Maiden Holmes (2020)

Très bon drama mêlant investigation et romance

Un très bon drama mêlant investigation et romance, avec une FL forte et intelligente (ça change :) et un ML beau comme un dieu !!
ML (Wahouuuu ......the ML really handsome and lets be honest but his acting in the drama was really good for a newbie).

L'histoire est bien ficelée, finement racontée et les acteurs (novices pour la plupart) sont excellents.

Les 2 romances sont très cute et avec des baisers réalistes (a lot :) :)

j'ai passé un super moment et j’espère revoir très vite tous ces jeunes acteurs à l'écran.

I’m just so surprised this didn’t get as much review as I expected. In one word : WATCH!

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My favorite trashy romance.

This is the drama version of the perfect trashy romance to curl up in bed with on a rainy day. It is not overly ambitious in terms of plot and will not satisfy hard core fans of the detective genre but overall it is an unpretentious hidden gem that will bring you on a delightful romantic journey.

Our titular character Su Ci is a brilliant young investigator with a hidden identity as the daughter of a traitor. Her reason for existence is to unravel the conspiracy that led to her family's downfall and murder. In the middle of a case, she runs into Prince Qi who is traveling incognito. He is also trying uncover the traitor behind his army's crushing defeat and his consequent demotion. They fall like a ton of bricks for each other well before they figure out each other's hidden identities. They form a fast friendship with another couple they meet on their first case and team up to solve a number of cases that lead to the ultimate unraveling of a bigger political conspiracy and redress old injustices.

The main issue with this drama is aside from some really steamy romantic scenes, the various plot threads lack intensity. The main characters only superficially interact with the characters in the cases and the investigations seem to largely involve the four friends solving the case by talking to each other. As a result there is no build up of suspense and excitement in the gradual reveal of the cases. The overarching plot and main antagonist is known from the get go but is still better written than the short cases and at least there is a small twist at the end. Oh you didn't notice? Yups... that's what I mean... The main villain is well acted and it is a shame they left the only heavy face to face clash between him and our leads until the end. The whole point of revealing the villain early in the game is to let them face off a few times.

So why watch this? Because it is a lot of fun and even though it shows that it is a young cast, there is great rapport between them and both romances are very good. The OTP have boatloads of chemistry, they look gorgeous and fitting together and deliver many squeal-worthy moments - I mean who cares that it makes no sense that they retreat into a cave after an ambush when help is just around the corner? You have to embrace drama logic - they go to the cave because they can wow us with more hot kisses there, don't worry about whether it is safer to reunite with their friends and guards instead. They are written to be smart characters and they generally are when they are outmaneuvering their enemies or busting criminals. But there are also many times when heavy suspension of disbelief is required.

Newcomer Zhang Linghe really impresses in his debut performance here as Prince Qi and my sense is he is an actor to watch. The main relationship is (outside of one short lapse) very well written - mature, mutually supportive and I just love how Prince Qi is very amorous he does not hesitate to pounce on Su Qi at any opportunity.

I really enjoyed this drama and if I were to rate it on fun factor and romance alone it would be a 9.0 for me but all things considered, I think an 8.0 is appropriate.

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