#nian shilan? maybe

[palaceoftears]

What did consort Shu even see in him? Like I do get the teenage crush part, but then in the harem he never treated her with genuine care untill he felt bad for his own doing. Don't get me wrong, I felt awful for her and hated the emperor as always, but I still think her character was way too bland, like a Ruyi 2.0 but without all the things that make her a complex character, only with her loyalty to the emperor that in this case didn't even make sense. I think Yihuan was there to be an example of what the emperor is capable of doing because of his paranoia, and also to contrast Yanwan's opportunism with her devotion. It is funny though that the drama is showing you how Qianlong screws everyone and that being loyal to him changes nothing, but also romanticizes devotion all the time (I'm talking about all those scenes with Ruyi & Yihuan being refered as different from the others because they're the only ones that care for him). The madonna/whore complex may be a too western term to talk about this (and also I hate it when it's thrown around randomly for any comparison of two female characters) but there's definetly a patron of good girlies that genuinely love the emperor always being shown praying & charming him w their knowledge and the manipulative evil ones that use him for their own interests potrayed as seductive, sexually active (w this I mean they are the only ones whose sexual relations with the emperor are implied via more than just getting pregnant) and yearning for other men that don't love them.

[mydaylight]

I'd forgotten about this little moment where the Empress Dowager seemingly is giving the Emperor an out with regards to Shilan's situation, i.e. he might have taken her hint and stopped sending her the incense. Though I think this was more the Dowager testing the Emperor's intentions than really expecting he would change his mind. (maybe even wanting to conjecture the Emperor's feelings towards Nian Gengyao to speculate on how might view Longkodo in the future)

[pommegranatte]

Nothing is more disappointing than when the main female character is “tough girl who is always mean and straight to the point and also sarcastic!” I’m so bored with that trope. Just...let her be nice...or if she IS gonna be mean don’t make that be her one and only defining feature. What I’m trying to say is: 2B is the perfect mean female lead character.

[shangyangjunzhu]

make me choose (6/10): nian shilan or wei yanwan

i remember when i married into the family, i was titled ce fujin and became his most favored woman. there were many women in his estate. everyone was afraid of him, except for me. he often took me horseback riding and hunting. he said he was only fond of me. but how numerous were the women in his estate! so numerous that it enraged me. he would stay with a concubine one night and with a secondary consort the other. i would wait and wait till the sky was lit. he still didn’t come to me.

have you ever tasted the bitterness of waiting for someone from dusk to dawn?

[liu-anhuaming]

the thing that is so exceptional about legend of ruyi and legend of zhenhuan is how understandable the villains are. 

of course, there are a couple cartoonishly evil minor villains that only feature for a couple episodes. however, the main villains like jin yuyan and gao xiyue from ruyi and nian shilan from zhenhuan have fairly complex and almost sympathetic motives. i think that their actions are completely inexcusable but i can definitely understand why they felt they had to hurt others considering the situation of living in the imperial harem.

i’ve watched all of ruyi and i’m over halfway through zhenhuan, and i never really feel satisfied when a villain dies. if anything, it just feels incredibly tragic, especially when they have their final monologues about why they did the things they did. i feel that if it weren’t for the fact that these women rely on the emperor’s love and attention for their survival in the palace, they might never have done such evil things.

if i’m being honest, i never got this feeling from the villains in yanxi palace. the villains in that show don’t feel as deep or three-dimensional compared to their ruyi counterparts. maybe i’m not remembering things too well since it’s been well over a year since i watched it, but the villains in yanxi just felt like they were being evil for evil’s sake. i think this is partially because yanxi has a different goal that ruyi and zhenhuan. yanxi is mainly a lighthearted romance, and i get the feeling that it’s supposed to have some feminist undertones judging by the way wei yingluo acts. in comparison, ruyi and zhenhuan and much darker depictions of life in the imperial harem and are pretty dedicated to suffering

i don’t want to keep rambling on so all i’ll say is this: the real villain of these shows is always the emperor and there’s no way harem dramas like these can truly be considered romances

[pommegranatte]

I think the reason why I dislike Yanwan but am such a huge fan of Shilan is...oh god, how do i word this? Shilan is shown as really only having the one goal: getting emperor’s love and attention. She does some disgusting things to accomplish this. And there’s no way I’m gonna defend her reasoning. But. Idk, for me i felt like I understood exactly why she did what she did. And given her personality everything she did was just. I get it, you know? It’s like, “Oh of course she would do some shit like that! She’s that type of person.”

But with Yanwan...what we see of her at the beginning is that she’s kind of ok. Her life aint going great but she’s got her boyfriend and she’s pretty scared of her future. Her family doesn’t like him and they mooch off of her. Solid set up! But...time and time again we are shown that she actually doesn’t give two fucks about Yunche (i cannot remember his name fuck). She goes for the way that will give her money and power each time. And I won’t even say “Oh, she wants to support her family!” We’re shown that she doesn’t even LIKE them. So for me, i see this two faced character who’s only motivated by greed and doesn’t have a real reason to be that way. Which is FINE! I usually love characters like this. They are always my favorite and I gravitate towards them! But I don’t know why Nian Shilan’s love for the Emperor and what fucked up shit she would do to achieve that is more interesting than Wei Yanwan’s climb up the ladder that’s only motivated by greed and power. And honestly, she has a stronger backstory. On paper, she really is someone i think is really well written! She’s far more manipulative than Shilan. But man there’s something about her that makes me squirm. Which I guess is the intention. They really did make a truly unlikable villain. I guess what I’m really describing is the difference between a villain who to me is likable, charismatic and fun to watch despite being horrible and despicable in every way; versus a villain who is to me is not at all charismatic but is far more cunning and twisted and complicated but not likable or fun to watch. With Shilan, i Loved seeing the crazy shit she would do! It was like watching a train wreck. But with Yanwan...man i just feel bad.

And you know what now that I’m thinking about? That probably has everything to do with our protagonist as well! Zhen Huan and Shilan have a TOTALLY different dynamic than Yanwan and Ruyi. I mean, let’s be honest, Ruyi was far too soft and sweet. Which isn’t a bad thing! But she’s often portrayed as...maybe not infallible but close to it. She’s very calm and hardly did anything to attack anyone; she’s always on defense! So seeing Yanwan treat her like she did for...what was to me not a good reason (Ruyi not telling her about Shu Pin’s meds, if I’m remembering correctly) was just rough.

Contrast that with Zhen Huan who was That Bitch. She started off as this naive girl who was cunning but not quite smart enough to counter all the shit that went on PLUS she let her feelings sway her (yea, Ruyi did too but not...in the same way). She was time enough for Shilan. Seeing those two butt heads was satisfying to me because i knew Zhen Huan could handle it!

Man, i dunno. I’m definitely not saying Yanwan is poorlu written, I actually think she’s better written than Shilan. But I don’t like her at all. And that’s a good thing, it shows how good she is as a character. But oh man do i hate this bitch.