Worth watching if you ignore the ending

So. This was my first Chinese drama and I didn't expect to finish the first episode, never mind all 50 something episode. Since I am new to c dramas, I'm not really a good judge of the actors, OST or plot but.....

I really enjoyed it. There was not one moment (except for the first episode) where I considered dropping it and when it was approaching 50 episodes, I was dreading having to finish it.
However, without being too spoilery, the ending was just plain awful, not because the ending was happy or sad but because of all the plot holes. The last few episodes were so rushed that they almost ruined the drama for me. Well, not almost, they did ruin it for me until I remembered how much I enjoyed the first half so I decided to compromise and give this drama a rating of 7.5

Other problems:

Plot holes - but they didn't appear until the end, so you could watch most of the drama without experiencing any major issues.

Major reveals - these are important secrets hidden for most of the drama and many characters go to great lengths to hide them but in the end, there were revelations left, right, and centre all at once without having much impact on anyone.
Here's an example, and I don't think it's much of a spoiler because it's barely mentioned, a male character is actually female but pretends to be male for no real reason. Throughout the whole drama she pretends to be a boy, only to at the end, reveal that she is actually a girl in a scene that lasted less than 5 minutes and had little to no impact on any of the other characters. So this poor actor had to pretend to be male for no reason. They might as well have gotten a male actor in the first place and saved that ridiculous reveal that they forced into one episode.

Villains- let's just say that I don't think each character got what they deserved in the end.

Miscommunications- which, granted are in most dramas but these ones weren't resolved because they were towards the end, and as I already mentioned ,the ending was such a mess that these things were sidelined.

Second male lead - I ended up rooting for him but they ruined his character in the end (like they did many, many other things) . He started off sly, manipulative but completely devoted to the heroine. He ended up still devoted to the heroine but lost his edge and became just desperate.

Ok, a lot of negatives BUT this drama did have good things as well :

Female lead - smart but not perfect and most importantly, remained motivated. Yes, she fell in love but she still had her own priorities and agendas which she didn't give up or ignore for the male lead.

Chemistry - I think the male and female lead had good chemistry, but so did the female lead and second male lead .....(just saying)

Actors - again this was my first drama so I can't tell for sure but I thought all of the characters acting was really good.

Plot - A good plot and storyline throughout most of the drama.


Would I recommend this ?

Hmmm.....yes because of how much I loved this drama before the ending. It's worth watching as long as you enjoy the first 40 or so episodes.

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When a drama has the female lead's name in the title, you expect great things from her.

My biggest issue with Legend Of Fu Yao, is the main character herself, Fu Yao, who lacks .....I don't know how to describe it, ambition? Agency maybe? I mean, she's the main character, the drama is named after her and yet she probably does the least out of all the characters. She has no goals, no ambition, no anything. She just reacts to what's happening around her and does nothing for herself. She's always helping this character or that, or is trying to get out of some situation. In the beginning there's this half-hearted attempts to find out about her identity but even that gets waylaid pretty much the same day she sets out to find out some clues.

Other problems:
Plot holes - This drama is packed with plot holes.
Characters - Too many characters with their own problems and backstories and etc. I wouldn't have minded that so much, if it didn't highlight how the main character in contrast, didn't have her own goals and ambitions.
Ending - This is my second c-drama and all I can say is, what's with c-dramas and endings? It's like their achilles heel. Let's hope this trend doesn't continue.

I probably could have forgiven the problems if I enjoyed Legend Of Fu Yao but the truth is I didn't. The main character was problematic and no matter how hard I tried I couldn't empathise with her or even like her that much. The maid lead on the other hand, was much more interesting, he was sly and manipulative and I enjoyed his character.

Despite not liking this very much, I have to say that I did watch all of it and barely did any skipping, so I guess I found it alright while I was watching it. It's just that at the end I was left dissatisfied and feeling that I wasted my time.

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Plot is important, something the writer/director/whoever doesn't seem to understand but

..... its okay because the main heroine makes up for it, oh wait no she doesn't.

Three episodes in and I'm majorly struggling. To be fair though, I can be kind of picky but this drama was something else. The first episode was fine. Everything after that went downhill so, so fast.

Where is the plot, people? Where???

This drama has no storyline and it has about 3 main characters, one of which I couldn't care less about. The other characters are so much on the peripheral that they literally have one task in the show each, whether that's solely to listen to the main hero (Winter King) complain or to constantly comment on how weird the main heroine is (dude who works for her).

The main heroine is also realy boring, they haven't developed her character at all and it doesn't seem like they will in the next couple episodes either. She's so hung up on main guy protecting her even though in the first ep she was like, I dont need you anymore. When she was a kid, she used her umbrella. 25 years later and she still has that same umbrella and no self defense/ fighting training at all. You can see why im not convinved that if i stick around for more episodes, they'll give her some growth. They couldn't even do that in 25 years.

Plus idk why we'd even root for her. She has no personality apart from wanting to be protected. If you've watched Master's Sun, then you know that the main girl was absolutely terrified of ghosts but she still aways tried her best to help them. The main heroine here does not. Oh i mean sometimes she'll squat next to a ghost of a child and give him popcorn but that's it.

Also, also, the fact that she has no friends/family. Like i get they want to make her pitiable but now she has no personality AND no people around her. She doesn't even seem to sad about it actually, so why should we?

I really like the main dude though. Until they forced him to fall in love in a desperate attempt to have some sort of plot, ugh. And the soundtrack has been awesome. But that's about it.

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