Tantai Jin Apologist

Jade's Fateful Love

Someone on c_ent recommended a drama called Fateful Love & when I went to look it up on MDL I found 2 dramas called that, plus this one, all of which released in 2024. I suppose we should be lucky nobody released one called Fateful Love of Blossom, for the ultimate 2024 cliché title.

I checked this one out to investigate & was immediately intrigued because it had a time loop/do-over element, where the main pairing had a magic pendant that would rewind time if they died. I love me some time travel tropes so I was like O_O YES PLEASE! And it was a relatively short drama, but not too short, with 24 episodes of 40 mins each (& several of them were 35 mins).

Sadly I ended up bailing 10 episodes in because even with that fairly snappy runtime, the plot still dragged, & after the first 2 episodes they barely died & needed to rewind (episodes 3-10 they died twice). Everything just seemed to screech to a halt as soon as they arrived in the capitol. Things sort of happen with no real impact. FL runs away & replaces her sister in the marriage, assuming her identity so her sister can marry her true love, & her brother is with her, & then we find her sister has settled in some random town after her escape. This means the country of Dongyu has lost 2 princesses, 1 prince, & the sister's lover is a diplomat, & the marriage is meant to seal a peace deal between the 2 countries after years of war, but this is fine I guess? ML seems to die in a confrontation but is quickly revealed to be alive & there is so further mention, even though he got stabbed in the chest. FL knows the marriage is important & has no particular reason not to marry considering the consequences, but wants to find a way out because... reasons. The ML's cousin is in love with him & sees herself as entitled to him, gets the FL & ML killed (obviously they get better), so he's obviously pissed & kicks her out of his mansion (presumably having her punished more severely would cause political issues so fair enough), & then a few episodes later she's visiting him & while he's not exactly friendly, he's weirdly chill about it. There's a stolen ledger that's apparently important only not really. FL encounters someone from her country being abused & intervenes, gets arrested over it & finds out her people are treated as slaves & the woman she helped has to go back to her master even though she apparently bought her freedom, & is just kind of, 'oh, well that sucks'. Stuff like that. Everything is just, oh okay I guess. There's supposedly political scheming going on but there's no tension.

They also did that thing where they make the FL incompetent in ways she should be competent. We're shown in episode 1 that she loves cooking, but later an etiquette teacher shows up & she struggles to pour tea (I don't doubt she'd struggle with the fiddlier aspects of a tea ceremony, but a cook being unable to pour liquid without spilling it? Come on. She's from a country of grassy plains with a tribal/Mongolian vibe & there is no way someone like that isn't an experienced rider, & when she & the ML go out riding, after initially riding super well & shooting with a bow from horseback, she falls off the horse when it gets startled & is immediately helpless & has to be carried by the ML & her sprained ankle is treated as a grievous injury.

2ML is a contender from Most Annoying 2ML in a Cdrama.

On the plus side the ML had such a cute baby face yet still had Lan Wangji levels of resting bitch face, & I love the contrast. I also love the South Prince, who should by all rights have been a super annoying character, but managed to be hilarious & endearing. Sadly neither of these characters was enough to make up for the boredom.

Fateful Love

The actual drama I was recommended. Made it 2 episodes in. Seemed promising at first. FL transmigrates from the modern world & immediately beats a bunch of people up & gives zero fucks it was awesome & hilarious watching her humiliate her shitty family. But then she seems to just let them walk over her. And she goes to the consort selection to piss off her sister, but then doesn't really try & is surprised at being chosen. Like are you trying to spite her or not? And why commission nunchucks if you can't fight effectively with them? It also looks like they'd doing the 'every other female character is a jealous bitch who wants the ML & hates the FL' & omg fuck that shiiiiit.

Especially as the ML is ugly (not helped by an atrocious wig). Like girl you can have him.

Even beyond his looks I had no interest in his story.

Legend of the Female General

I didn't even manage 5 minutes. Noped out as soon as I saw the character was forced to wear a mask. I know the MDL description mentioned that but I thought they were being metaphorical! I get they needed the character to not be recognised when she assumed her new identity after being betrayed. But it makes zero sense that her father would force her to wear it from childhood to disguise her as a boy. Just have her wear boy clothes! There'll be no obvious indicators otherwise until puberty hits & it's not like her face is what's going to give things away at that point. It just draws attention to the fact that something shady is going on. And we see her still wearing a mask when fighting, & you can't tell me everyone was fine with that.

According to the description the ML is suspicious & convinced she's a spy... after she returns post-betrayal, without her mask! So he was not remotely suspicious of someone constantly wearing a mask, but this random person is clearly up to something.

They obviously need to have the ML not recognise her, but idk just have a different actress play her in flashbacks, or do something with makeup, or say the ML has really bad face blindness or something!

I guess that's a petty thing to be bothered by, but I can only handwave so much. I'm pretty sure I'm dodging a bullet here as well. It took so long to get to air & that's rarely a good sign. Plus there were comments on the MDL page about how the pacing felt rushed, which didn't necessarily seem like a big deal (& people were defending the pacing by saying the novel had a lot going on) until I saw that the 4 episodes available on that first day were all 35 minutes. So you have a busy plot, & not only are you only using 36 episodes out of the maximum of 40, but the run time is shorter than it could be. Yeah, red flaaaaaags.

Could not get into this one. The plot seemed like it'd be exciting from the trailer, but every character was so smug & annoying, & judging by some comments on the MDL page, there are a few really stupid decisions made. I'd probably push through & give it a few more episodes (there are some comments suggesting that the FL gets a little better after the timeskip, but that still leaves the ML, who is even worse IMO), but I've got too much else to do, so I'll probably check in after it's finished & see how it's gone.

Went into The Range for some things for my houseplants & was greeted with a shitload of autumn & Halloween stuff. Like, multiple big displays right inside the doors, & several aisles of stuff, & practically every end display was autumn-themed also.

Look, I love Halloween & autumn as much as the next goth, but it's July FFS! And the amount was just excessive.

Climbed up Roseberry Topping Roseberry Topping, a hill in North Yorkshire with an interesting shape.

( to the top )

The weather was warmer than those clouds make it look, but there was a nice breeze at the top & I sat up there was about an hour before going back down.

I took a bunch of photos with the film camerafilm camera too, but they haven't been developed yet.

Restarted computer & the startup sound has gone back to the normal Windows 11 sound.

:(

This drama sounded like it should be right up my alley. Transmigration story that (according to the description), involved some meta elements on storytelling? Yes please!

But in order to fuck around the narrative, you have to tell people what it is. We got a few random disjointed scenes with no context or idea of how the fit into any kind of wider plot (I think the problem here is the drama is more concerned with roasting cdrama cliches than telling an interesting story that *happens* to be a parody. It doesn't help that one of those scenes invites comparisons with TTEOTM & the ML is not TTJ.). Then the FL gets drawn into the story, but things are already off-script, & she keeps dying & reliving a scene that is apparently not in the script. But instead of either surviving long enough in one of the loops to fix anything, or refusing to engage with a wedding to the 2ML (which is presumably what she's meant to do to clear the way for the ML), the loop just arbitrarily ends & she finds herself waking up on a day 6 months earlier. Like, why is any of this happening.

That might still be fun to watch play out if I liked the characters, but I don't. The FL is annoying. The ML is a charisma vacuum & his character doesn't feel like the protagonist he's meant to be in this story.

Getting into real nitpicking territory here, but I hated the music choices. The score/instrumental pieces were fine, but the more contemporary style stuff was all obnoxious.

I'll just go & rewatch Love Game in Eastern Fantasy. It did this way better.

( Ruination )

Says a lot about how ridiculously hot it's been the past few days that I can hear people outside cheering the rain (& accompanying thunder & lightning)

( warrior queen )

Finally getting around to posting some of the many photos I took in this game.

( if its in b&w it's automatically art )