Allen Ren and Peng Xiao Ran’s New Period Romance C-drama Love and Crown is a Masterclass Level of Bad in Acting, Narrative, Directing, and Visuals
I’ve been meaning to write about recently premiered period romance and revenge C-drama Love and Crown (凤凰台上 Feng Huang Tai Shang) with Allen Ren (Ren Jia Lun) and Peng Xiao Ran ever since I watched the first episode, but then I started having trouble formulating phrases much less full sentences because this drama is both sooooo bad and sooooo stupid to such degree it actually killed some of my brain cells. And it’s not just me as the drama is getting flamed and eviscerated by C-viewers, and even the original novel writer has come out to publicly disclaim and shade it lol. I have a soft spot for Allen and don’t hate Peng Xiao Ran so randomly decided to check this out, and was so perplexed by everything right off the bat that I’ve actually kept on watching because I cannot believe something this terrible not only got made but is being broadcast. The plot is nonsensical most of the time, the directing has abrupt edits, and the costumes and backdrops and CGI are at most high school musical level quality. I’m sure there have been worse C-dramas but I wisely steered clear of those, so this one gets my writing juices flowing because I have sunk 17 episodes into this sucker and need to vent about it.
Allen plays the Emperor Xiao Huan who force marries Peng Xiao Ran as Ling Cang Cang, his betrothed since childhood but who starts off the drama hating his guts. Then flashback to them cosplaying Jianghu wuxia experts swanning around investigating a missing children ring in a Southern city, with Allen somehow being the best swordsman in the entire world (not joking) on top of being the Emperor. She falls for him during his swashbuckling days under a fake identity but then shit hits the fan when he seemingly kills her beloved wuxia master (who turns out to be running a child sex slavery ring under orders from her own dad) and then she proceeds to hate Allen forever and ever. Allen does his best eye staring, brooding, and tightly wound acting to try and convey how tormented he is and that he’s actually fallen in love with his own fiance who happens to be the daughter of his court nemesis official. So the entire drama is him refusing to tell her any truth(s) while she assumes all sorts of evil things he did and hates him, rinse and repeat. And then midway through she leaves to go fight a battle in the borderlands, gets captured, he goes undercover again to save her. And oh, they somehow end an entire war just by their weird push-and-pull done openly in front of everyone.
Peng Xiao Ran’s character is so unbelievably dumb one wonders how she is able to survive because I can’t imagine she knows basic life skills like breathing much less critical thinking. Chen Yi Han is wasted as the best actress in the entire drama as the supportive to the Emperor second female lead. Zhang Yao as the second male lead looks like a chipmunk with marbles in his cheeks and swans around in his own subplot with the third female lead who just keeps doing eyerolling things to move the plot forward. The third male lead is so godawful at acting I don’t even want to mention the actor’s name, but he couldn’t act his way out of a room with one door and flashing airport runway signs directing him to the exit. As for the leads and the so-called romance in the drama narrative, they have near zero chemistry and any signs of life come one-way from Allen trying to muster up restrained longing, but it’s further stymied by the drama having no onscreen physical skin ship of any sort. I don’t know if I will continue watching this drama with bizarre fascination at how much more idiotic and poorly made it is, but if you too want to join in the so bad it’s just bad levels then check it out.
Ah this was such a beautiful write-up. Because yes, yes to all.
That’s on the scriptwriter here…she sucks at writing. Period. (She already ruined ‘Sword and Beloved’😖)
Also read reviews of her past dramas and people already complained about the same thing. No actor could have save that script.
Typo: could have saved
According to RJL’s fans, this was RJL ‘break up’ drama that he’s forced to film before leaving his previous agency. This drama is produced by his previous agency.
No wonder, Huanrui has consistently produced lousy dramas. What a waste of RJL, he was great in The Demon Hunter’s Romance.
Why all these negative comments.? I actually have no problem with the show. It is entertaining enough and I must admit that I watch this drama and Sword and Beloved because of the lead actor. Love Cheng Yi and Allen Ren. Such great actors.
What a huge shame…the lead casts are always the frontline to take the blames. It does not surprise me the casts themselves are confused about their characters.
Novel writer must be so angry.
Why all these negative comments.? I actually have no problem with the show. It is entertaining enough and I must admit that I watch this drama and Sword and Beloved because of the lead actor. Love Cheng Yi and Allen Ren. Such great actors.
Dubbing sucks too 😂🫠
His real voice is not pleasant to hear though.
Not completely unpleasant, but too thin, muffle-y, and soft for the commander-type roles he plays. I enjoy his acting otherwise.
Could it be more unpleasant than Dylan Wang’s real voice? LOL.
and I even already bought express vip to watch it, because I think it is quite okay at the beginning
LoL.. and now I just abandoned this drama …huhuhu…give my money back
I said it before, PXR can’t seem to get her big break/ breakthrough after Goodbye My Princess and it is sad because she had an amazing start.
I feel like this is pretty pretty terrible. Even mdl, this mega fan site overrating everything doesn’t play bias.
Isn’t this just always the way with Allen Ren’s dramas? None of his co-stars are ever allowed to look good for fear of overshadowing his very moderate looks and acting skills.
It was exactly the same in Love of Nirvana. The script was changed beyond recognition from a novel told from the FL’s perspective to something that focused entirely on him. The FL was turned from a courageous free-spirit into a needy self-righteous preacher that loved to be tortured by the ML while the SML, who in the novel was a brilliant political strategist who could outsmart the ML, was turned into a sad stalker with half a brain and a bad wig.
Bingo! Nailed him perfectly.
LOL.. Loved the rant 🙂 ‘..knows basic skills like breathing..’..couldnt find the exit in a room with one door… flashing lights showing the way..’ Hahaha.
Hope PXR is not ruin by this dram she was doing well after blood river
I’m glad I haven’t started this yet…
However, Koala, can you post about “Flying up without disturb”? I’m grieving this drama so much, what the heck did they do to it??? I shall hate producers who turn female centric dramas into male centric dramas for a thousand years with the passion of a thousand suns 😭😭😭 (I love the book so much, darn it. Why did they have to ruin it?!)
Ive missed your sincere comments about whole drama like this hahahah XD I only check bits and pieces so I didnt get how bad it was but now I wonder if I ever should sit and waste my time on it.
There also another problem If I saw it right. When there are close up scenes on his face to show how hard he is having at life, he ends up having two lines of eyebrows!!! Im not sure if its because of filters? they used or whatever but its so funny also awkward. I cant focus on scene while he looks like that TT
What a shame and a waste of money since there is less investment money going around.
I hope Peng Xiao Ran has something else waiting to be aired soon.
When China’s economy was thriving, they actually consistently made some really impressive dramas every year so fans could look forward to in the beginner of new year. Now, it’s probability to have a decent production. I strongly suspect that nowadays given very bad cashflows in the Chinese capital market, producers are actually using drama production to do actual money laundering. Other than paying minimum wages to filming staff, the rest of investment is going somewhere else. How can you expect post-filming production should be good?
I’m indifferent to Koala’s hilarious rant cuz I’ve been always indifferent to the lead actors too. LOL. That is, I have 0 expectation for their dramas.
Ep 1 was ok, i lasted full ep until ep 15 and then fast forwarded the next 5 and then i gave up. It isn’t Demon Hunter’s Romance. I know the 2 leads are saddled with a terribly bad script with even more terrible directing but neither were acting their best. Or rather Ren Jialun looks troubled.. which is fine but he is perpetually frowning. I never thought he was great but at least he was servicable in Demon Hunter’s Romance where Song Zuer basically acted for both of them surrounded by fantastic supporting actors. In this series, I just feel the 2 leads were terrible but the story was half of what made them terrible. I googled about the original story and it isn’t appealing. It is confusing. Biggest gripe is really how stupid is the leading lady and also why the leading male thinks she can’t handle the truth when she’s supposed to be some heroine in martial arts world. In fact EVERYONE is someone capable of fighting in martial arts world. But this series does show me who doesn’t really follow Ren Jialun’s career that he can act as someone despicable which he should. He can also give various interpretation to the acting of frowning. Are their real voice used? Anyway it is really a terrible series.
Hahaha
Great rant!