The Legend of Xiao Chuo

This drama focuses on 3 daughters of a prime minister under an emperor who is cruel and ruthless, the oldest daughter, Hunyan has been the surrogate mother to the other 2 daughters after their mother died. 2nd daughter is Wungili who is flighty and fantasies about marrying all the time. The 3rd daughter is Yanyan who is the main character, a willfull and self confident young woman played by Tiffany Tang who might just be the most beautiful woman I have ever seen. The 3 sisters become embroiled in the power struggles of the country and get drawn into marriages which destroy their their own relationship. This is a story of arranged marriages and dangerous intrigues which results in the sisters being dragged into rival factions and being used to gain power. Yanyan meets her soul mate in Han Derang but they seem destined to be thwarted by the trials and political infighting. This is a high quality production with fantastic cinematography, costume and set design which gives a great insight into the early period of Chinese history between 950 and 1,000 AD.

My wife and I quite enjoyed this show. The costuming is amazing. The scenery is quite enjoyable as well. It goes a little slower than most modern shows, and that is much appreciated! It has real dialog and character development.

Some things I did not care for: the show has quite a bit of blood, unnecessarily so. A number of servants are stabbed on a whim with no consequence to the killer. (I don't know if that reflects reality or not.)

Also, the English subtitles are somewhat poor. They're less formal than the original script. It may just be that the translator is Chinese and doesn't have a solid understanding of what phrases are slang in English.