One thing I appreciate about Beanies is that more so than other forums, there are a lot of you who while immersing in the emotions and the story of dramas, can still appreciate the complexity of the craft (directing, writing,etc.) and be critical when required. And that a lot of you, like me, enjoy watching even if not morally rooting for “bad” characters. You can separate the complexity and watchability of a character from their actual moral standing (let’s just say that we would watch anti-hero & anti-heroine on screen, maybe even root for them to do their crazy evil thing, but would definitely report them to the police if they were real people). Case in point:
– The crazy king in The Crowned Clown. After [SPOILER] they killed the king, my interest dropped from 100 to 0. As much as the king has become unworthy of his throne, and commited unforgivable acts, he was such a fascinating character to watch, and a formidable foe to our hero. Without him, half of the fun is gone, and also most of the reason to root for our hero. Now it’s back to simple court politics, which is actually done decently in the show, but not enough to pull me back in.
– The last empress: I’ve said a lot about this drama and I maintain that the evil characters are the most fun to watch. They did a decent job with the “good” characters of the show (Sunny is so badass!), but it is the “bad” characters that are having the most fun with their emotions and behaviors, and thus make them the most fun to watch as well.
– The story of Hao Lan: since not a lot of Beanies are watching this drama, I’ve been discussing it elsewhere, and am alone in appreciating the complexity of these characters who cannot be bucketed into “good” or “bad”. A lot of their actions are really unforgivable (besides the usual political machinations in the palace, there’s also some twisted emotional manipulation between loved ones), but to me they all make sense and are in line with the characters’ personality and motivations. It also makes it fun to watch these people with extraordinary abilities and similarly extraordinary emotions put in their all, whether it’s their career or love. Isn’t that what we watch dramas for? If I want to watch good guys doing good things, I can always volunteer more at our local non-profits and not waste my time with dramas!

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    True!!
    I stopped watching TCC, meaning to continue after it ended, but the death kind of left me hanging. I wonder how they’d balance the story now,and it’s sad to read it’s now turned into a typical sageuk (which isn’t bad imo, since I like them, but I kind of feel they promised something at the beginning and they’re now delivering something else)
    We’ve talked about TLE a million times, but I just want to repeat how much I would have loved them to turn sunny into mama jr and build a new and crazy empire. <//3
    I'm watching the story of ming lan first so I didn't read your comments on hao lan just in case, but I promise I'll talk to you about it when I start it! (in a million years, since I'm only on ep 14 of ming lan XD)

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      Chinese drama is a different beast isn’t it LOL Hao Lan looks to be 70 something eps as well, oh dear haha

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    Ok, so I’ve been soo behind on TLE, I’m not sure if I will continue. But I’m almost done with Ming Lan and will make the time to start Hao Lan. I’ll let you know when I start this!

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      can’t wait!! Haven’t been able to watch much with you for awhile Jen! Also I’m getting tickets to Black Pink concert in LA tomorrow, you in??

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        I’m passing on BP. Were you able to get your tickets?

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          Yes I did! Not from the official source but from resale, even though I got into the queue before official ticketing starts 🙁

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    Yessss! Right there with you on all these points, even with the shows I’m not watching.
    I’m always drawn to such characters as well and I feel pretty much exactly the same about The Crowned Clown.

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    Exactly true about The Crowned Clown! I am still watching but I watch a single episode over a period of days. It hasn’t been the same with the mad king gone. Yes he was crazy and proboably deserved what happened to him but the other lot is undeserving too! I can’t bring myself to root for an usurper.

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      Well a lot of great kings were originally usurpers as well, so that’s not my problem. It’s just, now the conflict between the clown and his antagonist is a familiar one, and not very interesting anymore 🙂

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        If it’s a monarchy then it should follow the bloodline. If it’s a democracy then it should be someone selected by the people. He is none of those unfortunately. And he is having the hots for another mans wife!! No. Just no.

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          that’s fair – this could be why monarchies don’t work out in the end since when a king is terrible, there’s very little anyone could do. I think I’m of a different opinion here where if a king is terrible, a revolution should happen – but yes maybe a revolution should happen from the outside, rather than the inside.

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            Yes! Exactly! Anyway it’s only a drama. Let’s just enjoy it while it lasts 😊

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    There’s nothing as satisfying as watching a delicious evil character.

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    Agree2.

    I only watch TLE from your list above. And as much as i kinda like the story about Sunny’s revenge, imo NWS’s arc unfortunately was not very well executed so it fell flat at times and eventually crumbled away. Huhu

    Anyways, it was the villains that actually pulled me in to watch and stay for the show. In the beginning we had Mama with her spy cam, RH was/is bad and has trust issues, also there is snake Min Yura in between them. The drama has flaws (maybe too many), but it is fun to watch especially when we have over the top villains like Mama and her son who flipflops like he has a good-bad switch. Hahaha

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