The thread is now open for discussions.
Gifs from kateknowsdramas’ tumblr:
I laughed at this scene but I’m not going to lie. I was about to roll my eyes because this is such a “Rowoon-esque” scene. Y’all know, Rowoon, right?
From “Extraordinary You” Ep 15 (or 7.5).
And part 2 from the same episode.
That said, there’s something about the performance of the actress, Lee See Young, in “Red Sleeves” that isn’t working for me. I usually like her acting but not here in Episode 2. I think she’s trying too hard to act like an ingenue that she ends up looking like a sycophant.
Part of me wishes that Kim HyeYoon was offered this role. I think she would make Deok-Im more sympathetic and appealing. Too bad she’s in the unlikable “Secret Inspector and Joy” drama fiasco right now.
Let’s enjoy the show.
Thanks again @pkml3!
Hoping to follow this thread more closely! Thanks for the gifs! True Beauty has a similar thing where she was trying to reach for the book but fell. Of course Extraordinary you’s scenes are extra memorable. I remember they almost had to get a body double for KimHyeYoon.
Oh, they got a body double gif of Kim HyeYoon? For what scene? For falling down? 🙂
I loved the scene in episode 3 when she entices the king to ask her to tell her story so he will spare her life. This had to be a reference to Scheherazade and a 1001 nights with Scheherazade telling stories so the king would spare her life. Looking forward to Episode 4. I think that playing a spunky character (like Joe March in Little Women – (even Katherine Hepburn couldn’t get it right ) is easy to overdo but the actress is growing on me and as the story gets more serious with palace intrigue I think there will be less of the bug eyes. Episode 3 hooked me to this drama.
Hah! That accusatory look of Deok Im’s at the end. So full of censure, LOL.
Love Jun Ho’s sageuk look btw and his crooked smile.
@pm3, not a body double gif but I think that scene at the library had her falling and knocking her front tooth…she said something about not being able to trust Rowoon to catch her 😛 oops! I mean they had many similar scenes falling down. The bts of that scene from 2:16mins
So far the story is developing well, hope it will keep the momentum.
I find the plot of the palace intrigue, threat to the prince and the anonymous letter pretty slow moving. Fortunately we have our couple moments.
Couple Moments
1) Crown Prince Yi San is so flustered that Deok Im has seen his face and knows he’s been deceiving her, he can’t even remember which direction to walk to his study hall LOL. What bothers him most is that she holds a grudge against him.
2) He waits around 3 days to meet DI at the library, and can’t focus because she does not turn up, and he can’t clear the air between them.
3) When he finally meets her in the library, he lets her speak her mind and then spends the evening until the sun goes down just staring at her.
4) When she ends up as his personal handmaid, he tells her to dry the ink but he grabs her hand, when she takes the paper.
San : “Why are you here? Do you know how distracting you’ve been?”
DI : “Did you recognise me?”
San : “Of course I did. You’ve been here in the same room.”
DI : “I would have left had you commanded me to do so.”
She tries to wriggle out of serving him but gets recalled.
San : “Raise your head. My personal handmaid has the right to look straight at me. That way, you can serve me more quickly.”
DI : “You told me to stay out of your sight.”
San : “I only saw you today because it was your first day. If you’re always next to me, someday I will see you no more. (He thinks he’ll become so accustomed to her that she’ll be like the wall paper. LOL. Where she’s concerned, he’s wrong.) As you are only a court lady out of many and of no consequence. Just make yourself useful.”
She has to make sure that the water pot for ink is always full.
She’s so fed up she practically squeezes the ‘life out of the water pot’ when she got it filled. LOL.
5) San enjoyed watching her looking out at the rain, while he pretended that he wasn’t watching.
6) When advising the king whether to eat the honeyed rice cakes, San followed the advice of DI.
7) San to DI after saving her from punishment : “What happened today wasn’t your fault. I hope you don’t dwell on it.”
DI : “Thank you, Your Highness for saving …”
San : “Today, it was you who saved me. I misread His Majesty completely. If you hadn’t been there, I wouldn’t have changed my approach.” (He would have recommended that the king eat the rice cakes.) “It could have been bad.”
San smiled at her : “You are certainly quite meticulous.”
San is concerned enough about how she feels that he takes the time to assure her and to acknowledge that she saved him from making a mistake. It was just short of thanking her, but better than nothing.
8) He ends up saving her a second time in one episode.
Enemies and Friends
The Hong Clan seem to be enemies of Yi San and possibly will gang up against him.
So now we have a royal guard in the pay of someone who wants San hurt or dead. We know that Head Court Lady is also plotting against San’s ascent with Councillor Hong. Then there’s Princess Hwawan, San’s aunt who is out to cause weaken San. Hong Deok Ro, San’s childhood friend and ‘lecturer/gyeonsaseo’ is treacherous. We know that he took credit for something DI did as a child and that he’s possibly conniving with Councillor Hong.
Asianwiki adds one more enemy, Secretary Jung, but we have yet to meet him properly.
In spite of the intrigue and DI’s duties, I like that she retained her ability to climb over walls without much problem, long skirts and all, compared to how San had difficulty doing it as a child.
DI should tell San that his mother is keeping tabs on him through her.
Hi, all. I’ve been lurking in the shadows for a while now, but never had the courage to post. But I do feel strongly about an aspect of this drama which I haven’t seen commented on and I feel the production needs lots of praise for it: they have done a super job of showing the atmosphere in a court where the king has the almost arbitrary power of life or death over everyone.
Although he seems quite sweet, as the princess noted, Seongjo has this power (even if he’s just in a bad mood). The example of what happened to Prince Sado (rightly or wrongly) hangs heavily over the palace. When he becomes angry with DI and calls for her execution, we may suspect he’s not serious, but she believes she has seconds to think of something to save herself. His ‘ha, ha, I would never do that’ doesn’t compensate for the very real fear his staff would feel under those circumstances. No wonder DI fainted afterwards!
Meanwhile, his grandson is prostrated on the ground outside, fearing the worst. Did he understand the politics involved that meant his grandfather had to make a show of his punishment? Yes, probably, but he also had his father’s death lingering in his mind. By the time they set up the partitions around him (showing, I believe, both a dragon and a tiger?), he would have been ready for the possibility of a violent end. I think Junho does an excellent job of showing this trauma, especially in the way he freezes when his grandfather reaches for him. He knew he could have been sacrificed, and circumstances switched around so quickly his head was spinning. Would you think of your grandfather as benevolent after that?
My final point is just to note how young our lead characters are meant to be at this point. Yi San accedes to the throne when he’s 24, so these events take place when he’s in his late teens/early 20s. This may explain some of his more impulsive behaviour!
Ultimately, Yi San is right – the palace is a dangerous place to be.
Hi @AddictedAhjumma! Welcome to this thread and BOD, and I’m glad you decided to delurk. It’s always good to get more thoughts from our fellow drama watchers.
Ah the atmosphere in royal courts … one of the reasons I seldom watch sageuks or Chinese period dramas which seem to mostly take place in royal courts. Yes, it’s often arbitrary the meting out of punishment, the emotional outbursts and unwise decisions that affect a whole clan, village, realm, etc. Too much power in the hands of the few. Too much intrigue, betrayal, injustice…. Usually not my cup of tea.
Quite few in power ruled by fear, wielding the threat of death and torture over all. Never know when they are serious or not, because they like to play it both ways. If the next thing the accused says displeases, it’s off with his head, but if the accused is able to sweet talk the king, he might get off with just a light punishment.
I’ve enjoyed Junho’s nuanced acting since Rain or Shine/Just Between Lovers and he continues to be good here. He does particularly well as the tortured soul, I feel.
Yes, one tends to forget how young these characters are, especially since they are acted by people in their late 20s and early 30s. I guess we can’t compare the kids of those times, and in the palace with our kids of today. The maturity levels are lightyears apart!
Do keep sharing your thoughts! Cheers!
I’m liking this drama so far, which has more to do with Junho’s acting too. I, like @GB, have liked Junho’s acting ever since Just Between Lovers which is one of the few dramas I have rewatched thrice.
In this drama, I like how Junho portrays dignity worthy of a prince along with his unwilling fascination for a court lady, also his conflicted emotions about his grandfather. I’ve not warmed up to the FL yet, I don’t like her bug eyes.
But I can feel the romance developing like a slow burn (I love those the best😊). This is a drama where both the leads are dignifird and will thankfully not resort to those irritating Ayegos and mushiness. So I’m expecting it to get better🤞🤞
Hi there @Phoenix! It’s good to see you here and to know that you like this show too. Wow, you watched JBL 3 times!!! I rewatched certain scenes several times, but I think, not the whole show. It had a sad vibe, but was so sweet.
My Hopes
I feel the same about slow-burn romances. I hope Yi San lets DI be free to speak her mind more often. It will enlighten him. He’s such a serious soul. Even as a child he embraced his crown prince role, wished to excel in his studies, and denied himself news of the little girl he wanted to thank. True to his word, he didn’t seek her out, and even now, does not consider that DI might be the same girl. He has naively believed (what he’d been told) that she left the palace, and he left it at that. (This is a far cry from those Shows where people as adults can recognise their long lost childhood first loves!)
DI will be a good complement to his seriousness if she’s allowed a little freedom. She’ll be the one to run around, to come up with ideas for games and fun, and to point out some hard truths to make him humble.
I hope San lightens up a bit. Going overboard on dignity makes him not much fun to hang around!
Even as a child, he suspected that his ‘friend’ Deok Ro was spying on him for his grandfather. I hope he has not let DR’s ‘friendship’ blind him entirely, and that he still has the knowledge that he’s surrounded by palace intrigue.
After these initial occasions where San saves DI, I trust that she’ll be given the opportunity to save San as well.
I just realized that I haven’t commented over here…
I really enjoyed Episodes 3+4. I want to see what will happen to Episode 5!
@GB Unnie, I agree to what you wrote above!
Hello, @Cleopatra – good that you are watching this too😃
@GB I agree with you, it would be interesting to see Yi San lighten up and DI being responsible for that. Thabk you for the couple moments recap – I noticed that touching her hand scene too😍
I do think DI should tell him that his own mother is spying on him, though I think not for nefarious purposes. She probably wants to keep her son safe.
You are right about Junho portraying these tortured characters well. I’ll be on this drama journey with you all then😄
@Phoenix! I’m so glad to know you’ll be watching along with us. I’m getting impatient for the weekend. So many shows (actually only 3 but that means 6 episodes, plus we have a rewatch so it’s more than 7 hours of watching!!) to watch and comment on. My brain has slowed down and I also get sleepy earlier. Wish I had the energy to keep up with all the episodes.
I was just thinking that 7+ hours of viewing, plus time taken to analyse and comment, probably makes it more than 14 hours of drama-centred entertainment. I guess that’s still reasonable out of 72 hours (3 day weekend). However, if we deduct the time for sleep, ‘work’, meals, etc…. I might have 33 hours left. Taking out 14 hours for dramas means I’m supposed to have 19 hours left. But somehow I don’t! LOL.
Does that sound like a lot of extra, unaccounted for time?
Haha who cares as long as it makes you happy? 😃 That’s the only thing that matters.
I’m only watching this one drama on the weekend though. Didn’t start Jirisan, it’s not my type of drama. Not watching Happiness either. I read a lot of books on weekends and go for walks, so can only cope with one drama. I still need to finish Dali and the Cocky Prince (4 episodes left). I hear we may get early snowfall this weekend, so super excited❄❄❄
Hey @Phoenix!
Yes. I am watching this one and I was waiting for new episodes!
I am glad you have started it as well!
@GB Unnie, said it all. We have so many episodes to watch but so little time, LOL!