hello, everyone, this is my honest review about this drama story of yanxi palace coming from a person who has watched 100+ cdramas and 100+ kdrama no kidding I stopped watching cdramas as frequently as I used to in 2021 and became a die heart kdrama fan only becoz cdramas are way to cliche and drag nowadays and I already watched the best of the best in cdrama but I still try to come back and try one out and this is the drama I saw in 2023 that brought the teenager who loved cdramas in me back hehe

just finished this drama btw so a bit biased rn so bear with me


I personally really appreciate this drama first of all I have to say they did the best job at casting and OST it's so perfect, I can't even imagine other actors in the main role. Also, there is something about the ost from the intro its exciting and builds up nostalgia in a way, overall the actors are super iconic but the king sometimes(rarely)does cringe in my opinion. the story itself is made up so beautifully with the history itself as a base It is interesting. the strong female lead gives relief from the desperate, always in misery female lead in most period dramas, it's quite refreshing and satisfying to see a strong-willed character always getting her revenge and making the villains come down call me petty lol but I'm so sick of seeing fml always so miserable and just idk helpless and they do unbelievable bs stuff out of nowhere if u look at most period dramas this is common also the beauty of this drama is just pure eye candy you can just melt away looking at the attire, As someone who has seen my share of traditional clothing in dramas this one did stood out a lot in the traditional cdrama world. this drama gives you the enemies-to-lovers romance effect and also a big 2nd lead syndrome don't want to spoil but it gets interesting and as the story goes on you develop a lot of character attachments get ready to ball your eyes out! the only annoying part I feel is the feeling of a jump cut or that some more story is missing from the drama, I felt like I missed something for sure, As in they should've added a bit more info on some characters to build more character info for the viewers.

As this drama is based on history we can assume they did not want to over-fictionalize the actual history, you need to be a bit mature to understand this drama. overall this drama is better than most of the weird overly dramatic and dragged period dramas today and one of the few traditional clothing non-fantasy drama that any type of viewers can enjoy (coming from someone who hates political dramas)