Winter

Oh sure you're right, it is mostly the viewers who glorify the problems and not the drama itself. The message you are saying was in the drama, was in fact not clear for me. For me yes the age gap and issues were adressed but the overall message was "age doesn't matter as long as both are of legal age". And for the mentioned age of consent. yes it is 14 but with restrictions. So for a 14-15 year old the age difference can be 3-4 years max (The older person needs to be younger than 18). And let's say it was unrestricted, since when is law your moral compass? If something is written in the law it is our moral compass? You do know that slavery was legal before right? So maybe legal doesn' actually mean good. I enjoyed the drama for the most part because I thought the characters where older. I am younger than DJX and I felt incredibely uncomfortable watching it in the end because of the age gap and because I would never date someone who is that much younger. Btw the age gap isn't the only problem the drama has. If we set the age gap aside how did DJX fall in love with sang zhi? Why? None of the side characters had a life outside of being a plot device for bringing the main couple together and it felt incredibely lifeless at times. DJX also barely had personality outside of being shameless and sang zhi. You can love hidden love I won't forbid you rlly but you should accept there are valid reasons to critisize it. You don't get paid for defending it like this.

"marriagable age" in the end of these dramas the couple is either engaged or married (sometimes with kids) when they are still very you in their 20s. That is not because that is the time to marry, it is because there is a low birth rate in china and everyone is single. I don't mind it that much because I can simply ignore it but no you don't have to marry that young. + refering to women and men as females and males is weird

I do realize that yes and you don't get my point. She is 18 and he is 23 when he falls in love with her. I am 21 and would never think about dating someone who is barely an adult. Now sure, it is fictional and all that, but it is also the most popular modern romance cdrama. The age gap isn't the problem they could have been 25-30 and I wouldn't bat an eye but this is just a different story, the brain finishes developing in the mid 20s so there we have one adult and one adult by law whose brain is still developing. and the first couple episodes where they cast a 10 year old and an 28 year old to play characters that are 14 and 19? Who thought that was a good decision

uhm yes because it is problematic and noone talks about it bur instead hidden love is labeled aa a blue print for romance dramas and the best of all? when it is not ans is instead (un)intentionally romanticizing this weird age gap? And even if they had no agegap, I still have stuff ro criticize bc it rlly isn't as great as everyone says. If you could get past the age gap/ignore it and enjoy the drama then good for you. you are allowed to like whatever you want rlly

where did you watch the rest? I thought about watching this but can only find the first 8 episodes on youku

Just to clarify, for me the problem isn't the age gap itself, it would be totally okay if it was like 28 and 34
The problem is how old they are when they fell in love and got together. And eventually marry... you don't need to marry at that age and I feel like dramas like these exist to manipulate is to get married and have children early/to find our one true love and romance before our brain is fully developed

If you can ignore the age gap, which you probably can't because it is a major plot point and everyone constantly mentions it, then thus is a pretty cute and good drama I'd say and I liked that the ML wasn't nonchalant and bland but more straight forward, which seems rare these days. But again, the age gap is problematic and I don't rlly know how to rate this drama. I even wanted to drop it but I have 2 episodes left so I think I will finish it.

In case you are wondering how big the age gap really is and why everyone is making such a big deal out of it. he fell in love with her when she was 18 and he was 24. Yes they got together when she was 19 and he was 25 but that's not the point. If you don't think 18 & 24 is unproblematic I don't know anymore

I too see this aa good news and hope that we can keep going like this and that it's only the first step.

I have watched POJ ans it was quite enjoyable but as you said not fantastic. For the other ones, I have heard of them but not sure yet if I should watch. Btw I finished watching fated hearts just now and can recommend it

I don't like kissing scenes so I don't mind the censorship there but in cases like this it is rlly a pity if you think about how much better it could have been. And also thank you for explaing because I rlly thought that maybe the law has changed but these dramas being fimed outside of china makes more sense. I do hope it will change in the future and that at least those dramas that have been filmed already can air one day

There are some chinese dramas with the tags LGBTQ or Queer so I am guessing they are under the category of a short length drama and don't air the way other 40-45 mins long dramas are airing.
And I also know that BL adaptions cannot air but archives isn't a BL adaption right? It was sonetimes very obvious there have been scenes cut and also a lot of episodes were 40-45 mins and then some were suddenly 35 minutes? They could have just continued to portray them as friends or even brothers and call eachother brother but like you can hug your friends and family. I just feel like the censorship is too much and it makes me a little sad of what could have been a way more emotional and heart wrenching story than it was.

Well I do agree with what you said, there aren't that many good modern romance cdrama out there. Especially the overused tropes are annoying. It is common in other genre too (historical, xianxia...) but in some modern dramas the tropes ARE the plot and not something to move the plot forward. I do like the genre tho, that's why I was hoping to get recommendations.

I still want to ask, which dramas can you recommend outside the modern romance genre?

I don't understand the censorship and how they decide what gets cut. I saw clips of archives where they hugged and nothing else happened so why did they cut that? what's so weird about two guys hugging? If you thought the one person who was your best friend and brother who you grew up with was dead and then they are alive, isn't it a natural reaction to hug someone? And might I just ask, apparently BL isn't allowed due to censorship but I see some BL series airing and the country seems to be china. so at first I thought they were filmed somewhere else like hongkong but if it was a hongkong drama it wouldn't say china. So how does the censorship really work, some BL are allowed and a hug in a bromance drama is cut?In case you know the answer, please share it with me since I rlly don't get that part

I mean you're possibly right and I wouldn't have shared my thoughts like this if the rating was more accurate but it is just bad and I like ranting so here we are haha

But that's what I mean you have 36 episodes? So much time and yet you give us nothing? In other dramas countless scenes and episodes are cut but they thought this was a good length for a drama like this?

Anyway, I have a question, since we have a similar opinion about this drama and I'm not rlly interested in LFY right now, do you have any other modern romance recommendations?

Well I partly agree that it does what it promises and is a feel good cute romance but the problem is that it is way too long. There is no second couple or any other sub plots with other characters and the focus is solely on the main couple. And they are just so boring, the female leads acting might have been good but there was just no character growth whatsoever and she stayed mainly passive which didn't help.
And sometimes work related plots can be good too when the work is interesting, which isn't rhe case here. I did understand why the FL was working there but that wasn't her dream was it? What are her dreams, her interests, her hobbys? Noone will ever know. And what we know about thr ML is also mostly related to work or him losing his job as neurosurgeon. All they ever did was work or eat outside (and he always paid even when she had more money?) It wasn't a happy drama for me either, I might have enjoyed it more with less episodes and some other changes but not like that.
The rating is still odd, didn't watch LFY but it can't be worse than this and yet it has a worse/similar rating? (I don't remember haha)

I think I could have answered my question myself? Well anyway I started episode 1 of the mystic nine 2016 and was like "wait I saw that guy in the cast of the mystic nine that is currently airing" yeah it seems after 10 years a lot of the cast members are actually the same. My confusion was due to the fact that every drama of the main lost tomb series has different actors who play the same characters. So I assumed it would be the same for the mystic nine without checking the cast.

Yes I wish they cut some scenes of the bandit leader and the zhang guy, they didn't need that mucb screentime and the romance was cliche and weird. Instead there should have been mote scenes of ZHX and especially ZHX and ZHL together. I saw some deleted scenes and why is the censorship so strict? I understand kissing isn't allowed but they cut scenes where they just hugged? Maybe this is better for my mental health bc if they actually included more scenes of the two together and if we had more focus on that the ending would have absolutely destroyed me as I would have been much more emotionally attached to the characters. I actually like sad endings and would have prefered if they made it clear he is dead and seeing ZHL mourn ZHX and maybe tell his students storys about him in the end.

Okay so mystic nine and the mystic nine tell different storys but the same character right? I was a little worried since the name is very much the same that they cover the same material just like I think the lost tomb 1 and the drama time raiders that released last year? (Pls do correct me if I'm wrong)

Maybe I'll come back to LFY some other time. Right now idk why but not in the mood for romance dramas

Also I did say that before but yeah again I agree it's very hard for the actors to shine in this one. I just don't understand why this has such a high rating. In general I have observed that the ratings make less sense than a couple years ago.

I wanted to put spoiler tag here but it doesn't let me edit nor delete the message so it is what it is