English Dub Review: The Apothecary Diaries “The Empress Dowager”

Overview:

Maomao’s reputation for resolving conflicts reaches the empress dowager, who will ask her to help unravel a mystery that won’t leave her mind.

Our Take:

One enjoyable thing about a show with mystery elements is finding realistic reasons for extraordinary things. The Empress Dowager is enlisting Maomao’s help in trying to find out if the Dowager cursed the Emperor’s grandfather. I thought this was going to be a surface level curse situation, but the reason they believe a curse is involved is because when they opened up the Emperor’s tomb, he hadn’t decomposed one bit. Meanwhile, when they do the same thing for his wife’s corpse, she has decomposed beyond recognition.

Maomao somehow finds herself getting mixed up with more and more important people. I have a feeling that eventually she will become someone that even the Emperor will begin to confide in. Especially if she manages to solve this mystery and get in the Empress Dowager’s good graces.

My only complaint thus far is that this series has been defined as a “romance” but there has hardly been any romance to speak of for a long time now. I would say that outside of Jinshi getting jealous about a few things, there has been next to no romance. Hopefully, we get some progress there soon.