Reviews

Showing without needing to tell

The subtext is palpable.
The chemistry is electrifying.
The emotions are raw.

I gave this a 10 out of 10 rating before finishing the 3rd episode.

The last 2 episodes could be crap and it would still be 10 stars based on the 3 episodes alone. Of course i waited until i finished before sharing my review. But as expected, still a 10 out of 10.

Instead of seeing stereotypical TV-movie romantic characterizations, both characters act and react in ways you really identify with. Their actions and words always feel like something you've done or thought of doing in real life. They don't rely on conversations with side characters to understand what the leads are feeling. There is no exposition of their feelings. There's no voiceovers. There's no need for it. Their actions are enough to know and feel exactly what they're feeling.

With writing and acting like this, the storyline could be the most boring thing and it wouldn't matter. Tv shows like this let me know that any old plot can make an amazing watching experience if it's written and acted well.

Do yourself a favor and watch this.

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A Cute Drama That Can Easily Be Missed From The First Several Episodes

Let me start off by saying that this is not one of those dramas that will lure you in with the beginning episodes. Other than being funny for a lot of the beginning episodes, it can be pretty confusing as well, as you don't really have a sense of where this drama is going until you reached a certain episode.

That being said, let me state a couple of things and you can decide if you want to watch it.
* If you mostly just care about the romance and the other stuff doesn't matter for you, then I think this drama could be for you.
* This is a FANTASY drama. So, throw out all of the comparison relating to real life.
* Plot mostly revolves around the novel world so nothing will make sense.
* If you can make it to Episode 8, that's when the drama gets really good and where you'll start to understand what's going on. I think the reason for the low rating is some viewers dropped this drama somewhere within the first 7 episodes.
* Most importantly, it's a happy ending

Story: While there is an overall goal for our lead characters, because it focuses mostly on the plot of the novel world, it can be pretty random. There's really no set direction when it comes to the novel world's plot so that's why for story it only gets 3 stars from me.

The cast: The characters of the main leads were good enough for me, however it felt more like the FL's character is not so smart while the ML's character is the brains in all of this. He always seems to be one step ahead. Great second leads as they are not annoying and have their own love interest with each other and good side character friendships and assistants.

Not much music here other than the ending credit ost being played a lot but I do like that song though. A potential rewatch for me but probably starting it from Episode 8 instead of the beginning.

Overall, another good drama to watch to pass time. Not too short or long episode length wise. It may not be an amazing or standout drama, but I still liked it. Ending was great and nothing felt rushed. I'm satisfied with this drama.

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Quirky and layered

This seemingly simple drama has some subtle layers that kept me interested.

Topics that are touched on - lightly because this is a comedy romance drama in that order;
how someone can create a lie and use their position and influence to cause harm,
betrayal by a friend can have serious long term effects,
not facing your fears can be debilitating,
fans can cause damage in social media.

Even though our FL has chosen to live in seclusion her thoughts are beautifully written and conveyed as inner dialogue.
The ML is almost the polar opposite to her and like a burst of summer sunshine he invades her life and heart.
There are some wonderfully lol moments and cuteness abounds.
Supporting cast are terrific too and the character development of both leads is believable. He used his smile and optimism to mask hurt and learns to be more realistic and she learns to stop hiding and confront or challenge what hurts her.

I liked Enrique's character so much I am checking out his other dramas.

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Nerve-wracking and exciting but very underwhelming ending

Slight spoiler?-
The first 8 episodes were really fun to watch, last 4 episodes got progressively boring - also morals where?
Acting by the supporting characters wasnt the best although gi osung and seo ji hoon did great even towards the end when their characters were barley making sense (in terms of motives).
This isn't a romance drama but the fl and ml had great teamwork and chemistry, and their gradual friendship was natural which made me root for them to get together. But somehow, the moments that were meant to be romantic at the end felt awkward - the whole drama just wasnt wrapped up well which is really disappointing because i was actually really enjoying it and looking forward for new eps.
Fun overall. solid 8/10

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It started out so well

I watch Chinese dramas for badass heroes/heroines who fight for the good and destroy the bad people who try to harm them. Not so with Fighter of the Destiny because the story lacks continuity in that the hero gets into a dire situation (usually bcos someone plotted against him) and then he's miraculously rescued after which he returns to normalcy without ever seeking retribution on those who attempted to kill him. At a point, it seemed like the whole world was out to get him and he just folded every single time.
It also didn't help that no one else in their clique had the intelligence to move things along. Loulou was always crying, pouting, or shouting for her Shifu, while thirty-six and the bear guy kept getting more stupid as the story progressed. Conversely, Chengsheng being the only one who could solve the riddles, heal with his blood, develop good fighting skills even if we barely saw him practice, and was primed to save the world...was just a tad bit too much.

Another negative aspect of the story is that I'm tired of the childhood-friends-to-adult-lovers pipeline in C dramas. I simply cannot watch another stupid story where kids are supposed to have fallen in love back when they were 5 or whatever. China has 1.4 billion people so even if we adjusted the population for the time period, it would still be in the millions and the likelihood of them reconnecting is infinitesimal. So, please, can writers please stop with this trope?

Lastly, despite not really liking the series, I have to give a shoutout to, Chen Su, the actress who played the Empress, as well as whoever styled her character because she was absolutely breathtaking.

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If everyone decide to corroborate a lie, then it become the truth

A well executed mystery story and with the side of youth. I love how they slowly uncover the truth , there is no boring episode and you will enjoy it so much.

Love the cast and the acting, you really can connect to them.

Though, I guess we should have see the story about the squad, I think there is more to that than being them a backstabbing gays lol. They deserve better storyline I think. But Its the twin sisters story so its understandable.

Really recommended you to watch it. Its a unique kind of revenge dramas.

Oh I cant move one. I need a prequel with the squad. I need to know what happens before. , they're just so happy and lovely with each other. <3

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Good mini-show with an interesting love story

This is a very good mini-show. The storyline is interesting and although the subbing was really bad at times, I understood most of the story. With better subbing it would have been clearer what was going on.
Character wise we get this not so outstanding and somewhat naive FL who gets married to a very manly and fierce ML with a hidden past and a terrible reputation of killing people (and wifes) left and right. Of course things are not that simple as we realize when everything unravels along the way.
Acting wise this is not top shelf but it’s definitely not bad. The actors do a fine job portraying their characters despite the short format and I guess low budget. The chemistry between the leads is good and the love story becomes very sweet.
So, if you like something fast and short with an interesting storyline, this is well worth watching.

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Strange in the wrong way

I was looking forward to this, Jung Hae-in being one of my favourite actors.
I just read the main storyline before and thought it sounded promising, but the actual series didn't deliver it for me.

The start is just confusing. So we are where? In a dystopic parallel world? Or in our world? I don't know, because if someone like the main character really existed with these kind of healing and recovery powers, and that would have been known since his childhood, he would not have seen the light of day ever again because every nation in the world would have tried to put him into a laboratory and disect him to find out his secret. That at least was my first thought after 20 minutes in.

The next thought was, who are all these people, why do all the things happen, and at some point I felt annoyed as the main character loudly speaks all of his obvious thoughts in a way nobody really does. It's just something I don't like in general. I don't like being spoonfed every single thing like that. For all the abilities he possese he seems awkwardly helpless and clumsy most of the time. I finished the first episode and most of the time you see him clutching his missing eyesocket or both his eyes in panic and uttering obvious things. He is steadily on the run and can escape, until a very tiny woman shows up, (either knowing all the secrets for an unknown reason or just trying to be the weird 'I like creepy things'- character) and after seeing his healing ability, happily throws him off a roof. Oo

I honestly didn't like any of this. It's dark, and I like dark, but this just feels unpleasant. The characters seem flat and constructed altogether, and I don't like any of them, at all, it just seems sterile and weird to me. It also reminds me of rather bad copies of some Marvel movies I didn't finish either because I disliked them.
You get thrown into the storyline without any necessary background information, instead there is lots of graphic organ cutting, pulling and slicing and this steady rather helpless out loud commenting of the main character. It would have been so much better and more intelligent the other way around. Give visual background, let the audience think and let it understand the mysterious lead character by his actions, his gaze, etc.

I stopped watching after the first episode, so if it got any better or even brilliant later I might have missed that. I simply didn't care about any of the characters or the story, it just seemed too artificially fabricated and thrown together in the attempt to create atmosphere and tension - which sadly it failed to do.

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Nope....

One of the worst "old" kdramas, it went full old melo style which kdrama thought it was cool and trendy to do at the time. Other than the nostalgic feel, this drama is a failure and got nothing going on for it. Not recommended! At least you get to see the younger version of some familiar faces.

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flawed yet utterly enjoyable, uses narrative manipulation, explores the dichotomy of revenge/justice

i watched Revenge of Others weekly and one thing that cannot be denied about it is that it was incredibly enjoyable. the fast-paced episodes, the interesting characters, and the complex layers of mystery kept me waiting for the next episode. this show, in its essence, is an interesting exploration of the bullying culture that exists in South Korea that also tackled the themes of violence, justice, retribution, and revenge.

i will address 5 main points:

1) COMPLEXITY -- this show was a mystery/thriller so it is expected that there will be a lot of misdirecting and new pieces of information being revealed with each episode to build up the suspense. however, i think the show was too complex for its own good. everything seemed to be connected and it seemed like they willfully kept things complex and unresolved to keep the viewers guessing but even when we were at the halfway mark, nothing was revealed yet. by that i mean, there was no subplot resolution until the very end. on top of nothing being resolved, they kept introducing new plotlines and new characters to increase the complexity of the overall plot and add to the mystery. i was afraid they would leave the resolution of everything to the very end and of course, that was the case.

overall, the way they introduced information was (intentionally) disconnected, especially the flashbacks. the timeline of the flashbacks was very confusing. i knew they would end up leaving the resolution of everything to the very end but it’s still annoying how they have over-complicated things throughout the whole show just to add to the mystery. all the little clues that were given to the viewers to keep us guessing and all the theories didn’t matter in the end. i generally liked how they have misdirected the viewers at least a couple of times regarding who the murderer might be but there were just way too many variables and characters and storylines going on for there to be any actual thrill in trying to guess things about the plot. because it didn't matter and the clues that were given were only there to confuse us further and none of them actually led to anywhere. you just had to watch it and accept what the show gives you.

2) LOGICAL FALLACIES -- despite the overcomplexity i talked about above, i actually liked how detailed the main story of this show was. however, the main story and the characters' actions were full of logical fallacies that you would not even realize are there if you didn't actually question their actions. i went into detail about a lot of these in the reaction thread i did for this show on Twitter, but one of the main logical fallacies was how Chanmi was incredibly gullible at times while being smart and reserved at other times. Sejin's whole story where he painted Sooheon as the culprit was full of holes yet Chanmi attempted to shoot Sooheon based solely on his witness account and some circumstantial evidence despite being emotionally involved with him. then only a few episodes later, the same thing happens again. Osung, who they know to be a cunning liar and manipulator, said Wonseok was the one who pushed Jaebum and Chanmi didn't even question it when her not questioning witness accounts almost led her to kill someone innocent who she cares about. her carelessness and naivete were inconsistent. she was distrusting at times yet she also believed things very easily at other times. this just seemed to be a thing where whenever it was convenient for the plot for her to believe what she heard, she did. overall, i think the logical fallacies were caused by the overcomplexity of the plot. if you're giving the story THAT many details, you're going to have some plot holes.

3) BULLYING CULTURE -- clearly, the deeply complex culture of bullying was one of the main themes of this show. they showed the extent of the bullying that exists in schools, its intensity, and how far the students actually observed the silent "rules" that came with this interwoven culture. one thing i found interesting was how the show portrayed the "bystanders." when Junggyeong, the rapist, was at school bullying the victim or any other student, he was never confronted by anyone or more specifically, he wasn't confronted all the time. yet, when he had to leave the school, all the students were cheering out the windows, acknowledging his bad actions and expressing their thoughts on how he deserved what happened to him. i thought that was interesting because bullies almost always require bystanders who do nothing seeing as they will bully people in public to showcase their power. if enough students were to stand up when they saw Junggyeong bully others, he or the other bullies wouldn’t be so confident in their assumed power the next time. another parallel to this scene was when Osung was live streaming a fight between two students and the whole school joined the live and watched two people very violently fight each other. this scene provided us with another look into the workings of the bullying culture that the kids at this school were clearly so accustomed to. they saw violence taking place yet all they did was watch and react as if it was not actually happening in real life and people were not actually getting hurt.

i think what happened in the finale shows that the two instances of irony regarding the bystander students were very much intentionally included the way they were in the show. in the end, just when we thought everything was over, Osung dies while Sooheon tries to defend himself from him and we see that none of the students tell on him to the police because they all thought Osung deserved to die. so, suddenly, they didn't look at the case as a murder, even though an 18-year-old kid died in front of their eyes. they looked at it as retribution/justice/revenge. this way, we see that the students, the bystanders, yield the power to change the course of police investigations. i can’t help but think that this is another reference to the bullying culture at school and it is once again showing that the bystanders have all the power.

4) APPROACH TO VIOLENCE -- i thought this show had an interesting approach to school violence. one that i personally would not expect to see. this show explored the dichotomy of justice/revenge, and other themes of intent, responsibility, and retribution. what was interesting is they explored these topics through the perspective of the bullies, as well as the victims. for instance, you had Chanmi who did not want to rely on the cops to bring justice to her brother (they were useless anyways). she wanted to straight up kill the person who murdered Wonseok. then, you had the trio of Soyeon, Ojung, and Sooheon who were taking matters into their own hands and creating their own justice by punishing the bullies, or more like the criminals, who had severely hurt people in irrevocable ways. this means they believed in violent retribution. they believed in speaking the bullies' language. they believed in dominating them through their own weapons of violence. just like Chanmi. but of course, the incompetency of the police and the politicized and unjust nature of "justice" in South Korea (they even criticized certain policies re: the punishment of minors, etc.) played into their approach to things.

but we also saw a different side of things with Jaebum at the end. a gray area. he had been violent and done things he can never take back while he was taken over by his other personality. he had suffered memory loss and didn't even remember doing these things. now, would it have been "just" if Chanmi shot him to avenge her brother? would it still count as retribution if he cannot even take responsibility for the things he doesn't remember doing?

the show posed a lot of important questions regarding violence: is it okay to use violence with violent people? are some crimes worse than others? is it okay to hurt people if they hurt others unintentionally? what role does intent actually play in how we respond to violence? can you still be held responsible for the things you did when you didn't intend to do them? is it okay to enact violence in the name of revenge? who gets to decide what others deserve? to what level? with these questions posed and these themes explored, the show portrayed high schoolers using violence because the justice system or the law enforcement didn't protect them from violence. in the end, we also saw the students continuing to get justice their own way and enact revenge the way they want as they chose to protect Sooheon and not report anything about what happened.

5) INCORPORATION OF ROMANCE -- from the start, we all knew that the genre of this show wasn't romance so there likely wasn't gonna be any romance in it. however, there was "romance" throughout and i actually loved how they incorporated it into the genre. in kdramas, there seems to be a thing where they try to not mix romance as a genre into non-romance shows. romance is a part of life and it happens naturally. it is okay to include romance in non-romance shows because it doesn't have to be the focus of the show. romance plotlines in non-romance dramas are often badly written & poorly integrated but in Revenge of Others, the romance came naturally and it was built slowly on top of feelings of worry. so much so that, when Chanmi and Sooheon finally held hands at the end and confirmed their feelings for each other, they didn't even have to say "the words." they just knew and it was that. Park Solomon and Shin Yeeun had great chemistry and i thought they complemented each other quite well since Yeeun has a colder vibe while Lomon brings in the warmth.

OVERALL -- i really enjoyed watching this show over the weeks. i thought the finale was okay even though it was not completely satisfactory for me. i thought it was an interesting twist that Jaebum was the murderer and he was actually responsible for all the bad “acts” (e.g., the murders) yet Osung was still the actual villain. nevertheless, although an interesting twist, i don’t think Jaebum’s personality disorder was a very well-constructed storyline and that is why the finale was a bit underwhelming. the thing is, they wanted to keep Jaebum on the sidelines throughout the show so the viewers didn’t immediately doubt him but his storyline requires much deeper exploration. dissociative personality disorder (DID) is often caused by trauma. how did he develop it? when exactly? of course, the clues as to him having two personalities were given often, but it wasn't very well-explored in its entirety. in the end, it just seemed like they didn't want a basic murderer reveal. they wanted it to be unique, like, yeah, it was Jaebum but actually.. it was his other personality.

now, it is important to remember that this show relied heavily on narrative manipulation to keep the mystery theme going. a lot of the plotlines actually seemed to only make sense based on whether it was convenient for the plot or not. nevertheless, this was undoubtedly one of the best shows of the year with a great look and directing, incredible performances, and interesting themes.

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A recommended Binge Watch if you're into cheese

Plot-wise the show was definitely lacking. But I have to give it up to the characters and case for making me finish the full 16 eps of the drama. The characters are sweet and the actors do a good job of immersing me in their stories. There was some huge potential lost but the drama never promised me more than it delivered. It felt like your old-school high teen drama and was perfect for it. I skipped through the ending a bit so I have to say I have no clue what happened to the villain and idc cause he was never the point I suggest if you read this review before watching you ignore that part too!

It was nice to see Bae In Hyuk in a happy cute role, looking forward to his future dramas. I need to watch more Han Ji Hyun too

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The ticking bomb

A mystery comes with a ticking bomb, a series that pretty much entertaining, a closed room murder mystery with a key like a ticking bomb
Story :
the series is pretty entertaining, and the plot was pretty much structured and the twist unexpectedly foreshadowed.
yet still they spend too much scene for things that made just to strangle things up, some truths could have been revealed sooner, and the revelation paced too fast, the ending itself is pretty good but its just the intensity just feel so wrong
Characters :
homework for every korean drama. basically there are three sides , revengers, neutral , and the bad guys with plus a ticking bomb, as the story progressing the revengers feels like they lost their main reason why they want to find the killer which is revenge. it feels more like they are playing detective.
half of the series I really liked the connection between the male and female lead they has common enemy yet doubt each other, both are being careful about each other even after knowing they have mutual enemy. but nearing the end femaie lead being too dependent to the male lead, she forget that it was her revenge and the so known "god of war" male lead turns into war dog blinded by love, I mean the man that always minding his own business get frustrated when the female lead left like a dog lost its owner, wtf. best character progression on this side is the mediator girl as the story progress she learns that their act are too dangerous and could go unpunished, she sacrifices herself and takes responsibility for their act to cut loose ends. people will says that the police are useless but for me the characters fills their role well as neutral side that gives pressure to everyone, they doubt everyone they had some internal problem midway and solved them as an adult they stays neutral until the end, good progression I must say. for the bad guys, they are messed up, so fucked up that I almost have nothing to say the queen bee doesn't fill her role at all feels more like a tool that everyone can use, main villain has barely influence to anything at all I must say he is too weak. and then there is the ticking bomb the key to the whole series which is jaebum he serves pretty well as twist bearer could have been better, but not bad honestly I'm impressed.
Music :
Not bad, but not good either not so special doesnt add any intensity to the scenes nor ruining it. and none of them memorable either
Conclusion :
a series that you could enjoy once and never again, I really like the truth key was the only twist and comes like a ticking bomb. yet those could've been executed better, maybe the actor and actresses are too young to understand the rage of revenge, or maybe didn't directed properly. I mean the male and female lead confrontation felt pretty intense, why the ending didn't ?.
Imagining that the final confrontation of female lead with the bomb came in the middle of the dark and rainy weather pointing gun like she means to kill, every rage and frustration blew up at once. and the last confrontation of the male lead with the main villain comes with proper reasoning, show off time for the main villain to picture insanity and craziness. well that sounds too anime-ish but that would be memorable and dope.

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Watchable mixed-bag and signals

I enjoyed how the different focuses of each story flowed from one to the other, but the pacing was all over the place. I liked how certain actors in the main pov role were giving a chance to play against the their usual typecast parts and that the main characters being in the wrong is actually shown as being so, whether the respective actor was able to carry the screen time with their acting though is different per case. For a show that sets itself up to show the underbelly of the industry, it doesn't really do much of that aside from showing Pan being sold by his manager to creeps. Most of the storylines involve actors being ruthless to get their time in the limelight rather than the larger systemic issues. Even when the show mentions other issues in the industries like how it's reliant on nc scenes and "service", the show merely lampshades but doesn't have anything in particular to say about it since the show itself is complicit. It literally asks questions it doesn't really answer in form of their own gossip girl type social media account that's featured throughout. There were also fangirl inserts in the form of two characters. The writing for the live comments from both Thai and international fans were eerily spot on and added well to the tension of the scene as you tried to read the reactions and watch the scene at the same time. It was one of the most well done of this kind of storytelling device I've seen so far, so kudos to the show for that. Some of the twitter trends featured were pretty fun to see like how the changed up the names of real people and events that trended regularly in Thailand like dogexpo7 instead of catexpo9. The actor First again is the stand out of War of Y as he was in Y Destiny and props to Toru as well. Both of them carry zero ego when it comes to acting and are fully committed on top of being actually very good at it which made their storyline the most enjoyable to watch. All of the main pov characters are unlikeable though humanized and Achi was the one who got away with the least comeuppance, which is ironic considering how he complained about how Peek was getting that special treatment in Y Idol. Achi is also a rich kid with a nepo safety job waiting for him for insult on top of injury. First really did an amazing job to make Achi bearable to watch. I liked that none of the couples end up happily together. The ultimate winner and this series' gossip girl, ends up to be none of the featured pov characters, but P. Attichon who seems to have some weird unresolved negative tension between him and the actor he's shipped with, but it's never addressed and he unveals his new series about marriage equality as well showing how he uses his social media savvy to stay on the pulse of what audiences want. Overall I appreciated the effort to do something out of the norm even though the delivery didn't exactly come through, it's still more watchable than most other current Thai bl offerings around the time of it's airing.

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Great Acting by the Entire Cast But Plot Took a Nosedive in the 2nd Half

I'd seen a retro tribute modern drama already with ZLY this year but this one had a totally different premise, so I wanted to see how she would handle a harder plot and though she and the rest of the cast did a wonderful job in their respective roles, the plot took a serious nosedive towards the second half and the end.

Pros: I can't say enough about the acting of this very professional cast. ZLY did a terrific job as XBX, a stubborn, enterprising, reflective, yet very flawed character and everyone else followed. At first, I wasn't a fan of GXY as she appeared like a spoiled rich girl going through a rebellion but it became clear after a handful of episodes that though she was spoiled and bratty, she had a big heart and really cared about TXQ. The "steel trio" of XBX, TXQ, and CYZ were a great bunch who sincerely loved one another even if that sometimes came across as tough love or protection in the form of lying which backfired more often then not. The intent behind it was real.

Other favorite characters were ZL, President Gao, Dr. Su, Su Computer Nerd, and manager Jia; all were wonderful supportive people to XBX and each other wherever they fit. When it came to the good guys, all of their parts were done accordingly. The scenery and OSTs were on point and appropriate.

Cons: While I understood this was a propaganda tribute drama and that it would have a lot of that included in it, what absolutely shocked me was the hamster wheel plot of the antagonists would completely overshadow even that. There were a total of 4 really bad guys, one coward, and one insignificant idiot that came and went. The plot essentially took a nosedive in the second half when the 3 main antagonists/business partners and XBX plus her ex routinely sent each other to jail. It was a literal revolving door of prison sentences. They'd set each other up, beg for someone else to take the fall, or manage to somehow twist themselves loose so many times that all of their illegal deeds combined would probably equal a 25 year minimum for each save XBX.

Everyone of them ended up with some sort of redemption arc in the last few episodes that they didn't deserve. Even though Mr. Wu did turn himself in, in the final 15 minutes of the last episode, the amount of illegalities he'd done throughout the years should have seen him in prison for more then just a year. I didn't like the antagonists at all in this series, though their acting was on point 100%, it was because every time one would get into trouble, he'd get himself out by setting someone else up, rinse, repeat x maybe 8! The storyline hindered them completely which was very sad because they could have really done something more believable in terms of how the law worked.

Speaking of the law, how is it that TXQ got 5 years in prison for kicking XBX's ex in the balls while the latter was choking her to death (murder attempt number 1) and the ex 10 years later only got 1 month after he ran her off the road and threw a metal pipe at her head causing a head injury (murder attempt number 2)? So saving another person from near death is illegal but actually trying to kill someone isn't. In that second case plus with the antagonists, was XBX Mother Theresa? She gave the ex a debit card that she'd deposit money in each month to help him and the kid he adopted. She felt like she owed him; for what? Trying to kill her? Same with Wu, Qiu, and even Dong, they'd set her up but there she goes trying to bail them out. That kind of backwards logic was confusing. Lastly on this topic, they essentially spent the last 4-6 episodes spouting various domestic and international laws that the average viewer wouldn't have a clue as to what was happening.

Another point of contention was with poor CYZ, once it was obvious he had terminal cancer and had little time to live, they kept dragging his death out. It was brutal to watch; they could have had the pier sunrise scene maybe 6 episodes earlier then they did. Made me wonder if they purposefully did it as filler but that's like the really wrong way of going about that. Because even to the last episode, they brought him in as happy and in flashbacks. That would have been way better then what was done with his character at that time.

The introduction of Russian speaking characters that couldn't speak the language fluently like Nina was ridiculous especially to someone whose native tongue it is. The entire Russian arc in the beginning, I fast forwarded because it was off historically among many other things. The last part that bugged me though it wasn't huge were the costumes especially XBX's wedding dress which was straight out of the 1980s instead of the year 2000. Some ppl said she didn't have enough money for a new one but that didn't jive either as by that time she and ZL lived in a huge house and her car was a Mercedes, she didn't drive herself but had a driver and assistant with her at nearly all times.

So though the acting was very well with a professional cast, the storyline/plot started out strong but then just unraveled. Hadn't it been for the great acting, I would have given it a much lower score.

Would I recommend it? Honestly, only if you like ZLY or anyone else in the cast. Otherwise, plot wise it's not strong at all with many factual and historical errors.

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