Finally finished watching Judge Dee's Mystery Part 1
This picture is a reference to the first case in the series. *Picture is taken from MDL*
I started watching this drama some time around March or April this year on Netflix...It took me many months to finish it since I was either busy with IRL stuff or I ended up watching and finishing other dramas. I remember I finished watching Reset, another Cdrama which was a really exciting thriller series, and a few other dramas in the time that I was still watching Judge Dee's Mystery.
The series is based on the novel series written by Dutch author Robert van Gulik.
It basically tells the story of Di Renjie (courtesy name Huaiying) who is initially introduced as a wayward gentleman with a talent for crime-solving. One day, after sitting for the imperial examination, which was mainly imposed on by Mr. Hong (his caretaker since childhood, if I understood their relationship correctly), he goes out drinking with his friend at an entertainment house, only to get involved in a deadly fire which killed everyone except him. Seeing that he is the sole survivor of the incident, he later gets accused of arson and murder by the judge in the capital. Unwilling to submit to such an unfair decision, Di Renjie proposed that he is given a chance to gather evidence to prove his innocence. Long story short, he succeeded and the Empress Wu Zetian, who is impressed with his crime-solving skills, dispatched him to a border town as a magistrate. Having experienced being falsely accused without proper proof and trial, Di Renjie became resolute to uphold justice as magistrate of the county.
The series continues on adapting cases from the novel series. I initially wanted to give a 10/10 due to how solid each case was + fighting sequences were excellently choreographed. However, my score started to dwindle to 9/10 around the 4th last episode because his confrontation with Heiyan's leader feels rather flat, like, all the build up and that's all that they came up with? (Heiyan is the big bad for the majority of the series, btw). The final 3 episodes managed to bring it up to 9.5/10. The romance between Di Renjie and Cao An got pretty sappy at the end 😅. I didn't think it was necessary to be sappy. But as it turns out, this series actually has a Part 2 though I don't know when it will air. The teaser that they showed at the end looks promising though. I'm excited to see more of the Empress and of course, more of Di Renjie and his gang.
So, in conclusion, I love the series as a whole. I probably won't rewatch it though except maybe for some of the fighting scenes because they were just too good.
That's all my thoughts on this drama for now. Sorry it probably looks messy since I've been watching it on and off over the span of 5 months so I can't really write everything in detail. But that's the gist of it.
I'll probably be writing my thoughts on Ryusei no Kizuna soon. I'm loving the series so far so I might finish it faster than I thought I would.
That's all for now. See you all later