[Mainland Chinese Drama 2018] The Story of Ming Lan 庶女明兰传 / 知否？知否？应是绿肥红瘦

[gleek49]

Just now, ForgottenSoulx said:

 

I mean he still could have refused and said right there and then ML i only want you , but instead he went out of this way to try make her jealous...

 

No hes Evil in that situation to keep it a secret that he has another women and 2 children before marriage, he clearly intended to force the children and another concubine on his weak wife without letting her know before hand.

 

Im saying that his mistakes are part of the reason why she does not trust him and its right for her not to trust him based on what she know's. 

 

 

 

1. He never agree to accept the concubine, she did it all on her own. And he has been trying to get her to open up for a while until then, and she wouldn't budged, didn't even seem to be upset about the concubine, treating the whole event as a job, you expect him not get mad? The guy is short-tempered and prideful, maybe the concubine event was his limit, he couldn't keep begging her to love him all by himself all the time? His action was impulsive, from a fit of anger, desperate for some sort of reaction from her, not "went out of his way to hurt her". I'm not saying that he's right, but he was emotional, it's understandable, just like how ML being all business and no emotion is understandable. 

 

2. Everyone knew about MN, he told Yanran's grandfather that after marrying Yanran, he would only kept 1 other woman aka MN. So they knew that he's already had MN at that point. 

 

3. LOL, ML wouldn't mistrust him because of that, if she believed he was that "evil", why would she ever agreed to marry him in the first place? Or vouched for him every time someone criticizing him? She stated several times that she's afraid that he treats her too well. It's not about what mistakes he made in the past, her fear is that he would not love her like this forever, she doesn't want to love freely now then get heart-broken in the future. That's why she's setting her expectation low, not because she doesn't have absolute trust in his moral, but because she doesn't believe in loving someone forever. As I said before, she has valid reasons.

 

4. My point was never about what he did wrong to make her like this, but about how her actions, while understandable, can lead to insecurities and frustrations on his side, because while we, as audience, have seen everything and can understand why she's being like this, he doesn't. Of course, he's all angry and confused, which leads to impulsive and emotional reactions, it's all very human. Both of them are humans, and I believe that they will work it out like normal human works. There's no point of us sitting here pointing fingers and blaming and judging either of them, let just try to understand both sides and wait for them to work it out.

[Suzzy San]

1 minute ago, dito said:

 

 

 I'd say its the combination of both. The era defined the relationships between the husband and wife as open. Husbands were free to choose other women to sleep with, outside the house or bring them inside and give them concubine status. Even wife's own family sent women to be taken in as concubine so that their daughter would have the control over them.

In ML's case, she has first hand experience of broken promises and uncaring father....both those things convinced her even more to just take the marriage as a job and keep her heart safe. It may hurt ML to see her husband go to another woman's bed but she has convinced herself that is what GTY would want....coz thats what all men, usually do. Men who didn't take in concubines were very rare....only one in the book was RL's husband and that too ended up causing a head ache for RL as her mother in law was insisting on concubines for her son. RL had to relent and offer her own maids for her husband. 

 

 I think I have to agree with you.. It's the combination of both.. This place really makes one view things deeply.. All opinions make me think how each one of us would have faired as minglan or GTY.. I see myself being rebellious, but it's only because I've seen another Era so free and a little bit fair 

[Suzzy San]

2 minutes ago, gleek49 said:

 

1. He never agree to accept the concubine, she did it all on her own. And he has been trying to get her to open up for a while until then, and she wouldn't budged, didn't even seem to be upset about the concubine, treating the whole event as a job, you expect him not get mad? The guy is short-tempered and prideful, maybe the concubine event was his limit, he couldn't keep begging her to love him all by himself all the time? His action was impulsive, from a fit of anger, desperate for some sort of reaction from her, not "went out of his way to hurt her". I'm not saying that he's right, but he was emotional, it's understandable, just like how ML being all business and no emotion is understandable. 

 

2. Everyone knew about MN, he told Yanran's grandfather that after marrying Yanran, he would only kept 1 other woman aka MN. So they knew that he's already had MN at that point. 

 

3. LOL, ML wouldn't mistrust him because of that, if she believed he was that "evil", why would she ever agreed to marry him in the first place? Or vouched for him every time someone criticizing him? She stated several times that she's afraid that he treats her too well. It's not about what mistakes he made in the past, her fear is that he would not love her like this forever, she doesn't want to love freely now then get heart-broken in the future. That's why she's setting her expectation low, not because she doesn't have absolute trust in his moral, but because she doesn't believe in loving someone forever. As I said before, she has valid reasons.

 

4. My point was never about what he did wrong to make her like this, but about how her actions, while understandable, can lead to insecurities and frustrations on his side, because while we, as audience, have seen everything and can understand why she's being like this, he doesn't. Of course, he's all angry and confused, which leads to impulsive and emotional reactions, it's all very human. Both of them are humans, and I believe that they will work it out like normal human works. There's no point of us sitting here pointing fingers and blaming and judging either of them, let just try to understand both sides and wait for them to work it out.

Well said, I'm just waiting for them to argue and work it out at this point. We are viewers, we know everything, they are character limited to their script, so all this process of fights is to make ML open up and that's why I think the writer also believes that ML has to atleast open up even if she still wants to make a survival plan for herself, which I think it's just normal for human nature, but her survival plan won't be like now where its all because she still can't trust him, due to her understandable reasons but because it's something that must be planned.. So I think the script truly wants her to open up and cherish what she have before it's too late.. So we are on mission 'open your heart' for ML 

[dopez]

1 hour ago, hello210 said:

I thought it was cute that GTY and ML helped their friends overcome some of the barriers due to the concubine.  And the friends got prego after  Now they just need to deal with their own barriers.

 

Both ML and GTY are so sweet on helping General Shen and his wife on resolving their issues. Urgh the concubine is so annoying (despite I don't understand what they were saying in the raw lol). And I love how ML and Shen Furen (idk her name) become best friend

[dopez]

3 hours ago, ForgottenSoulx said:

Im not sure how this works but if you maid marry's they leave right? nooo i dont want Danjuu or Xiatao to ever leave ML 

 

Hopefully Danjuu still serves ML after her marriage. But as we can observed from Lao Tai Tai and Da Niang, both their momo are married and still serve them respectively. Probably Danjuu shall still serve ML

[dopez]

4 hours ago, leeza77 said:

Xiatao & shitou really cute

http://p.weibo.com/show/channerWbH5/1034:4333572103076328

 

MY SHIP IS SAILING YEYYYY 

4 hours ago, mingminglanlan said:

MEEE TOOO.... I will be so unsatisfied if XT and Shitou don't end up together. I'm so happy for ML that she has at least some loyal, trust worthy people to have her back. It seems like the tides are turning with the social circles, as every1 is seeing how genuine ML is, QH's wife and that Auntie that yelled at ML in her court yard. 

Does any1 know where I can get my hands on the english translation of the Chinese book???

 

Yup. All the patient pay off when they see how awesome ML is XD and for the english translation you could just see it here...

https://www.novelupdates.com/series/legend-of-concubines-daughter-minglan/

Unfortunetly, only 32 chapters have been translated

[ForgottenSoulx]

39 minutes ago, gleek49 said:

 

1. He never agree to accept the concubine, she did it all on her own. And he has been trying to get her to open up for a while until then, and she wouldn't budged, didn't even seem to be upset about the concubine, treating the whole event as a job, you expect him not get mad? The guy is short-tempered and prideful, maybe the concubine event was his limit, he couldn't keep begging her to love him all by himself all the time? His action was impulsive, from a fit of anger, desperate for some sort of reaction from her, not "went out of his way to hurt her". I'm not saying that he's right, but he was emotional, it's understandable, just like how ML being all business and no emotion is understandable. 

 

2. Everyone knew about MN, he told Yanran's grandfather that after marrying Yanran, he would only kept 1 other woman aka MN. So they knew that he's already had MN at that point. 

 

3. LOL, ML wouldn't mistrust him because of that, if she believed he was that "evil", why would she ever agreed to marry him in the first place? Or vouched for him every time someone criticizing him? She stated several times that she's afraid that he treats her too well. It's not about what mistakes he made in the past, her fear is that he would not love her like this forever, she doesn't want to love freely now then get heart-broken in the future. That's why she's setting her expectation low, not because she doesn't have absolute trust in his moral, but because she doesn't believe in loving someone forever. As I said before, she has valid reasons.

 

4. My point was never about what he did wrong to make her like this, but about how her actions, while understandable, can lead to insecurities and frustrations on his side, because while we, as audience, have seen everything and can understand why she's being like this, he doesn't. Of course, he's all angry and confused, which leads to impulsive and emotional reactions, it's all very human. Both of them are humans, and I believe that they will work it out like normal human works. There's no point of us sitting here pointing fingers and blaming and judging either of them, let just try to understand both sides and wait for them to work it out.

 

I never said GTY accepted the Concubine but he did accept when ML suggest he go with her for the night.. Oh i know a good idea i want her to open up to me so let's go pretend to be with the concubine im sure she will change what she think's after this.. 

 

Maybe they did know about MN but they did not know GTY planned to make her a concubine and about the children.  

 

I never said GTY is a evil character but at the moment he was evil in what he was doing. I know your point was not what he did to make her feel like this? That was my reasoning as to maybe why shes a bit like this.

 

My original reply to you was about you saying she should not question his character i simply gave a reason why she might question his character.. 

 

[pixiemouse]

It may be my soft heart, but when ML told her maids that she didn't want to rely too much on her husband, my mind filled in "because losing him would devastate me more than anyone else."  I felt her first love was one she got talked into. Her second marriage prospect was one she was only luke-warm about. Her husband is someone who has handed her the world.

[Suzzy San]

2 minutes ago, pixiemouse said:

It may be my soft heart, but when ML told her maids that she didn't want to rely too much on her husband, my mind filled in "because losing him would devastate me more than anyone else."  I felt her first love was one she got talked into. Her second marriage prospect was one she was only luke-warm about. Her husband is someone who has handed her the world.

I love this view

[gleek49]

5 minutes ago, ForgottenSoulx said:

 

I never said GTY accepted the Concubine but he did accept when ML suggest he go with her for the night.. Oh i know a good idea i want her to open up so let me go pretend to be the concubine im sure she will change what she think's after this.. 

 

Maybe the knew about MN but they never knew about the children and im pretty sure they knew about MN but never knew he planned to make her a concubine right? 

 

I never said GTY is a evil character but at the moment he was evil in what he was doing. I know your point was not what he did to make her feel like this? That was my reasoning as to maybe why shes a bit like this.

 

My original reply to you was about you saying she should not question his character i simply gave a reason why she might question his character.. 

 

 

I'm baffle at your use of the word "evil". And again, ML does not question his character, she's literally the one person who has the most trust in his character.

 

And why are you not getting it? If she accepted the concubine then it is within expectation that he's gonna sleep with her. She acts like she doesn't care so why should he care? Why is he has to be the one who runs after her and beg her not to throw him to other women?  

 

But nvm, you obviously did not get my point at all, so why bother? We're just going in circle if we continue like this.

[hello210]

1 hour ago, ForgottenSoulx said:

 

Yeah it was evil and wrong. GTY picked a weak wife he could basically force MN and his children on to me that was pretty evil, he was not living openly in the city with MN and the kid's and that family did not know about MN and the kid's. 

 

1 hour ago, deslynn88 said:

I remember GTY picked Yanran because she had a good reputation as a kind and sweet girl (not necessarily weak).  He was also sympathetic about her position in her family that is ruled by her mean step-mother and step siblings who bully her (very similar GTY's own and ML's situation).  GTY was upfront about everything to ML, including how he is still actively searching for his son.  If Yanran's family would have considered him and they moved towards marriage, I think he would have been honest about MN and the kids before the actual wedding.

 

Lol...you beat me to it. GTY chose Yanran, not because she was weak, but because she was seen as very virtuous by many people.  She didn’t discriminate against the brothel women when they needed help with something  (based on info from courtesan at polo match) so he felt that Yanran would not discriminate against giving MN a position so that the kids can have a place in the family.  I don’t see being virtuous as weak, however it didn’t help that Yanran really was too soft a person. Aside from Rong’er and Chang’er, I think he already made up his mind about not having any more Shu or illegitimate children. Not saying anything outright about women and children that a man had prior to marriage is actually the norm in those times (even in modern times in certain social groups). If a man wanted to take responsibility and they’re “considerate”, they usually bring it up once they’ve married and their wife has established themselves in their position as the main wife so that when concubines enter the picture, they’re not as threatened. This is the ideal situation but we all know things can go differently as seen in the Sheng household. 

 

ML’s actions/reactions are both experience bound and era bound. It’s common for other women to enter prestigious households, why not do it her own way. No matter how much GTY can say or show his love, it’s not GTY but other women. For me, i think it’s that saying, “It’s not you I don’t trust, but I don’t trust them.” Because there are many tricks that women had in those days. He was tricked before just as her father was tricked and 6th Liang was tricked. Both GTY and ML were lucky that lady hadn’t been told by Aunt Kang or Stepmom to drug GTY, then that night would have been a whole different story. If she focuses on her role as Main Wife, she can still love him, but she can separate concubine matters as any other household duty, especially when she’s taught by Grandma to not rely on him excessively. And I also think that for ML, if she fully allows herself to be immersed in GTY the way he is with her, loosing him would devastate her more than anything else. However, men (even though GTY who knows her best) will still never fully understand this part of a woman’s heart. ML also never really seeing love being expressed, doesn’t know how to assuage GTY’s insecurity. Her trying to be sugary like MN or CL, would be just like how Da Niang was when she tried it . It’s both of them needing to be clearer in their communication with each other about these matters and understanding of each other’s POV’s. 

 

This whole part also matches one of the interpretations of the poem, the green should be plush and the red lean. I saw it somewhere that it was about the domestic life of women in that era, and also of aging. Women, often loose their sway on their husbands as they get older (husbands loose interest) and younger ones are presented to their prestigious husbands as concubines. It’s another thing that wives in this era sees as inevitable so she can’t fully rely on a husband.

[ForgottenSoulx]

54 minutes ago, gleek49 said:

 

I'm baffle at your use of the word "evil". And again, ML does not question his character, she's literally the one person who has the most trust in his character.

 

And why are you not getting it? If she accepted the concubine then it is within expectation that he's gonna sleep with her. She acts like she doesn't care so why should he care? Why is he has to be the one who runs after her and beg her not to throw him to other women?  

 

But nvm, you obviously did not get my point at all, so why bother? We're just going in circle if we continue like this.

 

So if ML accept's concubines that means GTY has to pretend to go with them to make ML more insecure and back up her insecurities? 

 

He should have just flat out said im not spending time with the concubine i only want you and will only ever want you.. instead he decides to try make her jealous. 

 

Which point did i not get because you never really made any good point, i also never said ML questions his character i was simply giving a reason as to WHY maybe she might question his character.

 

w/e end it here im bored of this conversation. 

[Leila Essalih]

Calm dawn please

[ForgottenSoulx]

17 minutes ago, Leila Essalih said:

Calm dawn please

[minglan1]

The confrontation of Yuanrao and GTY was so well done.He didn't go out of his character.He truly believed that GTY has swindled Manninag like him and would do the same to the emperor.He was making sure that no one else is hurt due to GTY by bringing it up in the court.He still lacks foresight like before.

He has blinkers on while arriving at conclusions about situations. It ends up hurting him when things go differently than anticipated.

It does lays the foundation of why ML would have a conversation with him.She is the only one who can make him take a deeper look at how he has been handling things.

 

The tangled relationships would smoothen out.The process has begun.This week is going to be an eventful one in the Marquis household.

Just wish the subbing was faster.

 

Note to self: Never start watching a drama until it is subbed half way through.

[ForgottenSoulx]

I hate waiting as well its the worse thing possible i was going to wait until show finishes and catch up but that is hard as well. 

[Lunkera]

I'm already too deep into this mess. My day is revolving about waiting for the raws everyday(3pm+ my time). I'm going to feel so empty when this drama is done.

[ForgottenSoulx]

9 minutes ago, Lunkera said:

I'm already too deep into this mess. My day is revolving about waiting for the raws everyday(3pm+ my time). I'm going to feel so empty when this drama is done.

 

Also apparently China has banned Palace drama's now.. My Queen Dugu and Zhao Ge better still be able to air, been waiting age's for these and they would make me feel less empty haha.

 

 Broadcast of palace intrigue dramas like Ruyi, Yanxi etc have been halted after the Chinese government media published an article listing 5 major negative effects of such productions, which include:

 

1. it has become fashionable to idolise the lifestyle of royalty, whereby those who bask in the glory of royalty end up being arrogant

2. The detailed portrayal of palace intrigues will worsen social evolution, which is incompatible with the socialist core values currently advocated by China, and a very real danger

3. Glorifying the era of emperors of ministers, detracting away from the glory of the current regime, the founding fathers of New China, model heroes and outstanding communists

4. Promoting luxury and pleasure, showcasing the extravagant style of the palace, which goes against the country's advocacy of the beautiful tradition of hard work

5. The one-sided pursuit of commercial interests while weakening positive spiritual guidance. Despite the commercial hype and success of such shows, there is no positive significance in cultural development

 

Original news article here.

[frenchfan]

48 minutes ago, minglan1 said:

The confrontation of Yuanrao and GTY was so well done.He didn't go out of his character.He truly believed that GTY has swindled Manninag like him and would do the same to the emperor.He was making sure that no one else is hurt due to GTY by bringing it up in the court.He still lacks foresight like before.

He has blinkers on while arriving at conclusions about situations. It ends up hurting him when things go differently than anticipated.

It does lays the foundation of why ML would have a conversation with him.She is the only one who can make him take a deeper look at how he has been handling things.

 

The tangled relationships would smoothen out.The process has begun.This week is going to be an eventful one in the Marquis household.

Just wish the subbing was faster.

 

Note to self: Never start watching a drama until it is subbed half way through.

I like that ML has a heart to heart talk to straighten things out with QH's wife.  I thought she was being petty before but it was just insecurities.....which I supposed you cannot really blame her for.  She has a handsome young future duke as husband and he in turn is still holding a torch for someone else (who was notably prettier albeit from a lower societal level than her). I like the way ML handled things by holding the bull by its horn.  I hope that she managed to shake QH to at least wake him to reality and consequences of his actions.  

[frenchfan]

Everyone seemed to be having babies : Changbai's wife, Hualan, Rulan and Madame Zhang (General Shen's main wife).  So exciting.  I do hope that ML will be pregnant soon too.  I wait impatiently every day to watch the next episodes and then the next.  It is getting super exciting.  The plot thickens, my impression of evil stepmom has only deepened and now, add to the mix is Madame Kang.  I am sure Molan's downfall is soon enough since her husband has found out their "fated" meeting at the temple was orchestrated.  Poor guy.