and a steamroller ran over him

life can be sweet

[anagrammaddict]

I finished Love Beyond the Grave today and have now started Fate Chooses You.

I've only watched one episode but somehow I have the feeling that it's going to have Allen Ren's character, Lu Huai, die tragically at the end. Just that sneaking suspicion.

[anagrammaddict]

I have caught up with pursuit of jade. I did not... expect to catch up so quickly. But I just burned my sleep as fuel to get through all 25 eps. And now I'm at the point where I have to wait 1 ep a day. Outrageous.

I am having a very good drama watching year so far!

[dingyuxi]

PURSUIT OF JADE 逐玉 (2026) — t/n: "běngōng 本宫" is used like the first-person subjective pronoun "I" in English and is used specifically when royalty refer to themselves

[da-man-si]

Where's the money? Where's the money in the treasury?

[anagrammaddict]

A++++ acting from both Xiahou Dan and Cheng Lei

[hypnolectric]

shut UP i'm hOWLING

[keychild]

I need everyone to take a moment to appreciate this frame.

The hand placement. The look. Perfection.

[anagrammaddict]

Cdramas watched in 2025

Last year I watched a grand total of 24 cdramas. To completion. Which is astonishing considering last year was a manic year for me. But then again, drama-chasing was a reprieve from all the fuckery and chaos of the year. (I may or may not have taken a couple of sick days to recover from very late night drama watching...that's how fed up with work I was...)

Here's a list of what I watched; not all dramas I watched were released in 2025 - some are a little older - but the majority of them were.

Blossom (2024)

There are a million dramas with the word 'blossom' in it, but I'm referring to the one starring Meng Ziyi and Li Yunrui. A super popular drama, that was only so-so for me. The main OTP was pretty forgettable. I can't remember the majority of the plot or the other side characters. There, I said it. [6/10]

The Ghost Bride (2020)

Short interesting drama on Netflix set in colonial Melaka. A little disjointed at times, and some of the characters could do with better development, but it had a unique premise, and it was pretty short at 6 episodes, and overall I did enjoy it. [7/10]

Moonlight Mystique (2025)

I was invested at the start, but by the end of the first arc, I was actively fast-forwarding every time the main OTP came onscreen. Bai Lu and Ao Ruipeng do not a good pairing make. And I don't know if it's just me...but Bai Lu's characters across her many dramas are starting to merge into one another. This drama was, however, redeemed by the stellar secondary ship between Chang Huasen and Dai Luwa's characters. [4.5/10]

Everlasting Longing (2025)

This one was nothing special, but at least the leads were pleasing to look at? I do, however, question some of the nonsense decisions made by the writers. Also, wtf was that second ship? [6.5/10]

Love of the Divine Tree (2025)

One of the better xianxias I've watched recently. Great cast, interesting characters though with an irritating second ML (what's new), good chemistry between the leads, and a lovely ending. Bonus points for the beauty that is Deng Wei's face. [8/10]

Si Jin (2025)

Another rebirth / second chance at life drama on this list. Interestingly enough, I preferred this one to Blossom. It must be because I have a soft spot for Jing Tian, and I did like the chemistry between her and Zhang Wanyi. And maybe I did like the absolute detestability of the mother-daughter villain duo. [7/10]

The Glory (2025)

ML can't act in this one, but Chen Duling was wonderful to watch. She was many things in this one: feral and reckless and desperate as well as cold and calculating and desolate. Also, some great acting there from Wen Zhengrong as Hanyan's mother. The interactions between the two of them were fascinating. And the main ship should absolutely have been Hanyan x Chai Jing. Also, the gorgeous colours and costumes in this drama were a visual treat. Minus maybe half a point because of the ML's acting. [7.5/10]

A Moment But Forever (2025)

This one has a very old-school xianxia feel to it, reminiscent of stuff from the Ashes of Love era. Even that ending had that old-school feel to it. But overall the drama had a fresh premise with interesting ideas and some beautiful visuals. The flying ship arc had a bit of a steampunk vibe to it. I wasn't at first 100% convinced about the main ship, thinking that the ML is too PTSD-afflicted and dysfunctional to be in a functional and believable relationship, but it took time, and by the end, I was invested. A pretty rewarding watch. [8/10]

The Love You Give Me (2023)

I think this is the first modern one on the list. Started off OK, then I began to get more and more impatient, because I just didn't like the main ship. And that's always a problem for a modern romance with a very average plot. I slept through a few episodes, and woke up feeling relieved that I didn't get to watch those. This one is a No for me. [3/10]

Breaking the Shadows (2025)

Watched this one because I was eager to see Sun Li, and I was in the mood for a crime drama. So that's exactly what I got: Sun Li in a crime drama. Great acting as usual from her. Plot is OK. All crime dramas in cdramaland generally tend to end the same way, thanks to the censors. For this one, it was Sun Li's complex character portrayal that carried the drama. [7/10]

Love in Pavilion (2025)

I had no expectations for this one, because I hated Red Moon Pact. Yang Mi was soulless in that one. And I really, really dislike Gong Jun's brand of acting. He's always a mannequin. A beautiful mannequin. Every time he tries to show some emotion, he always looks like a beautiful mannequin scowling petulantly. So LiP was a pleasant surprise. Beautiful and tragic and dark, and a great set-up and backstory to the problematic character that Wangquan Hongye ultimately transforms into. I really enjoyed the way the relationship developed between young WQHY and DFHZ, the maturity of it, only to be undone by the trauma WQHY goes through, to finally end in the morose marriage that doesn't even last long. There were some cute side ships in this one, but they were not particularly memorable, and only existed to enhance the tragedy. [8.5/10]

Joy of Life (2019)

I don't know why I waited so long to watch this one, but god am I glad I finally got down to it. Outstanding. Excellent acting, fascinating setting, super complex characters and relationships, characters who you expect to go along certain c-drama-predetermined pathways but end up surprising you, really good humour, lots of plot intrigue...peak cdrama here (for me, at least). [9.5/10]

Joy of Life 2 (2024)

And after I watched JoL, I had to immediately follow through with JoL 2. I don't know how but JoL 2 was even better than its first part. Darker, definitely. And with Fan Xian more mature and...with a little less power or control over things. Which made things so much more relatable and believable. I can't rave enough about this one. [10/10]

The Demon Hunter's Romance (2025)

A wonderful drama! With some genuinely unique storytelling. Bonus points to the puppet inn arc as well as the time loop in a painting arc. I enjoyed this one from start to finish; it was so, so good. And the OTP is easily one of the best pairings I've seen in cdramas. Gentle, mature, not-petty, caring, warm - I would never have guessed a cdrama pairing could be so soothing, content, and drama-free. Unfortunately because it's a cdrama, ML and FL ultimately did not end up together. But I did not mind the ending, because sad as it is, it made narrative sense. [9/10]

Homesick (2022)

I was in the mood for another crime drama, so I picked this one because I thought the summary sounded intriguing. I did find it suspenseful while watching, though perhaps the last few episodes my interest had waned a bit. I like the 'family with dark secrets' premise, but somehow the motives for the characters in this one don't quite add up. Crime dramas somehow always tend to feel the same to me; they really need a strong lead with good character development to keep things interesting to the end. [6.5/10]

Fangs of Fortune (2024)

It took me 10 months to finish watching this one. I started and stopped a few times. I was just not convinced by those early episodes. From episode 1, it was set up to be a bad ending, with Zhao Yuanzhou's fate to die by Xiao Zhuo's sword. Then the next few episodes were about forced bonding between a group of very broken people. Everything felt very contrived and any cheeriness or humour seemed to fall flat. I was thinking, this drama is telling me it's going to be tragic and right now it's manipulating me to like these characters and fall in love with their relationships so I'll be even sadder at the end...I don't buy it. (At one point, after several months, I came back to this show, and clicked into a different version - the Cantonese dubbed version. And just couldn't take it seriously. The thing with Guo Jingming's dramas is that the characters tend to speak in a very slow and whispery way, possibly to create some air of mystery as part of the whole atmosphere, and it just didn't work with the Canto dub. I speak a little bit of canto...and it is not a language for whispering mysteriously over an extended time. The last time I came back to this drama, I was determined to finish it, and I'm glad I did. Parts of it dragged, but the characters did grow on me, and so did their relationships (you could easily ship everyone with everyone else), and there was some terrific acting in that. I think there were a couple of scenes that really hit me hard: 1) Mountain God Ying Lei at his moment of death, holding on to Bai Jiu after doing his best to save him, and 2) that heartbreaking scene when Xiao Zhuo is too late to save Bai Jiu, and finds him dead. In a very human way. Body just lying there, abandoned and very physical, none of that ethereal dissolving into gold or petals or stardust or whatever, like what happens to demons and spirits. It was a journey watching this one, but ultimately I'm glad I made it, as it was all worth it in the end. [8.5/10]

Legend of the Female General (2025)

This one should have been so much better. It has my favourites Zhou Ye and Cheng Lei in it, along with the added bonus of Cheng Lei's uncomfortably intimate scrutinizing screwdriver gaze lol. It had amazing chemistry between the leads. But ultimately it got too heavy-handed with the preachiness, which just made parts of the drama silly even with suspension of disbelief. [6.5/10]

Shadow Love (2025)

Cheng Lei has one of my favourites ever since his mini drama A Familiar Stranger, so to be able to watch him in back to back costume dramas is a huge plus of 2025. What can I say about Shadow Love, except parts of it were very silly BUT I loved it. Not the best of dramas but I loved the chemistry between CL and Song Yi (surprisingly loved it more than LotFG), and I loved the range that CL got to show with his 3 separate characters. Definitely one of the most enjoyable dramas of 2025. [8.5/10]

The Seven Relics of Ill Omen (2025)

Honestly I didn't think much of the characters in this one. They felt very bland. Some interesting ideas and settings. The ending didn't really work for me. Something felt missing from the whole drama. [5/10]

When Destiny Brings the Demon (2025)

Great premise and another solid xianxia for 2025. Super relatable FL (at least at the start), good chemistry between the leads. It did start to drag a little towards the ending, and I got impatient in the mortal realm arc. That just wasn't necessary. But otherwise, I did enjoy the drama, and the characters were great. [7.5/10]

Fated Hearts (2025)

Enemies to lovers done perfectly. The chemistry! The unhinged-ness of the leads, the side characters, the plot twists...all of it was amazing, very boldly done. Li Qin and Chen Zheyuan were perfect and so believable for the lead roles. I even enjoyed the ridiculous princess arc (read: waited with anticipation for her downfall or comeuppance, which she never got...). The pacing slowed down a bit during the Storm Alliance arc, but everything else was amazing. [9/10]

Love in the Clouds (2025)

I liked this one enough, but I feel like Lu Yuxiao carried this one a little more than Neo Hou. I can't remember the last drama I watched where ML and FL had been swapped at birth, so this was something different from me. Parts of it did get a bit repetitive, especially with the relationship development between the leads. There were some beautiful costumes and settings though, and with a good ending that stayed true to the drama. [8/10]

Sword and Beloved (2025)

This started really, really well. I enjoyed the quiet calm relationship developing at the beginning between Wangquan Fugui and Qingtong. I could have watched the entire drama between those two living their secluded peaceful lives, even if no romance ever developed between them. The drama went downhill after WQFG's dramatic (read: pierced by 10,000 swords) exit from the Wangquan residence. The desert arc was...boring. Didn't care much about the side ships (ok, fox & general were cute, but the dragon ship was a big bland nope). The separation of QT and WQFG was one of the worst decisions made by the script. Then we had QT dealing with her stupid brother arc. The problem with this show is that there were 0 interesting or original villains. A wailing shadow tree with whispery shadow foxes as the personification of evil gets very old after 3 shows of it, the Quan evil dude was just as one-dimensionally evil, and QT's brother was just your typical petty spoilt brat proliferating in cdramas. The most interesting and complex 'villain' was perhaps Wangquan Hongye, who wouldn't typically be considered a villain. And don't get me started on the ending, which the writers just pulled out of a hat, complete with info dump at the end (I did shed a tear at QT's death, because...what a waste. And Li Yitong did make her character so endearing). [6/10]

Whispers of Fate (2025)

It feels like they built the whole drama around Leo Luo. Correction, Leo Luo is the drama. A fairly interesting plot, with some good moments. Very beautiful costumes (on Leo only, though), frustrating side characters that the writers took time to develop with care at first, and then somehow they do a 180 and make illogical decisions ruining their character logic, what's new. An ending that dragged, and was bogged down by pacing issues. Jeremy Xu as a opera-loving puppet villain was a sight to behold. Man should play more villainous characters. [7/10]

[weiyuheng]

someone made a song about That One Staircase that's in every guzhuang drama ever so i translated it LOL

it's very rushed and i haven't watched all of these shows so idk how the official subs translated certain place names but i did my best

all errors are mine <3

source

[anagrammaddict]

This character here is a villain. And he's a fairly serious villain. I cannot take him seriously though. Because I'm immature and his name happens to be Mu Qibai (iykyk).

So how can i take anything seriously when we have scenes like this:

I mean i lost it the whole time JBZ was howling 'Qibai-xiooonng'

[anagrammaddict]

That amnesia subplot had better take up no more than fifteen (15) seconds of whatever episode it will happen in, and then never return for the rest of the show

[anagrammaddict]

I can't believe I start off this show thinking omg the leads are totally unhinged and we're now at a point where 95.36% of all the side characters have revealed themselves to be just as or even more unhinged, or well on their journey to Unhingement.

Emperor of Susha? I thought he was a usual cdrama POS emperor/ father, manipulating his son into power all to be a good ruler one day, apparently. And yeah he's all that plus very unhinged.

Empress Zhuang? Almost fooled me into believing she's just a garden variety scheming empress from the hougong. Then she goes and she force-feeds her comatose husband sticky rice, slapping him and screaming at him to wake up and spend the rest of his life with her. Unhinged.

Murong Yao? Unhinged. And not highly intelligent either.

Xia Jingshi and Xia Jingyan? I don't even need to go here. unhinged and unhinged.

Feng Xiyang? Unhinged and delusional. And unintelligent.

Feng Chengyang? I fully expect his journey into Unhingement to begin anytime now.

Meanwhile the ML and FL who from the start had the hinges of all the doors in their brains blown apart... somehow seem to have replaced all their missing hinges or maybe they installed automatic doors in their brain or something, and are surprisingly now the most reasonable people in the whole drama.

[dangermousie]

If your OTP doesn't flirt through nostalgic discussions of wanting to inflict maximum damage on the other, do they even care?

[dingyuxi]

FATED HEARTS 一笑随歌 (2025) dir. Chu Yuibun, Francis Nam, Gu Zhiwei — How did it feel to be pierced by an arrow shot by the woman you despised most in the world, and watch victory slip from your grasp?

[anagrammaddict]

well, i'm now into ep 4 (or 5?) of fated hearts, and so far it's got echoes of shadow love, which i'm not complaining about. shadow love with more torture and less naked abs (ok, that's a lie - feng suige's entire battalion pretty much disrobed in public and stood there...but that doesn't count!). they've really upped the torture and the biting as well. will definitely appeal to the kinks of a good subset of folks lol.

what i do really like about the show so far is the mystery surrounding fu yixiao. usually in the cdramas i watch it's the ML who's all mysterious & hiding a million secrets etc., but in this one, FL so far is an enigma. both ML and FL have their demons and are fairly unhinged, but FL so far is the more mysterious one. must be the amnesia thing.

plus i do love li qin a fair bit.

[anagrammaddict]

i finished watching shadow love a couple of weeks back, and well it was a chaotic whirlwind ride that took me to places i didn't expect it would go. not the most brilliant of writing, but definitely one of the most entertaining cdramas of the year for me. loved the leads, their relationship was sweet and sultry and okay, a bit syrupy at times but well basically the chemistry is terrific.

and because i watched this immediately after LOTFG, i have to make the comparison, because the comparison is asking to be made...and yes, shadow love was 100% more entertaining and satisfying. less manufactured modern social messaging, less preachiness, more self-awareness in the fact that it doesn't take itself too seriously.

and cheng lei is given more acting range here compared to his character as xiao jue in LOTFG. he's given free range to flex his marvellous facial muscles. he can scowl, side-eye, glare, shoot knives from his eyes...but he can also smirk, simper, and pout lol. i must say, even though his character as annan wang seems to be the most popular with viewers, i do enjoy seeing cheng lei as a more carefree, goofier character in jin an. all the cheng lei dramas i've watched (and i've only watched 3) all portray him as the aloof general / military commander, and he plays that part super well. so seeing jin an chase and pine after li shuang and sometimes be genuinely silly or at least the 'less mature' partner was unexpected and something i didn't know i needed in my life.

[greyjug]

I wanted annan wang to be violently throwing up after remembering he tortured his beloved wife with his own hands they didn't show him regretting it properly like i was expecting he would bang his head on the wall or something after realising what he did but alas he didn't suffer enough

[anagrammaddict]

You and I both, op. He didn't even say so much as a sorry lol. Not that sorry would have cut it, but still.

[anagrammaddict]

I am way too invested in these last few episodes and the previews and my brain is going into a bit of a spiral. Looking at the previews again the only ending I find reasonable now is everybody dies in rage and angst. And that li shuang if she makes that decision to feed Duan aodeng the brain powder shit, i hope it's because she does it out of conscious, cold, calculated revenge, not because she was duped silly by the consort. Yes I think I can accept that. I'll be so pissed if they lower general li's intelligence in the last few episodes.