Worth your time!

It's a good watch. A familiar story (poor girl who later succeeds) with unusual twists. Among the three leading roles (Wan Mei, Chang An, Gong Zi), the scriptwriter and the director have favored Gong Zi the most. Not only he has the best costumes in the drama, but his character is the most compelling one: good looking, strong will, keep cool in every situation, burning with revenge, superb in strategic thinking, martial arts, music and culture, but fatally sick, secluded, lonely, and generally has a pessimistic view of the world and people. He is the only one in the drama who displays the full range of human emotion: joy, amusement, hate, jealousy, love, passion, despair and rage, This kind of role is usually a gold mine for any serious actor and Wang Duo did rise to the challenge. Since Gong Zi's revenge is the major part of the story, the scriptwriter has reduced the role of Chang An to cooking, fighting, hugging, and longing for Wan Mei. Among these tasks, showing love to Wan Mei is Shaw Qu's weakest point. Without the dialogue, their embrace looks very much like between two siblings. Had the love scenes between the two had half of the desire and passion of Gong Zi's many attempts, their love story would have been more convincing. Li Yi Tong is good at tragic moments, but tends to shout and scream whenever she has to show anger. Sure she can shout, but it has to go with with the equivalent expression on her face. Wan Mei is also a character with contradictions: wants to help unfortunate people, but doesn't want to sacrifice herself/her goal/her life for anyone. In fact, only Cha Luo and Wan Mei are the only two characters who never make any sacrifice.

The opening song is very good but is overused throughout the series. Make-up (especially for Gong Zi, the Emperor) is overdone at times. Good martial arts choreography. In history, Gong Zi/ Li Si Yuan eventually became the second king of Later Tang. As such, the ending is appropriate. Although Chang An loves Wan Mei deeply, he actually understands her the least.

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