A must watch I must say, especially for the romance and the unique situation as well as the way they handle themselves.
The last plot though was very weak, I guess the original writer didn't write it. And someone else came up with that cliche. The execution was so low quality that it broke immersion. The ML, FL, even the villain parts were lacklustre. The change in the villain's objective was also completely weird and out of the blue.
Also it seemed this production wasn't very high budget so there was a serious lack of extras/CG, the armies had less than hundred people usually and the fight scenes were clearly bogus. I was really astonished when in one of the fight scenes, the soldiers were literally playing with swords, haha.
Well I couldn't coup with the last episodes and the overall struggle after the first watch, so I cut all the romance stuff to a single whole, 7.5 hours long. It is such a treat to see it every now and then without watching all that 40 hours of content!
If someone wants it, I can share, its 17GB big. Though do know, I didn't polish it with effects to smoothen the cuts, only used existing scenes to create transitions from night/day etc.
Plot holes galore, that's what the drama should have been named.
Each and every plot is accompanied by glaring holes and lacking any backstory, it is as if audience is considered starving retards lusting for entertainment, no matter how nonsensical it may seem.
Fortunately our world has an unending supply of great entertainment, so I recommend to look elsewhere. Unless of course you have that extraordinary girth to ignore the crumbling foundations and enjoy the utopia built on top.
I disagree with you about voting based on feelings I think that this is so normal it's okay cause this is why…
Actually everybody has their own criteria of what they want to see in a drama.
This drama had many things that made me want to drop it. Like how the ML was such a fool in the first half or how the drama glorified the situation the boys were in as if something good, conversely it was a very bad setup and kids must not be in a situation where they get to make decisions for their parents. I have experienced this personally of how such results.
A weak story with an insecure mother, who even though understands the problems, simply can't see away from her insecurities that can be allayed with a simple visit to a lawyer or talking to family or best yet, talking to the ML!
She is extremely lucky to find him as a second chance, when the kid is still very young. Like it is for the whole, "I will not let my child's father in his life, even though he is a great father and I understand the need of a father in his life."
Justifying her bad decisions as well as depriving your child of a parent. ML is truly a great father, he is so far away from a bad example. Later, to even think that a day in a week or whatever time frame is ok for a child to bear and understand in his life, is just so far out there that it was hard to keep up with such irresponsibility.
It is weird to me that so many commenters on MDL have this bizarre hang-up about sex scenes. Exactly what is it…
There is no such thing as a limit on length for a movie. If the production team has story they deem important to portray, they will show it. Its a misconception that good footage will be sacrificed for an undesirable scene. Especially with such a high production budget and A-list actors.
Not to mention sex scenes in this movie, even in the extended editions, only amount to 8 minutes in length, out of 124 minutes. That's not even 10% of the movie.
FM's face was always like someone wanting kisses and nothing happened, that really upset me
She was just so hopelessly in love and also considered herself in a dream like situation that she didn't even see or had enough attention to understand that as a problem.
It made me question whether the drama was intentionally made with a medieval Chinese mindset. but then the quick transition from kiss to bed, though innocently, still made me come back to realize that was just over-exaggerated dramatization.
So it was a nice ride at the end. Start and mid were strong, end was stretched. The main couple kind of lost focus…
The short time the show gave them for their romance was well spent and both were so adorable. I loved how he asked her to just feel, and her holding his hand was just perfection.
Really looking forward for her first main role, I had liked her in Dear Missy as well.
So it was a nice ride at the end. Start and mid were strong, end was stretched. The main couple kind of lost focus as the tension went away.
Didn't like how they handled the second couple, they gave them so much screen time and what do we get, a behind the scenes confession? You got to be kidding me!
But I really loved how they handled the third one. With such little screen time they achieved a whole lot more they lost for the second couple. Just how it should have been for such a long standing best friends relationship to realize love.
I loved this show, it would have been my second best Chinese show yet, a feat in itself, as so few have had me so enamoured. The first being the masterpiece - Meet Yourself.
But, of course there has to be a but. And as the expectation had grown so high, the disappointment was equally harder and much more. So please bear with the essay if you do feel like giving it a consideration, haha.
Am almost finished with it but the ending doesn't really matter anymore to me, the hype has run out and I'll just be finishing it for the sake of it. It was the tour arc that broke the camel's back for me... I came really near to dropping the drama if it had gone just one episode more on that trip.
You see this arc rode on the hype train of the main couple finally getting to kiss and the second couple finally committing to a relationship. Relying on the past experience, a glorious first kiss in a romantic setting or that play in the anniversary show, and a shy romantic confession by Jiumei would have been the perfect central goal of this otherwise wonderful arc.
But NOTHING happened! HAHAHA
There is limit to how many times you can repeat the mind numbing mechanic of both leads closely facing each other, freezing up and not ending up kissing each other, either due to an interruption or just simply not doing it, kekekeke. It seemed so artificial and forced!
It was like I was watching a Japanese anime/drama, with a romantically spineless, beta male protagonist. Who freezes both mentally and physically, when the heroine clearly wants to be kissed or would be receptive to one.
But this drama actually went one more step into the abyss by making the ML say "Are you tired?" when the FML was all ready and wanting to get kissed! I was like what the ______ ____!!!
It reminded me of two separate memories: - A scene in a western show, White Collar, where the ML's boss but actually the sidekick, while undercover, lures a beautiful lady, who is enamoured with him, with the line: "Are you thirsty?" And how when he tells her wife, who is extremely intrigued that he had to flirt when he has zero skills in such, bawls into absolute laughter after hearing his pickup line.
- Of my 19 year old self, who used to escort my first crush to the university bus and then one day, she asked me whether I liked her, point blank. I froze up! Later made some sorry excuse and lost a potential chance to be with her.
The true first kiss was so meh. Like what the hell were you thinking to kiss her at a staircase under the sun at the back of some building in cosplay. You had so many instances where she looked absolutely dazzling and you did nothing but freeze up.
I am hoping the drama will get back to its superb pace after this and I will only have to cut that blot on its fame of an arc for future viewing.
Edit: It didn't return to the same pace, in fact it fizzled out after the tension was gone.
Gina Jin has always had these few shots in each drama where she looked uncomfortably skinny so its really not something new. She usually wears baggy clothes so it doesn't come off so obviously. I guess the wardrobe managers didn't agree this time around.
I don't know, every time i try a Chinese drama below 8.5, its unbearable, has bad ending or bad characters and…
Yes, open endings are a bane for me. I don't imagine something to satisfy myself as I consider it not cannon.
Unless of course the premise makes it so that an open ending is desirable, but majorly such are very realistic dramas and I am not here to find some justification to reality with it.
I see dramas as best only when they have rewatch value, Like My Ajhussi for example, it was a great drama but had an open ending. I mean in terms that the leads didn't find concrete happiness in their lives. A 10 minute last scene does not count. It just frustrates me to no end.
Well overall these are just curbs I made so I can control my drama watching hobby. Previously I had the habit of watching everything and anything with romance as genre above rating 7.
Hey! Cellist kim Bok Jo shi! I have a feeling our destination is the same!
Buhahahaha
---
Cello da! Well with your arms it should be cello or flute, right? That's our Chubs!
jhahahaha
---
Book Joo, watch out! (Uses Book Joo to shield himself as a car splashes through a nearby puddle, drenching her) Wah! It could have been so bad! What could I have done without my quick reflexes! That guy needs to learn how to drive! Book Joo: YAAAAAAA!!!
But clearly, what elements did you not like? I know that what I mainly didn't like (not including famous scenes…
Nah , there reaction was extremely lacklustre when they came to know his story. Same when they got to know that it was their uncle who was the father. They were like wood.
Can you imagine if LZS had expressed his anger in front of his father sometime before embarking on his revenge plot, or the leads or Gu family came to know about his secret, how reality could have been so different. LZS was the casualty of being the villain in this story.
That's why I felt the injustice about him, when he was telling his story. I really felt that this guy also deserves a happy end, regardless of how many get to be killed. Manu thousands died on the path of the leads' pursuit of happiness.
I think you are unintentionally, super imposing your understanding from the novel onto the drama, that's why you see it in a better light. My understanding of these characters will never be like how they are in the novel which doesn't have to wrestle with episode limits.
But clearly, what elements did you not like? I know that what I mainly didn't like (not including famous scenes…
What kind of escapist comment is this? If one doesn't have a good argument, make a silly comment to suppress dissent, is this your idea of exchanging opinions?
As for evidence, lol, everybody accepts what the leads say, its the most common lazy plot device in Xianxia. The belief system is built on many many such small intricacies being ignored to expound on few main decisions and build their evidence.
But sometimes even that is skipped like how GJS investigates embezzlement in the ministries without giving any evidence except for his short report. We are shown zilch about the crimes after he gets support from the three officials. Nothing NADA, just a fade to his completed investigation, lol, obviously they decided to cut it out. Talk about lame scene composition.
The madam accepts life changing decisions from LYR without comment, without struggle. As if LYR is a reincarnated master. No self-made businesswoman with any integrity would accept a 6 month old newbie's decisions thought up overnight.
The managers accept GJS's words without research, without evidence which in fact later does get verified as false and just an assumption. They accept compensation from GJS but forget that this wealth puts them in jeopardy in these times of chaos, the same thing the main house is intending to avoid by giving away their wealth.
GJS gets to move the general's son without evidence, he just has to say check it out or avoid that, and voila, thousands to hundreds of thousands of troops move without any official decree or intelligence report sanctioning their movement.
We can debate endlessly on this. But its very clear the writing is weak, director also has some issues with scene composition.
Now you can have your own opinion, I am not here to change it. I am expressing my opinion.
The last plot though was very weak, I guess the original writer didn't write it. And someone else came up with that cliche. The execution was so low quality that it broke immersion. The ML, FL, even the villain parts were lacklustre. The change in the villain's objective was also completely weird and out of the blue.
Also it seemed this production wasn't very high budget so there was a serious lack of extras/CG, the armies had less than hundred people usually and the fight scenes were clearly bogus. I was really astonished when in one of the fight scenes, the soldiers were literally playing with swords, haha.
9/10
If someone wants it, I can share, its 17GB big. Though do know, I didn't polish it with effects to smoothen the cuts, only used existing scenes to create transitions from night/day etc.
Each and every plot is accompanied by glaring holes and lacking any backstory, it is as if audience is considered starving retards lusting for entertainment, no matter how nonsensical it may seem.
Fortunately our world has an unending supply of great entertainment, so I recommend to look elsewhere. Unless of course you have that extraordinary girth to ignore the crumbling foundations and enjoy the utopia built on top.
This drama had many things that made me want to drop it. Like how the ML was such a fool in the first half or how the drama glorified the situation the boys were in as if something good, conversely it was a very bad setup and kids must not be in a situation where they get to make decisions for their parents. I have experienced this personally of how such results.
She is extremely lucky to find him as a second chance, when the kid is still very young. Like it is for the whole, "I will not let my child's father in his life, even though he is a great father and I understand the need of a father in his life."
Justifying her bad decisions as well as depriving your child of a parent. ML is truly a great father, he is so far away from a bad example. Later, to even think that a day in a week or whatever time frame is ok for a child to bear and understand in his life, is just so far out there that it was hard to keep up with such irresponsibility.
Not to mention sex scenes in this movie, even in the extended editions, only amount to 8 minutes in length, out of 124 minutes. That's not even 10% of the movie.
It made me question whether the drama was intentionally made with a medieval Chinese mindset. but then the quick transition from kiss to bed, though innocently, still made me come back to realize that was just over-exaggerated dramatization.
Really looking forward for her first main role, I had liked her in Dear Missy as well.
Didn't like how they handled the second couple, they gave them so much screen time and what do we get, a behind the scenes confession? You got to be kidding me!
But I really loved how they handled the third one. With such little screen time they achieved a whole lot more they lost for the second couple. Just how it should have been for such a long standing best friends relationship to realize love.
But, of course there has to be a but. And as the expectation had grown so high, the disappointment was equally harder and much more. So please bear with the essay if you do feel like giving it a consideration, haha.
Am almost finished with it but the ending doesn't really matter anymore to me, the hype has run out and I'll just be finishing it for the sake of it. It was the tour arc that broke the camel's back for me... I came really near to dropping the drama if it had gone just one episode more on that trip.
You see this arc rode on the hype train of the main couple finally getting to kiss and the second couple finally committing to a relationship. Relying on the past experience, a glorious first kiss in a romantic setting or that play in the anniversary show, and a shy romantic confession by Jiumei would have been the perfect central goal of this otherwise wonderful arc.
But NOTHING happened! HAHAHA
There is limit to how many times you can repeat the mind numbing mechanic of both leads closely facing each other, freezing up and not ending up kissing each other, either due to an interruption or just simply not doing it, kekekeke. It seemed so artificial and forced!
It was like I was watching a Japanese anime/drama, with a romantically spineless, beta male protagonist. Who freezes both mentally and physically, when the heroine clearly wants to be kissed or would be receptive to one.
But this drama actually went one more step into the abyss by making the ML say "Are you tired?" when the FML was all ready and wanting to get kissed! I was like what the ______ ____!!!
It reminded me of two separate memories:
- A scene in a western show, White Collar, where the ML's boss but actually the sidekick, while undercover, lures a beautiful lady, who is enamoured with him, with the line: "Are you thirsty?" And how when he tells her wife, who is extremely intrigued that he had to flirt when he has zero skills in such, bawls into absolute laughter after hearing his pickup line.
- Of my 19 year old self, who used to escort my first crush to the university bus and then one day, she asked me whether I liked her, point blank. I froze up! Later made some sorry excuse and lost a potential chance to be with her.
The true first kiss was so meh. Like what the hell were you thinking to kiss her at a staircase under the sun at the back of some building in cosplay. You had so many instances where she looked absolutely dazzling and you did nothing but freeze up.
I am hoping the drama will get back to its superb pace after this and I will only have to cut that blot on its fame of an arc for future viewing.
Edit: It didn't return to the same pace, in fact it fizzled out after the tension was gone.
Unless of course the premise makes it so that an open ending is desirable, but majorly such are very realistic dramas and I am not here to find some justification to reality with it.
I see dramas as best only when they have rewatch value, Like My Ajhussi for example, it was a great drama but had an open ending. I mean in terms that the leads didn't find concrete happiness in their lives. A 10 minute last scene does not count. It just frustrates me to no end.
Well overall these are just curbs I made so I can control my drama watching hobby. Previously I had the habit of watching everything and anything with romance as genre above rating 7.
Korean dramas in comparison can be tried in my experience to as down low as 8. Japanese is a big no for me, regardless of rating.
Hey!
Cellist kim Bok Jo shi!
I have a feeling our destination is the same!
Buhahahaha
---
Cello da!
Well with your arms it should be cello or flute, right?
That's our Chubs!
jhahahaha
---
Book Joo, watch out!
(Uses Book Joo to shield himself as a car splashes through a nearby puddle, drenching her)
Wah! It could have been so bad!
What could I have done without my quick reflexes!
That guy needs to learn how to drive!
Book Joo: YAAAAAAA!!!
HAHAHAHA
Can you imagine if LZS had expressed his anger in front of his father sometime before embarking on his revenge plot, or the leads or Gu family came to know about his secret, how reality could have been so different. LZS was the casualty of being the villain in this story.
That's why I felt the injustice about him, when he was telling his story. I really felt that this guy also deserves a happy end, regardless of how many get to be killed. Manu thousands died on the path of the leads' pursuit of happiness.
I think you are unintentionally, super imposing your understanding from the novel onto the drama, that's why you see it in a better light. My understanding of these characters will never be like how they are in the novel which doesn't have to wrestle with episode limits.
As for evidence, lol, everybody accepts what the leads say, its the most common lazy plot device in Xianxia. The belief system is built on many many such small intricacies being ignored to expound on few main decisions and build their evidence.
But sometimes even that is skipped like how GJS investigates embezzlement in the ministries without giving any evidence except for his short report. We are shown zilch about the crimes after he gets support from the three officials. Nothing NADA, just a fade to his completed investigation, lol, obviously they decided to cut it out. Talk about lame scene composition.
The madam accepts life changing decisions from LYR without comment, without struggle. As if LYR is a reincarnated master. No self-made businesswoman with any integrity would accept a 6 month old newbie's decisions thought up overnight.
The managers accept GJS's words without research, without evidence which in fact later does get verified as false and just an assumption. They accept compensation from GJS but forget that this wealth puts them in jeopardy in these times of chaos, the same thing the main house is intending to avoid by giving away their wealth.
GJS gets to move the general's son without evidence, he just has to say check it out or avoid that, and voila, thousands to hundreds of thousands of troops move without any official decree or intelligence report sanctioning their movement.
We can debate endlessly on this. But its very clear the writing is weak, director also has some issues with scene composition.
Now you can have your own opinion, I am not here to change it. I am expressing my opinion.