#towards the republic

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Towards the Republic is a national embarrassment.

So many Australian actors doing such terrible, terrible acting. Please, you are in a high budget prestige drama about important historical events stop reading your lines like this is a language learning tape.

I get it, it's a bit part, they're not going to let you fix the bad grammar in the script, but you don't have to say it like at the very least you can have a cadence and tone matching what you say instead of sounding like an instructional video for safe working at heights.

[variouspolltournaments]

Note: Character does not have to be the main protagonist, just a protagonist. Can be any kind of villain, including (but not limited to): just straight up evil, former and "because the narrative says so" villains.

Submissions for this tournament are still open, I'm just getting as many prelims out of the way as I can before they close.

Propaganda: Towards the Republic is a historical drama and Li Hongzhang is one of the central characters. He is a "villain" in the eyes of many historians because he was responsible for negotiating the "Unequal Treaties" after the Sino-Japanese War and the Boxer Rebellion. The show takes a figure who was until fairly recently seen as a national traitor in China and portrays him sympathetically. There's a scene when he receives a message from Cixi to negotiate terms with the Eight Nation Alliance after they captured the Forbidden City, and he angrily says he's once again being ordered to become a traitor and sell out China.

[variouspolltournaments]

Note: Character does not have to be the main protagonist, just a protagonist. Can be any kind of villain, including (but not limited to): just straight up evil, former and "because the narrative says so" villains.

Submissions for this tournament are still open, I'm just getting as many prelims out of the way as I can before they close.

Propaganda: One of the central characters of the show. Apparently it's seen as a relatively sympathetic portrayal of her, but she does come across as a villainous figure especially in her power struggle with her nephew the Guangxu Emperor and the Hundred Days Reform

[variouspolltournaments]

Note: Character does not have to be the main protagonist, just a protagonist. Can be any kind of villain, including (but not limited to): just straight up evil, former and "because the narrative says so" villains.

Submissions for this tournament are still open, I'm just getting as many prelims out of the way as I can before they close.

Propaganda: Towards the Republic is a historical drama and Li Hongzhang is one of the central characters. He is a "villain" in the eyes of many historians because he was responsible for negotiating the "Unequal Treaties" after the Sino-Japanese War and the Boxer Rebellion. The show takes a figure who was until fairly recently seen as a national traitor in China and portrays him sympathetically. There's a scene when he receives a message from Cixi to negotiate terms with the Eight Nation Alliance after they captured the Forbidden City, and he angrily says he's once again being ordered to become a traitor and sell out China.

[confusedbyinterface]

Maybe I am being Eurocentric here but a journalist in Beijing wrote "there are things that I must not write, and that may not be printed in England, which would seem to show that this Western civilisation of ours is merely a veneer over savagery" and I'm just not getting that from the show. It's more concerned about the Emperor and Empress Dowager.

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I am a little disappointed in how the Boxer Rebellion is portrayed. Like, having the Eight Nations actually demand Cixi be deposed rather than that being a lie by pro-war officials is a weaker story. They even bring it up right after they lie about winning the Battle of Dagu Forts

I was also hoping that like the Japanese before the Sino-Japanese war we'd see war fever in the Eight Nations, the fear for the embassies and demand to revenge missionaries and ambassadors, maybe even anti-imperialists supporting the Boxers. I wanted to see the Kaiser's hun speech, not just have it mentioned.

Feels weirdly like the main thing the Eight Powers cared about was restoring the Guangxu Emperor. The ambassadors don't seem to have any concern about their own personal safety or that of their families, even after Von Ketteler is killed.

On the other hand given how westerners are portrayed giving them more screentime would just be extremely cringe so...

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Hey Guangxu why are you calling the Empress Dowager "Daddy"?

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Hey Guangxu why are you calling the Empress Dowager "Daddy"?

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Xu Tong cannot stop talking about how western women wear slutty little dresses and kiss each other all the time. My guy you are telling on yourself in front of the whole imperial court.

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Qing officials are making good points on reforming the dress codes: Manchurian robes are loose and breezy and they are not going to wear a fucking tie to work

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Seeing a scene which must exist in every other Chinese historical drama but is never depicted: Kang Youwei is at the ruins of the summer palace rehearsing the speech he'll give to the Emperor and getting his students to make objections like the conservative officials so he can prepare appropriate responses.

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Me getting assassinated by Japanese ultranationalists for calling the Meiji Emperor a "scrunkly blimblo"

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I really appreciate how Towards the Republic is multilingual, like half of this episode is in Japanese.

I half suspect in an American series, they'd have the actors speak English with Japanese accents

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I really appreciate how Towards the Republic is multilingual, like half of this episode is in Japanese.

I half suspect in an American series, they'd have the actors speak English with Japanese accents

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Empress Dowager Cixi: "Everyone's calling me decadent, and saying they want to support the nation and the people. But what if the nation has bad vibes or the people are just unpleasant to be around?"