2.5 Points for Wayne's acting, 0 for everything else.

I wrote this as a comment, but felt it would make a good standalone review. I wouldn't call this ending bittersweet. There was no sweetness in it. They tried and failed to make me believe that Hao Ting had moved on. That final conversation was lazily written, and all of it was stuffed into the last few minutes of the episode as a rushed attempt at justification for a tacked on twist. The writers wanted me to believe that Hao Ting will move on with his life and be better for his experiences, but all I was left with was a sad man who made all of his life's important decisions to follow a boy and ended up with nothing. We leave this drama with our lead character being pushed by his parents to marry a girl we don't see, that Hao Ting shows no interest in, as he's about to go abroad to study something he also shows no real interest in. A subject he chose, mind you, because Xi Gu liked it. Is it possible Hao Ting genuinely likes his major and his girlfriend? Sure. But we don't get to see that. We're left with a depressed shell of his former self carrying out the motions of life because he has to and not because his experiences have improved him or because he has a will to live. Realism is fine in a drama. Sad or tragic endings are fine in a drama. But execute them properly and have buildup to go with it. Properly conclude the themes and emotions you're trying to invoke. We didn't get that with this ending, which is why it's a frustrating mess. It felt like another drama's ending spliced and glued to the end. Even a sad ending can be satisfying, but this one is anything but because there is no resolution or thematic cohesion.Other things worth mentioning that contribute to the low rating:- Xi Gu's doppelganger. It was both hard to believe and infuriating because his existence is solely to stall time until the mid-episode twist.- The reinforcement of Hao Ting's "I'm not gay/bi, I just loved him." It was already a point of contention for many people, but they doubled down by trying to explain it as no man ever being able to replace Xi Gu. Good thing he gets a girlfriend, I guess?- Falling into the age old BL trope of killing your gays.- Sloppy and rushed conclusion to the second loveline. That conflict was barely introduced, but then it was "resolved" in seconds.

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