With a star-studded cast & premise, it had promises of a great sageuk - but it just came close to being meh. It failed as it tried to be the Korean GoT (even some of the sigils were similar + unnecessary nudity) but its main downfall was the weak confusing narrative and some of the main actors not living up to their potential (the Queen and Prime Minister).

► Story: Too much of anything is bad
The constant back and forth between past and present in every episode got boring and did not help in creating a seamless storyline. Some of the twists/turns were badly explained or rather left to interpretation - making situations illogical, with gaps. They just increased the volume of the background music, giving that epic heroic vibe but failed to showcase it through story and characters on-screen. Adding nudity just for the sake of it - does not help the story either. It does not work like that - at least for me for a Political/Historical drama of such repute.

► Acting:
• The Queen carried the Resting B*#ch Face which I guess was supposed to emote that she was a noble figure and her mind was strategizing moves way ahead - but it did not feel that way. It just felt inexpressive - and I do not dislike the actress per se - but this is her third work, that am seeing - the previous one being Burning and Money Heist (Korea) and seems like this is ongoing phenomenon. Sad to say but I do not think she is an expressive person, and therefore not a good actress in my books now. Just by doing some bold scenes and keeping a stoic face does not cut it for me.

• Most surprising and disappointing was Kim Mu Yeol as the Prime Minister, Eul Pa So. His character was supposed to be the twist, but it was delivered so flat and lifeless. You'd expect a twist to be delivered with some kind of shock value in the revelations but this did not, in fact the narrative was so bland we did not even realise when the twist for his character even came in. Not sure if I should blame the writers or directors, cause I have seen other works of the actor and he is one of the most talented actors in the industry who literally make any role their own.

• The only saving graces were Lee Soo Hyuk, with his flawless portrayal role of the barbaric 3rd Prince; AND even in the limited screentime Ji Chang Wook (the late King), Jeon Bae Soo and Jo Han Chul (Queen's father & uncle) and Park Ji Hwan (Commander) delivered their characters to a perfection. But sadly, they could not salvage everything else that was going wrong with this drama.

► OVERALL:
With all the negative points highlighted above, the drama does has its positive moments. For example: it does try to keep a level of excitement for the audience to know what the Queen will do to survive. But the bad parts overshadow the good by a long margin, and I have seen some other gems in similar genre and themes. And if the story and acting is weak, then nothing can save this drama, no matter how good the action, visual effects and feeble attempts of suspense were. Therefore, I have given it 7/10 which for me means a good/decent drama - had potential to be great but was missing a lot, especially with the ingredients it had in hand.

Would recommend to watch only if you have nothing else.