Review for Curse of the Royal Harem
Written By: Lee Yee-Wah, Choi Shuk-yin Executive Producer: Chong Wai-Kin Location: Hong Kong Production Company: TVB Language: Cantonese No. of Episodes: 29 (overseas)
First Impression: YES! I love these types of Dramas! The theme song is really good too!
I was extremely excited for this drama because ancient ones like these interest me a lot. To be honest, I didn’t even see one trailer for this drama and just decided I was going to watch it, regardless of the cast and plot. It was a disappointment in the first 10 episodes but it picked up afterwards. The overall drama was slightly draggy though. Let’s go over the main points:
Plot: Running out of Ideas?
I watched another Qing-Dynasty Drama, The Life and Times of A Sentinel, in the summer and I couldn’t help but think that CRH was copying off some ideas from “Sentinel”. First of all, in “Harem”, Joel Chan, the Prince Sui, is revealed to have a past secret relationship with Myolie, the Empress. Similarly, in “Sentinel”, Kenneth Ma (who was also the Emperor’s younger brother) had a secret relationship with Elaine Yiu (the Imperial Noble Consort.) And the thing is, both females of the story want to forget the past and continue being the present Emperor’s wives whereas the men can never forget about his true love?
Another thing is, why is the Grand Empress Dowager/ Empress Dowager always the main villain? I’m tired of seeing old woman plotting everyone’s demise. I know it’s true that they are treacherous and “evil” but maybe someone else? Maybe an eunuch or a palace maid?
The actual plot —-> The first 10 episodes were terribly boring, as stated before. Not much is going on. Yee-Lan, the Consort of the previous Emperor who is missing in battle is grieving over the loss of her husband. The Empress Dowager sees her as a person of bad fortune and instructs that she be buried alive in the Emperor’s tomb. However, the current Do-Kwong Emperor saves her because he had feelings for her. She becomes one of his Consorts and the Empress (Yuen Yuen), becomes jealous and plots Yee-Lan’s demise.
However as we get near episode 20, things pick up and there is dramatic change to the characters. The action is significantly rising and the drama is preparing itself for the climax. (After pregnancies and then giving birth and then death and sacrifice and plots revealed and secret relationships and…)
Then after the climax, you would think that the drama would end there. But no, it keeps going. Then you realize that the climax you thought WAS the climax was in fact NOT the climax. And then you wonder, “Is there really a true climax in this drama?” It was draggy.
Characters and Acting: It was okay. I was watching this drama with my mom and I agreed with her about some things.
a) Myolie’s acting was not very outstanding (at least in the beginning) She doesn’t fit the role of an Empress
b) Jessica didn’t really deliver a mind-blowing performance. But rather it was same, plain and nothing really new. The last few episodes allowed us to see an evil, wicked side to Yee-Lan.
c) Sunny Chan was a terrible Emperor. His acting convinced us.
d) Joel Chan did a wonderful job. He should have deserved more recognition.
e) Gigi Wong DID look like a convincing Empress Dowager.
f) Nancy Wu is always a villain. A well-portrayed villain though. How in the world does her character survive so long?
Basically those six points sum up the main cast and their acting.
Everything Else: I think that compared to some other dramas where the plot is rushed, this drama, although draggy, gave a more “artistic” feel. It felt like a slow roller-coaster.
I thought that Jessica had way too much make-up on. The music was repeated way too often and some parts gave me a deja-vu feeling, like I’ve watched it in another drama before. OH, I have another example of that. I remember in the Beyond the Realm of Conscience”, when Tavia got slapped in the face by another Consort and her response was that she would one day “return that slap.” And just so happens, in CRH, when Myolie slaps Jessica in the face, she goes “one day, I will return that slap.” Coincidence?
OKAY. MAYBE I’M OVER ANALYZING.
Overall: I hope I’m not biased but I enjoyed the drama :) Although acting and plot wasn’t the best, I liked how the characters developed. How someone so bad could suddenly be so good and the other way around. I thought that the costumes were very nice as well.
My rank out of 10? -7.8
