*I’ve been tiptoeing around a villain for a stretch of episodes, but I feel like it might get too hard to that up much longer. So, I will be identifying the current big baddie in this review.*
I really enjoy how this show keeps it moving. Some of the ongoing arcs can start to blend together a little from episode to episode, but there’s always something wild that stands out and takes the plot to new places.
Wai Siu-bo thinks he’s had it when the nefarious empress dowager, knowing he’s onto her, insists that he be moved to her service instead of the emperor’s. This frightens him, both for the sake of protecting his own skin and for the well-being of Fong Yee and the princess hidden in his quarters. Meanwhile, the feud between the Green Wood Lodge and the House of Muk comes to blows.
All the best stuff today is in Wai Siu-bo’s plot, so I’ll just talk very briefly about the rest of the episode. So far, I’ve thought the fight scenes on this show look pretty decent for what I’m guessing wasn’t a huge TV budget, but it seems that doesn’t extend to archery. During the throwdown between the Green Wood Lodge and the House of Muk, they’re beset by imperial soldiers who attack them with arrows, and the clumsy-looking way the martial arts adepts “deflect” the arrows by waving their swords in the air borders on laughable.
Wai Siu-bo is really going through it in this episode. I know I’ve said things to that effect before, but the empress dowager (and her deadly acolytes) are no joke. You can see the fear, dread, and disgust falling across his face as he listens to the empress dowager convince the emperor to basically loan Siu-bo out to her, knowing the emperor won’t refuse his stepmother and that there’s little he can do once he’s in her clutches.
As he usually does, he manages to hang on by the seat of his pants, staying just ahead of the empress dowager’s deadly intentions toward him with some quick thinking and a little help from his friends. But, also as usual, a brief victory gets him acting a bit cocky, and he makes some dumb, bold move out of pettiness and spite that threatens to put him in even bigger trouble than before.
My favorite acting from Tony Leung Chiu-wai, though, comes after the main action of the episode. All manner of drama has gone down, and after debriefing with the emperor, Wai Siu-bo is reluctant to leave. There’s a different tenor to his lies here—far from his usual fast-talking bombast, his lies are softer, and he’s almost gentle with the emperor, like he feels guilty for deceiving his friend. Obviously, the emperor doesn’t know the full extent of the situation, that Siu-bo is upset about leaving his service because the empress dowager is trying to have him killed; instead, the emperor just thinks Siu-bo is distraught just because he misses him. As Siu-bo hovers in the doorway, not wanting to go back to the empress dowager, the emperor is really sweet in his efforts to comfort and reassure him.
I’m not generally one to ship things outside of canon, but the tenderness of this scene has a hint of romance to it, especially in the way the emperor wipes tears from Wai Siu-bo’s eyes and how Siu-bo approaches the end of the episode worrying about the emperor (who, again, doesn’t know about his stepmom’s homicidal inclinations) and missing the closest friend he’s made at the imperial palace. While I’ve sometimes thought the emperor is a little too cavalier with Siu-bo’s life as one of his servants, it’s clear in this episode that their friendship means an awful lot to both of them.
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