Post by ajk on May 20, 2017 15:59:01 GMT -5
We were left in the middle of everything when this episode ended so it's kind of tough to talk about it as an individual episode. But I love how everything is playing out. It's a very clever story, they way they've put so many different pieces together. They laid seeds for it in previous episodes--Hyang's reluctance to act, the blank scroll, Choe C's final dose of medicine--and now we're being rewarded for following along with it all. Parts of it are a little unclear, but it may just be the limitations of reading the imperfect subtitles so I'm reluctant to criticize. In the end it really will be amazing if Choe U manages to pull this off and top his brother and all of the military force backing up his brother.
I also really liked that KJ's idea about taking the ministers hostage turned out not to be important and was left aside as the story moved forward. Most historicals that are about a particular person, in a situation like this one the person's idea would be the game-changer and the person would be front and center. Not here. When the previous episode ended, it sure looked like a slave's idea from out of nowhere would decide the result of the entire conflict. And I didn't like it, because that kind of thing just doesn't happen. But guess what, it didn't, and it turned out that KJ was only a bit player in this episode. Very encouraging--shows that the goal here is telling the story and not making everything about the same person from Day 1.
About the only thing I didn't like was the prediction from the "astronomer" (astrologer!) becoming so important. But that's just personal. Those guys did have influence back then so you can't fault the story for it.
Choe Hyang's surprised look upon seeing his father looking so well: "Yes father. Out of surprise. And joy." Yeah you can just about see his pants on fire.
Speaking of which, whatever was in that final pill Choe C took, how do we get some of it?
"He broke my heart. I guess he'll never be mine." Guess not, Chunsim...now let's not start a catfight over it. At least she didn't knock over Wola's tray and spill the medicine (and let's admit it, we were all wondering whether or not she would).
Songi: "Is that so? Everything's prepared? Very nice for a slave girl." Her mother: "Why are you acting this way?" Thank you Mrs. Choe! Ugh, you get the feeling that this wedding business is going to get a lot worse before it goes away.
Choe Chunmyong sending a second scout to the party: "You go. I don't believe this guy." That probably was not a literal translation but whatever, it cracked me up. The first messenger, you had to feel for him--he had to report to his general that the old man on his deathbed had jumped up and was partying like it's 1299. He must have been afraid he'd be demoted on the spot!
We even got a pretty good cliffhanger ending. If those troops wait for another messenger to go scout things before they're ordered to disperse, Choe C might drop dead first and the whole plan will fall apart. I hope the resolution to all this is worthy of the buildup.
I also really liked that KJ's idea about taking the ministers hostage turned out not to be important and was left aside as the story moved forward. Most historicals that are about a particular person, in a situation like this one the person's idea would be the game-changer and the person would be front and center. Not here. When the previous episode ended, it sure looked like a slave's idea from out of nowhere would decide the result of the entire conflict. And I didn't like it, because that kind of thing just doesn't happen. But guess what, it didn't, and it turned out that KJ was only a bit player in this episode. Very encouraging--shows that the goal here is telling the story and not making everything about the same person from Day 1.
About the only thing I didn't like was the prediction from the "astronomer" (astrologer!) becoming so important. But that's just personal. Those guys did have influence back then so you can't fault the story for it.
Choe Hyang's surprised look upon seeing his father looking so well: "Yes father. Out of surprise. And joy." Yeah you can just about see his pants on fire.
Speaking of which, whatever was in that final pill Choe C took, how do we get some of it?
"He broke my heart. I guess he'll never be mine." Guess not, Chunsim...now let's not start a catfight over it. At least she didn't knock over Wola's tray and spill the medicine (and let's admit it, we were all wondering whether or not she would).
Songi: "Is that so? Everything's prepared? Very nice for a slave girl." Her mother: "Why are you acting this way?" Thank you Mrs. Choe! Ugh, you get the feeling that this wedding business is going to get a lot worse before it goes away.
Choe Chunmyong sending a second scout to the party: "You go. I don't believe this guy." That probably was not a literal translation but whatever, it cracked me up. The first messenger, you had to feel for him--he had to report to his general that the old man on his deathbed had jumped up and was partying like it's 1299. He must have been afraid he'd be demoted on the spot!
We even got a pretty good cliffhanger ending. If those troops wait for another messenger to go scout things before they're ordered to disperse, Choe C might drop dead first and the whole plan will fall apart. I hope the resolution to all this is worthy of the buildup.