Oh man, I don’t know where to start with this review of The Double. The Double is a historical / costume drama starring Wang Xingyue and Wu Jinyan. You can watch it on Youku or their YouTube channel with English subtitles.
As the title states, The Double is an unexpected masterpiece. It premiered after Blossom In Adversity and it wasn’t one of Youku’s top projects. It wasn’t marketed that much because it was a mid project and even us fans didn’t expect much from it. But, sometimes you never know when you have a rare treasure in your backyard. The Double unexpectedly received more attention and oh man, people were talking about it. Youku then started investing more in marketing the drama as if it was a top project. I can say, The Double is Youku’s most successful project in 2024 at the moment. Numbers aside, is The Double really a masterpiece? Well, let me bore you with this long review of mine.
Story
There’s a lot to discuss so I won’t waste time by rewriting the drama’s synopsis, full details on The Double are here. I want to start from the beginning and then break the storyline piece by piece.
The Identity Switch
I love the storyline and it caught my attention on the first episode. There’s something such as love at first sight and me and this storyline instantly clicked. So, it’s all about Xue Li / Xue Fangfei / who was buried alived by her husband and she survived. You already know it’s one of those revenge dramas and a fake identity is always a must. Xue Fangfei happens to meet Jiang Li at the mountains and Jiang Li somehow convinced her to stay alive. After an incident, Jiang Li died and Xue Fangfei decided to take the identity of Jiang Li so that she can take revenge for her and Jiang Li. No one knew Jiang Li except for the women who stayed with her at the mountains and her servant Tong’er.
Jiang Li is the daughter of the grand secretary’s daughter. She was send to the mountains as punishment for 10 years for an incident that happened when she was young. She was framed. No one cared for her, no one visited her, she was all alone. This is a good way to get someone to take another person’s identity without wearing a mask. Jiang Li gave Xue Fangfei a pin which can be used to prove her identity and that’s when the identity switch was unavoidable. At this point, I didn’t see anything wrong with the story.
Return To The Jiang Family
After taking the identity of Jiang Li, Xue Fangfei and Tong’er had to come up with a plan to return to the Jiang family. This is where the story gets exciting. While chasing after a suspects, Duke Su ends up in the mountains and he meets Jiang Li (Xue Fangfei), who happens to have put her plan into action. Duke Su’s appearance wasn’t part of the plan but she used him to finalize her plan and leave the mountains.
When they returned to the capital, Duke Su learned that Jiang Li used him to leave the mountains and get the Jiang family to take her back. This is also a good idea to solidify Jiang Li’s identity. If she returned to the capital with Duke Su, no one will doubt her identity. But the problem was her face. Jiang Li and Xue Fangfei both lived in the capital. I wanted to see how they will handle this problem.
Welcome To The Jiang Family
When Jiang Li retuned to the Jiang family, she was already prepared. Tong’er helped her with details of the Jiang family and some other stuffs only Jiang Li knew. This also helped remove the doubt from the family. Jiang Li then encountered her evil stepmother, Ji Shu Ran.
Ji Shu Ran was Jiang Li’s real enemy. She was the reason why Jiang Li was sent to the mountains for 10 years. While her father Jiang Yuan Bai was a bit ignorant with matters concerning the household. He’s always following his wife’s suggestions. I can’t put all the blame on him, Ji Shu Ran has a smooth tongue.
Jiang Li’s return was a nightmare to Ji Shu Ran because her daughter Jiang Ruo Yao will no get the ‘princess’ treatment. Jiang Li will be the first lady of the house since she was the second young lady and Jiang Ruo Yao was the third young lady. Another thing that added fuel to the fire was the engagement between Jiang Li and Zhou Yan Bang. They were engaged before Jiang Li was sent to the mountains. After Jiang Li left, they engaged Jiang Ruo Yao to Zhou Yan Bang. To Ji Shu Ran, Jiang Li’s return might mess things up. She wasn’t wrong. Zhou Yan Bang was chasing after Jiang Li.
I liked how they handled this identity situation in a realistic matter. I honestly thought they would act as if Jiang Li and Xue Fangfei didn’t live in the same city. They’re few scenes where Jiang Li went outside and people were like ‘wait a minute, doesn’t she look like Xue Fangfei, Shen Yurong’s death wife?’ This was also a good build for what was coming next regarding the identity.
Duke Su on the other hand was also suspicious of her. He was always spying on her because she got involved in a case. This became a norm. Every case Duke Su investigated was something going to bring Jiang Li to Duke Su. Talk about meeting your fated one.
Jiang Li’s first victim
Jiang Li didn’t return just to enjoy luxury. She came with a mission and that was to avenge Jiang Li and also clean her reputation as Xue Fangfei. Remember, after burying Xue Fangfei, Shen Yurong and his family spread rumours that Xue Fangfei cheated while they frame her. This is one of the reasons why Xue Fangfei could relate to Jiang Li’s pain because both of them were framed and their reputations were ruined. She wanted revenge for the both of them.
To get revenge, she had to get out of the shadows of the Jiang family. Ji Shu Ran wanted to hide Jiang Li from the public eye because she didn’t want her to take her daughter’s spotlight. Jiang Li had to let people know about her existence. So she did get her first victim, Jiang Ruoyao at the coming of age ceremony.
This was also the first time Jiang Li officially appeared in public. The Shen family, her ex husband and ex fiance were there. A ghost returning. She had to face a man who buried her alive, the Shen family who ruined her reputation. For me, this was the moment I realized this drama is going to be epic. Everything about the coming of age ceremony was gold, even Jiang Ruoyao fainting. I was cheering for Jiang Li with joy like ‘get them, get them, let them pay one by one’!
The exam saga
Like I said before, everything Jiang Li touches is somehow related to what Duke Su is investigating. Jiang Li wanted to pass the exam and go to the palace to search for the one who instructed Shen Yurong to k!ll her. This led to a bet being made between Jiang Li and the Li brothers. It was also another way to introduce Li Lian, Li Jin, Li Meng, Ye Shijie and Liu Xu. I will talk about Jiang Jing Rui (He Feng Tian) a little later.
The exam saga led to my favorite scene for the year which featured Jiang Li playing Qin in episode 11. Man, I keep repeating this scene. This also led to a shift from the school to the palace. The shift to the palace was smooth and the story peaked.
I fell deeply in love with the story when they started investigating Yue case, Magistrate Xue’s case. They had more to offer and they didn’t deliver less. Each plot connected with the last one and brought the leads together. Duke Su also had his own past demons that he had to confront. Man, this was good.
The characters
First of all, I love this style of close up camera angles. You can easily read the emotions on the actor’s face and this speaks volume on how talented they’re. All characters were well played, the casting team chose the best team, no doubt. Shen Yurong was unpredictable but his emotions were well expressed. I wonder how many times he had to practice to get in character.
Now let’s talk about He Feng Tian playing Jiang Jing Rui. He’s such an amazing actor but underated. I have seen him working with Xu Kai in Court Lady, Wonderland of love, she and her perfect husband. It’s kind of sad to see him as a supporting actor. The only time he was the male lead was in Couple of mirrors. This guy can act, he’s versatile and doesn’t get the flowers he deserves.
Despite being a bit evil, Consort Li is one of my favorite characters. She might have been against Jiang Li but her love for the emperor is real.
I can say a lot about Elder Princess Wanning. She crazy, cruel, smart and evil, but a part of me does feel sympathize with her. At first I hated everything her but looking at her origin story, I understand why she became what she is. But then, at the end they revealed something about her and I was like ‘damn, do you need my sympathy?’ and then Shen Yurong does something to her and I’m like ‘poor thing’. These characters are toying with my emotions
The Double Ending
The Double has two endings, one sad ending and there’s an extra episode with a happy ending. I don’t really care about the ending because the story was amazing, I even didn’t notice the drama was ending. I just loved how they didn’t reveal Jiang Li’s identity, they just let her be whatever she wants. It’s not like they don’t know about her identity, they don’t see the need to mention it. Xue Fangfei is Jiang Li and Jiang Li is Xue Fangfei.
Conclusion
Despite the ending, I highly recommend The Double if you haven’t watched it yet. I see myself rewatching it sometimes. The leads had an amazing chemistry even with less kiss scenes they managed to keep that fire burning. The dialogues where entertaining and the comedic elements were natural. It might sound like I’m being biased but I’m rating this drama 10/10
