What am I watching?

TV Series – Unchained Love

This is a foreign language series I am watching on Viki Rakuten.  It is a suspense romance with 36 Episodes that comes with English Subtitles.

Growing up, I loved the costume dramas as well as musicals.  They were bright, colourful and cheers you up on a dark evening.   At the moment, it seems as if English-language movies have lost their way.  In trying to reproduce authenticity, we find ourselves squinting at dark screens and listening to poor sound.  Is it me, or do modern actors all look the same?   Where is the emotion, the passion? What is with the wooden acting?

When sound first came to movies the actors had been trained to show expression in their body and facial language.   This seems to be lacking.  The soul has been lost.

This is where I turn to foreign language programmes for the costume dramas.   Give me sword fights, bright staging, and beautiful costumes over folks standing and drivelling on about something boring.

So, what is Unchained Love about?

We open with a dead king.   Dead in the days when those concubines without children were put to death to serve him in death.  They should be grateful and feel blessed.

One of his concubines was unfortunate enough to be given to the king shortly before his death, and whilst never meeting him, is still selected for death.  It does not matter that there is no way she could have given the king a child.  It is more important that there is the correct number of sacrifices.

Naturally, she is rescued in time, but not by her awful ‘mother’ who keeps trying to have her killed.  She is illegitimate and was only handed over to the palace in place of her legitimate sister to die.

Her saviour is a powerful man who is supposed to be a eunuch.  I have my doubts.  He seeks revenge for the murder of his brother and plans to use her to further his mission.

There are a number of power-hungry antagonists there are corrupt royal family members and corrupt officials galore.  My favourite being the Empress Rong’an who appears to like killing people and sees our heroine as a threat which of course gives us a chance to see her efforts to kill her thwarted.   To put it mildly she is nuts.

The story is a mix of romance, justice, palace and political games with just the right amount of violence to keep it moving.  I look forward to seeing who wins and ends up losing their lives.