. It's very intentional. As a matter of fact, I foresee with my third eye that these guys are either going to get
a. a tragedy. One person dies or better yet, Hamlet style they ALL die
or
b. an ambiguously open ending where we're not sure if a main character is dead not. Maybe they sacrificed themselves or maybe they're just shadow lurking in the background.

Gird your loins and brace yourselvesssss

I see what you did there LOL

I'm on episode 6 so far and I'm confused... is it just me or does the show pick up flavor further along the way because right now it's a really under seasoned salad of nothingness. Like, I don't know if there is supposed to be chemistry between the two leads or if I'm psychologically resisting the chemistry because I know how young Ai Mi is. The politicking is also really... just really flat so far. Nothing is happening, people are very hot and bothered about 30,000 people dying but no one is doing anything about it, nothing is changing. The only thing that surprised me is that *one character* biting the dust so early on in the series.

I'm going to stick it out for a few more episodes and see where it goes.

Um are you mentally stable? Do you think MDL is a country and we’re all refugees here or something? Lmao.

Oh man. Everything about the Shuang and Jin’an pairing is so milquetoast. If this romance had a colour it would be beige. Are they even trying to make their pairing compelling? Even my brother’s half-ass congee has more strength than this watery slop.

That's probably because its the same director as Pursuit of Jade. He even uses several camera and production techniques in PoJ that he used in this show.

Alright. Made it to episode 37 and now I’m like… what are we doing here. How have they sandwiched PTSD and healing from trauma between half ass politicking and mediocre war games… is BEYOND me. Did they have too much money to blow through??? Were they so excited about MoLi that they had to milk that cow a little harder? We will never know.

What a tragedy to happen to such an excellent drama.

The real question is, how much pining is happening in this drama?

Okay on a scale of 1 to Constantine, how scary is the horror aspect of this? I mean I cant handle psychological horror like, I can’t even look at posters cause that 💩 lives with me for WEEKS after.

Harrrrrrd passss.

Ye Li suffered from trauma induced psychosis. A more extreme form of PTSD.

Honestly, at episode 33 now and I have to say that the themes of this show are severely misrepresented in MDL’s summary and tags because it has completely blindsided me. It’s definitely not fluff romance or period drama theatrics. The political intrigue is standard fare, but the two main leads are absolutely riveting. The whole team has done a really really freaking good job with building up Ye Li and Xiu Yao’s dynamic, from beginning to end. The arc is not in the characters but in their relationship. The music delivers. It’s masterful and meaningful. The soundtrack is built over several episodes to reveal the plot and character stories simply because of the way it has been arranged and enmeshed into key scenes and character developments.
I did not expect to be as moved by this drama as I have been. I don’t even know if I like it all that much, but I know it has left an impact on me.
Also I just love Cheng Lei’s face OML that white hair made everything better. What a silver fox hot damn.

I don’t usually write reviews for c-dramas because I’m so new to it, but once I’m finished I believe this drama is something I must review because wow.

Honestly Cheng Lei’s visuals are wayyyy too princely for him to do military style cargo pants and oversized denim lmao

OML what is happening here

Tragically, the quality of cinematic splendor has quietly slipped into obscurity as each episode slowly dips into standard format camera work, overly long pans and mid-ground setups.
Music is still good but kind of underutilized.

On episode 2 and I LooooooOoOoOoooveeee the cinematography. The colours!!! The soundtrack!!! I don’t know if the plot and narrative will go downhill later but omg Cheng Lei and Bai Lu goddamn all that chemistry and excellent acting.