Common But Special Drama

This is a drama that I dropped around a month ago but decided to rewatch and continue. The reason I dropped it before was because the first few episodes did not spark any particular feelings towards the plot or the characters. Nevertheless, I ended up coming back to it again because I was interested on how Rain Wang (the actor of Jingshu - female lead of the drama) acted in this particular drama. Here are some highlights about the drama:

~ THE CHARACTERS (THE STORY) ~

Before going on, I am a person who has a total bias for strong, smart male and female leads, and I am not a big fan of any characters that are easily manipulated or are not open-minded. That being said, the Crown Prince has got me sighing for basically the whole drama because he is quite inconsiderate, does not put much thought in any of his actions, only brings trouble, and clouded by this hatred. We get the feeling that the Crown Prince does not want to be the Emperor, so with the responsibilities forced on him, he just is not responsible and is way too focused on love. Indeed, he did go through a lot of trauma with the death of his royal family, but he does not consider anyone else's feelings; disregarding his concubine, misunderstanding his teacher, hating his love rival, thinking of fighting and power all the time as the solution, and more. Most importantly, towards the end, there is a sudden change in his character that just did not make any sense at all.

Which brings me to my favorite character: Han Guang. Out of the whole drama, he is the unfortunate second/third lead in the drama that falls in love with the female lead, BUT instead of being like the Crown Prince and hating the male lead, he only wishes for the female lead's happiness. Also, unlike many supporting characters in terms of love, he does not do the whole protect-her-quietly that makes us have the second lead syndrome. His faith, loyalty, and love is just amazing.

Similarly, one of the best aspects of the drama is intertwined with the Grand Counselor and the power of the throne. We have the Grand Counselor who is in power and is hated by almost everyone, but we also see a side of him that gives no thought to the power he holds, his love for his foster daughter, and his wish for the best of the country. In fact, the only reason he took the power was to help the country although he became a figure that stole power and treats other harshly. I am not a person who likes the type of characters who like to sacrifice for the country and such, but the drama portrays this character amazingly. We see the responsibility he holds and also some of the irresponsible actions he took in the past, painting him not as a completely all good person, but only as a person who really tried his best.

Other than the individual supporting characters, we also have our two or three couples and some unfortunate deaths. The first one would be the Queen, King, and Grand Counselor love triangle, which ended quite tragically. The second one is the Prince of Baili/the prime minister's daughter/fake wife love triangle that was both good and sad; I love how the prime minister's daughter let go of her hate, and she was really one of the characters that had a great character development. The third one would be the relationship between the Crown Prince and Princess Li that ends happily but starts quite disappointingly with the Crown Prince's not-very-good behavior and attitude. The forth one would be General Xie and his wife that also ended tragically when his wife died that was very unnecessary.

Leading us to the main couple and main leads, Jing shu and Lue Ying. Individually, I quite like both of them, where Jing Shu is skilled and most importantly, she respects Lue Ying's decisions even if she disagrees with them herself. In the beginning, there were only a few episodes where they deny their feelings. Although I disliked how Lue Ying was not very communicative with her, their relationship was pretty nice. Along with my bias for smart characters, Lue Ying is the one in the drama that is skilled at almost everything and a super fast learner too.

~ PLOT/NARRATIVE (THE STORY) ~

The plot does get slightly draggy, repetitive, and in loops. The all-for-hate Crown Prince. The almost-going-to-die Lue Ying. The I-will-sacrifice-anything-for-my-daughter Grand Counselor. Honestly, the story could have ended much sooner had it been more concise. The plot is also very predictable because of all the constant foreshadowing. The audience could already tell the background of Lue Ying for half the episodes of the drama, but it was not until the near end does his true identity gets revealed. I usually like foreshadowing, but I expect that the actual reveal would come soon, too.

~ THE ENDING (THE STORY) ~

This drama has a great ending! I love long happy endings, where both the main leads have a satisfying closure along with most of the supporting characters. Usually, I enjoy endings with at least a whole episode on how their lives are afterwards, where none of the main characters die off, I have admit that I rather like this ending. We already know that Lue Ying had a tragic, torturous past, and to be honest, it is very realistic that he dies. The ending gives a great closure like feeling, where he has a daughter with Jingshu, and once he passes away, Jingshu continues having a positive outlook. However, there is also an alternative ending that cuts outs his death in episode 54, but personally, I liked this realistic ending better.

Another big part of the ending that I liked (though could also have been more concise) is the full backstory of the relationship between the Grand Counselor, the Queen, the King, and Yun Xie (the villain). A lot of the times, most dramas never have a true whole episodes and scenes of the past, and these dramas usually just have the present people talk about the past situations and have flashbacks. However, unlike those dramas, this drama actually has about 3 episodes that are fully about the history behind the characters, which was great!

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Worthy Character Development Drama

In the beginning, I was unsure if I should watch this drama, but after starting and completing the drama, there is not one part of me that regrets watching this drama. This drama is all about the growth of each character, not just the main characters, and also about answering several common questions and problems that appear when one is striving for success. Here are some of my thoughts about the drama:

~ THE STORY ~

I absolutely love the development of each character. We have our first main lead that goes from an obnoxious child to a mature teen, another main lead that learns the difference between losing and improving, and our favorite historical ghost who finally understands what success means. The supporting characters each have their own story; one of them learned to recover from loss; another learned to let go of dreams. This drama and whole narrative is really all about their lives and the steps they are taking that impact one another.

The friendship between each character is amazing as well. The bonds. The conversations. The supportiveness. This drama really does its best to answer the question of whether letting go of friends in order to succeed is the right choice. Our main lead chose the path to go forward and improve his Go skills, leaving behind all the friends he had at school. We see this theme again when the main lead becomes one of the few professional Go players, while one of his friends, who had been in the Go industry for way longer than he had, was not able to. Nevertheless, we really do get the chance to see this type of strong friendship and love, with no romance, in the drama.

Another aspect of the story that was amazing was the realistic-ness. Of course, it is not very realistic with the whole historical Go player that turns up in the modern world, but I do mean by the decisions themselves. We see that one of the characters, in fact, many of the supporting characters chose to give up Go for a variety of reasons. Some realized they only played Go just for winning, while others had realistic obstacles. For example, one of the most memorable moments was when one of the supporting characters chose to step away from Go in order to take care of his father.

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Frustrating but for some reason I still continued watching

After spending much time watching the Court Lady, it would be a waste if I did not review it ahaha. I originally started watching the drama because of Li Yi Tong. Overall, there were parts I hated and parts I liked. I cannot count the number of times I wanted to drop this drama, but I still ended up coming back to it. Let's just put it at a love-hate relationship.

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THE STORY: OVERALL

The story could pretty much be classified into two parts: 1) Comedy 2) Tragedy
Overall, I gave it a 2.5 star, which is low but adding up the characters and plot development, a 2.5 is about the right amount. There's too less character development. Either too much comedy or too fast of a tragedy. Most importantly, the overall structure of the storyline was not very well written. I was tempted to give a higher score because of the ending, but after much thought, and with all the times I was frustrated with the narrative, a 2.5 worked better. I will admit that the best parts of the story was family dynamics, where the loyalty to one's family (outside of the royal family) is clear, but it was not really enough to make up for the rest of the story. I personally think the story would have been better if the comedic and tragic parts of the stories were intertwined instead of having it two basically separate sections.

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THE STORY: PARTS

1) Comedy: Based on the synopsis, I could guess that it was a bit more on the comedy side, but not this much. Here, we see the good family dynamics within the Sheng Family (male lead's family), and the character change of the male lead from a playboy to a general. While I like how characters change, I was looking for a more realistic character development for the characters. The whole idea of the male lead changing for the female lead was just okay at best. All in all, comedy is quite a huge part until the point that it's a bit too much, and the rivalry between two families was too repetitive.

1.5) Transition: As I was getting a bit tired of the comedy and the male characters (I'll explain below what 'male characters' mean), there is a transition to more of a serious side. I absolutely love court politics, harem politics, and schemes in many dramas, so I was really looking forward to the next part.

2) Tragedy: The moment we came into this section, everything started going down, or it was more like the comedy already wore the wall down, but this part was that last shock that tore the wall down. My dislike level for several characters just got me so mad and frustrated. As someone who barely stops watching an episode midway, this drama has broken that record. I've paused the drama so often because I was frustrated about how the story is going. The beginning of the 'tragedy' portion was a bit slow, where the Crown Princess just needs someone to shake her awake, and some people just need to have common sense. The rest of the 'tragedy' portion was too fast, where people died as if nothing major happened, and they died for the pretty meaningless things. Adding on to this portion, the romance of the main characters is just a 20-episode misunderstanding that is never resolved until the last few 6 episodes.

3) The Ending: I love the ending actually. This is perhaps the only part I really liked throughout the whole drama. After the odd people-dying portion of the tragedy part, this part was more reasonable. The main reason I liked this ending was because of the 'trust' portrayed. I'm someone who loves healthy, trustful relationships (not necessarily romantic ones mind you). Without spoiling much, there's definitely trust involved in this section. No one major really died near the last 5 episodes, which was a relief, and everyone had a good, satisfactory ending. On the other hand, the only concern I have is how one certain people died way too easily, and as mentioned before, the lack of character development.

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ACTING/CAST & MUSIC

Acting: One of the best parts of the drama! I watched this drama because of Li Yi Tong and Xu Kai, and as always, I was not disappointed by Li Yi Tong though I did not really like the character she played. Other than the main cast, the supporting actors were 100% amazing. The way they were able to convey the personality of the character and just give off the right aura was great. I'm definitely looking to watch more dramas by these actors.

Music: I did not really pay attention much to the music, so I would keep it as a 5.

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THEMES

SIDE CHARACTER ROMANCE: Other than the ending (which might have been good because it was a closure after keeping up with this drama for some time), the side character's romance, or side couples, was the best part of the drama. Be warned, however, that about half of the main side couples are broken apart, which is just a big sigh. There were some couples that I absolutely willed for a better ending, but the plot line had to do them like that; either one died, both died, or one imprisoning another. Putting the ending aside though, the romance between the characters are quite apparent although, now that I think about it, the relationships could have had a more balanced amount of power between each person that could have made their relationship better. I have to admit though that the romance was what kept me going.

THE 'MALE CHARACTERS': To put it all in a simple phrase is that it would absolutely uncomfortable watching the scenes with Prince Liang, Prince Zhou, and even Sheng Chu Mu (the male lead). I understand that historically men may have been disrespectful to women, and women are always 'gentle' and submissive. However, it was still very uncomfortable to watch how some of the main characters treated the women. It is not just the treatment of women either; it's about the way the script has it that the men made quite idiotic decisions and believed in unreasonable things. These were the scenes that I stopped for a dozen times because I just could not continue the drama.

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Complicated Age-Gap/Social Norms Romcom Drama

After watching this drama, I am rather conflicted on how I feel about watching the drama. The drama in general is really just about basically person A that has a relationship with person B, they break up, person A has a relationship with the person C, person A's brother has a relationship with person C's niece, turns out person C and person B's father are friends, more drama happens, and then person A is back with person B. The drama is pretty much drama. Anyhow, here are some of the positives and negative sides of the drama that I have taken note of:

~ THE STORY (NEGATIVES)~

Frustrating Couples: I am someone who values trust and open communication within every couple in dramas. Those qualities are honestly what makes a romance drama good for me, especially since too many romance c-dramas are about misunderstandings and all that 'I'm not going to tell you to protect you' that gets frustrating. I absolutely love those jealousy scenes, but it definitely is possible to have trust while being jealous. As for this drama, oh my, they just aren't into open communication or trust apparently; there are so many things that could have been resolved had they just communicated. That's for the main couple. As for the side couples, a lot of the times the relationship just feels so toxic.

Frustrating Characters: Throughout the drama, I had a love-hate relationship with the main leads. One second, I liked the way they conversed and went through with certain decisions, and another second, which is most of the time, I am quite disappointed in them. Sure, both of them aren't experienced in love, but there are some things that shouldn't require experience in it to realize. As for the side characters, one of the co-workers is extremely toxic; I personally value friendship more than crushes, and this character officially ignores her friend because her crush seemed to like her. The second male lead's sister are quite irritating. The female lead's parents were amazing for the first half of the drama, and then it went down.

Lack of Character Development: Almost 90% of the drama is about how the female lead is unable to commit to the relationship because she cares about how others think about her relationship. The drama highlights her insecurities, which is absolutely normal and expected of a romance drama. However, around the last few episodes, she suddenly has this realization that I love him more than I care about how others feel because I can't force love and all that. In general, she did not develop much as a character, if at all. Neither do the other characters. The male lead, second lead, supporting characters, and almost everyone had no changes. The only main change was the female lead's best friend who decided to get divorced, and she was a minor character who was not as involved in the plot.

Social Norms: I understand that one of the aspects of this drama is about how people think society deems age gaps in relationships to be quite negative, and in some ways, yes, this is true. However, the story is too involved in this assumption, and the characters never realize that the society is more than that. I am sure that there are still many people who deem age gaps and teacher-student relationships as something negative, but there are also many people that are supportive. In terms of the drama, the story and narrative was too narrow and unthoughtful.

Lack of Logic: I get that the focus of the drama is that romance and love is not logical, and you just feel your heart beat around that person. However, there is a big difference between love and attraction. We have the main couple that met and were like, oh I like you, for almost no reason. The second male lead suddenly changes his mind and starts liking the female lead. The female lead's brother just suddenly likes the second male lead's niece. I am definitely not a person that goes for slow romance, but there is really no reason behind any of the character's actions in terms of love. A question for the characters is: What do you like about your counterparts?

~ THE STORY (POSITIVES) ~

Certain Characters: If there weren't a few of the supporting characters that I liked and me-needing to complete the MDL 2021 challenge, I would have dropped this drama early on. The first character that I didn't have a chance to dislike throughout the drama was the female lead's brother and one of the female lead's best friend: Song Xue; they were the star characters. The second male lead is pretty decent as well, and the male lead's stepmom was pretty amazing, too. Other than Song Xue, perhaps the next best character is the character that only appears in the drama for about 2 episodes; she was the girl who was attracted to the male lead, was honest about her liking him, and helped him get the female lead.

Certain Scenes: This drama would count as a comedic drama, so I did have some good laughs over certain scenes. The conversations between the female lead and her brother; the breakup dinner for the female lead and second male lead; the revealed secret of the male lead's identity; the almost got caught in a secret relationship scenes.

~ THE STORY (NOTES) ~
I am not a big fan of the drama. There were a few issues here and there. I did find the teacher and student relationships were a bit odd; though I have nothing against teacher-student relationships, the conversations and interactions just did not really match. This drama is also quite different from other c-dramas in that its progress is pretty fast in terms of romance; for example, one-night-stands happen, which do not really occur in c-dramas as often.

~ ACTING & MUSIC ~
I have been wary starting this drama because I am not a super big fan of the male lead's acting, and this drama did not really improve my impression of him; it might have lowered it, too? As for the other actors, I personally thought the female lead did well (with the exception of the crying - maybe the script originally made the crying so fake?) and the supporting characters did pretty well too, so I gave it a 7/10 because none of the acting stood out much, which is expected for romance dramas. As for music, I do recall a few good music pieces, but they did not really leave an impression on me either.

~ OVERALL ~
That's about it! I don't believe I will be rewatching this drama anytime soon, and because I only spent about 1-2 days finishing this drama (ahh, yess, I am the type of person who stays up at night to finish watching a drama), I wouldn't say if it really is worth it or not, since it didn't take up too much of my time. Overall, I gave it a 5.5/10.

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Interesting and On-the-Edge Drama

I was initially attracted to watch this drama by the title "It's Okay to Not be Okay." From the title, I expected this drama to be something I would get in my heart, and I wasn't disappointed in this aspect, where it has been a emotional rollercoaster, and there were a lot of areas and scenes where I connected and sobbed my heart out to. Nevertheless, there was this area that was missing, and I spent a lot of time thinking of what exactly was not fulfilling after watching this drama. At this time, I am still not completely sure what I was looking for that is missing, but here are some of my thoughts about the drama.

~ THE STORY AND NARRATIVE ~

The story is tagged as a psychological, comedy, romance, drama, and family. Nevertheless, it ranges slightly into 'horror' and 'detective' theme. Overall, the plot is pretty on-the-edge but predictable at the same time. Ever since the two characters travelled all to Ok psychiatric ward, it was easy to predict the story line and ending. Additionally, the story isn't very romantic in any way; in fact, it deeply involves the mental health theme and recovery. I have seen a lot of people mentioning that this drama was very 'healing,' and I agree, but before watching this, it would be nice to know that there were a lot of dark scenes and heart wrenching themes, not exactly the 'healing' we have in mind. Back to the romance part, the relationships seemed to revolve more around dependence rather than love 'love,' which some people may agree and disagree to.

~ THE CHARACTERS ~

I will be honest; although I am in fact a person that is very involved in the mental health field, I found it very hard to connect with the characters most of the time. There are times where I did not get how exactly they felt, especially with Ko Moon Young's antisocial personality disorder. I actually took some time researching more about this particular personality disorder to try to understand the situation a bit better, but at this point, I'm still questioning how an antisocial personality disorder person is capable of truly 'loving' someone. I suppose the word 'love' is very subjective, and speaking of which, I am not very convinced of the romantic love between the two main characters because I felt that they simply bonding during this traumatic time, but then again, who am I to say? Back to the point, because I had a hard time connecting to the characters, it was slightly difficult to continue the drama.

As for the acting, although I have seen reviews praising about the chemistry between the two main leads, I felt that the chemistry and romance were all a bit forced. Sure, the conversation flowed (based upon the script) and they did have some sort of connection, but both of them just seemed so independent in a way. Either way, I'm not quite sure if it was exactly the acting or if it was the personality of the characters. I have to really say that the actors themselves portrayed the characters super well!

~ THEMES ~

MENTAL HEALTH: Other than the hard-to-understand-themes, there were a lot of common themes with loneliness and happiness that really hit deep for me. This is a drama that covers a lot of common thoughts we have, which drew a lot of emotions and heart breaking moments, where some are happy ones and some are sad ones. The drama really covered a lot about denial, avoidance, and seeking support in terms of each character's development; it was amazing to see how each character progressed, too.

FAIRY-TALES: With the female lead being a fairytale writing, it shouldn't come as a surprise that there are stories and stories and stories with hidden meanings behind each one. The drama itself has 16 episodes, slightly separated into 16 fairy-tale stories that goes along with it. I personally always loved reading twisted fairytales and fairytales that have hidden meanings, and in this drama, they take it to a new level, where the female lead completely take the moral of every fairytale into a darker and 'realistic' perspective.

~ MUSIC AND AESTHETICS ~

The music was honestly amazing! I personally believe the music makes everything a lot better, especially the songs were a bit creepy and deep at the same time. I would take it so far as to say the music was really the best part of the drama.
Here's a playlist some may want to check out: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1ITeTDTz5lIkZ4VkrCS3LG?si=3uH2SxVmT1GKEdMNE3UvOw

The next part is the amazing aesthetics. The costumes were awesome, which is pretty much expected in every k-drama these days. Either way, the power of each costume, and the meaning behind each of them were just wow. I still remember a scene that stuck with me, where the director of the psychiatric ward mentioned that (not directly quoted) "she wears fancy clothes not to show off, but to protect herself, like armor."

~ REWATCH VALUE ~

As I slightly covered before, psychological dramas that range into the 'detective' or 'horror' areas aren't really my thing, so I will not be particularly rewatching this drama any time soon; I love horror movies not dramas because it gets kind of old in a way. In any case, the main reason I may rewatch it is only for certain scenes. On that note, I loved all those small stories and the whole plot of the drama, except the overall plot of Moon Gang Tae's mother's murder case.

~ OVERALL ~

I absolutely loved and agree with Ko Moon Young's perspective on the fairytales and facing reality, and it was amazing to see how she was able to face everything that came her way. The moral of going out of avoidance to facing reality was also very relatable. Most important, it really was those short themes, where some of the characters acted with disregard of the public opinion in order to help certain people really stuck out. It is the feeling of relief to get everything out and getting past traumatic experiences.

The relationship between the main characters are quite different from regular k-drama couples. The upside about this particular relationship was that there were little to no misunderstandings. Nevertheless, I personally thought the relationship wasn't built upon love, but more about dependence and understanding, where these two characters were able to support each other; which made me think about whether it was love or not, and whether having antisocial personality disorder made it possible to love, but who knows? At the end of the drama, I felt that their relationship seemed more about convenience, but I suppose it depends on everyone's perspective on it. On a separate note, the side character relationship also seemed a bit forced and for convenient sake.

Throughout the drama, the main issue I encountered (which is slightly covered in the "Character" section) is that the character's intentions are hard to relate too even if they made sense/were understandable. I am more of a person who likes morally grey characters with relatable 'antagonists,' but this drama is more of a oh-so-he/she/they-did-that unattached-kind of feeling, which made it very hard to continue the drama. I did end up finishing it, but it was more of because I wanted to have a closure.

Another issue I had trouble with was the repetitiveness. Don't get me wrong. I love the fairytales and the horror scenes, but it gets kind of boring, and the plot also gets kind of long, where certain scenes could be simply cut out to make it more interesting. Nevertheless, the drama was an interesting watch!

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A Classic Wuxia Drama

I started watching the drama around the time it first started airing, and within the first few episodes, it seemed quite interesting. Nevertheless, it fell a bit from my expectations but was definitely a good watch.

~ THE STORY ~

As the headline mentioned, this drama is a classic wuxia drama, where there is the whole righteous vs evil, and the good never ends up being good. We eventually see the person who was the most calm become the plotter behind the whole martial arts conspiracy. In general, if you have watched enough c-dramas, the plot is honestly quite predictable, and I am a person who is all for unpredictable plots, so in this aspect, Word of Honor met what I expected but was not was I was looking for. A good side to this predictability is all the foreshadowing. Word of Honor had a lot of foreshadowing; perhaps the most I have seen in any drama; and the foreshadowing was pretty nice too!

A lot of people mention about the BL (boy love) in the drama, and yes, compared to a lot of other c-dramas, this is a drama that comes off as flirty. However, if you have read the novel, the scenes are a downplay. I really enjoy those scenes in the drama, but at times, I did not really see the connection even though I absolutely love how protective and the trust they have around each other (especially in episode 28). In general, I like their relationship, but I expected a bit more.

Now about the 'gray' areas and antihero aspect. Yes, it is true that both of the male leads have killed their fair share of people and have a different perspective on death compared to other people. However, perhaps it is because I have watched quite some dramas that have these type of protagonist that I just am not as attracted to this aspect of the characters; I expected a more dark and dangerous side of them.

Unlike the dramas where we have this one villain that turned to have another villain that backed him/her/they up, and then the whole mess, we have a clear villain within the first 15 episodes though the villain was quite predictable by episode 5. (It's always the good guys) To be honest, I like this villain because he has a clear reason for wanting to have the power: he wants to have the thrill of plotting and succeeding. It's all about the plotting rather than the final power.

Now, the good aspect that I enjoyed! The hurt and past. I love character development, and I prefer dramas that start of low and build up. In this drama, we have two characters that are both torn over their own pasts and in need to move on from it. Each of them are able to understand the other without any words. On a side note, (spoiler) I am not a childhood troope person, and although I get that the drama might have made the male leads from the same sect to pass the censorship of hugging, the idea did ruin the drama a bit for me because instead of Zi Shu supporting Kexing due to his understanding of him, we kind of get the vibe that he partially supported him because of him becoming his Shidi.

Slightly unnecessary death. *huge spoilers for those who have not read the novel (please do not read this paragraph if you do not want any major spoilers)* In the novel, Gu Xiang and Cao Weining both die, and true to its adaptation, the drama also has it that both of them also die. While I like that the drama followed the novel quite closely in this aspect, their death honestly feels quite unnecessary, so not a huge fan of this scenario that happened.

Some more unnecessary characters. The Seventh Lord and the Great Shaman. Originally, in the novel, the two of them were the ones that came up with the method to cure Zi Shu, and it would have been alright that the drama did not follow the actions, but for the last episodes that they were present in, they honestly did not even do much. These two characters only seemed to be here because the novel had them.

~ THE ACTING ~

I spent a lot of time thinking about the acting because sometimes it is hard to distinguish between the acting and our dislikes and likes of the character itself, and after much thought, I decided to give it a 9/10 though I personally think that if it were some other actors, they would have done pretty well, too. Zhe Han did a good job portraying Zi Xu, but I am a bit iffy on Simon Gong's acting of Kexing. The supporting characters did amazing, so if I were to rate them together as a group of actors/actresses, I would give a 9.5/10.

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