Princess Silver is mainly a love story, with the key themes that sincerity & honest communication ultimately conquers love. The story follows Princess Rong Le/ Man Yao, when she departs Qi country under her brother Rong Qi’s instruction to marry the 7th Prince of Northern Lin country Zhong Zheng Wuyou as a peace treaty between the 2 countries.
Both are unwilling parties to the marriage, especially Wuyou, who doesn’t believe in love upon his mother’s death. Fate has it that Wuyou falls in love with Man Yao (owner of a tea house) which is Princess Rong Le in disguise. As Man Yao gets to know Wuyou more, she becomes attached to him & his sincerity. Their simple story should have ended there as they are betrothed to each other and love each other. How complicated can things be? Ah… but this is a series with 58 episodes, of course it will be complicated.
Not knowing that Man Yao is Princess Rong Le in disguise, Wuyou rejects the betrothal. Not wanting the peace treaty to waste, General Fu Chou offers himself as the substitute. By the time Wuyou realises, it is already too late. Reminder #1 to myself – be honest about each other otherwise miscommunication will occur!
Emotionally distraught, Wuyou drags Princess Rong Le/ Man Yao to his mother’s tomb to get clarifications and locks themselves in for 3 whole days. Reminder #2 If a decision cannot be made in an hour, taking an extra 3 full days will not help with the decision-making! Confronting Wuyou, Man Yao accuses Wuyou of making use of her to obtain a mystical book, and stubbornly insisted that she would not follow someone who does not love her sincerely. Wuyou acknowledges his deeper intent (and seems to have learnt his lesson about sincerity & honesty) and retreated to Southern Lin as advised by his father to distract himself.
After going through the wedding, Man Yao then realises Fu Chou and her brother Rong Qi have made a pact & stages the substitution for a yet to be disclosed bigger plan. Confused of being used by both men, Man Yao, resigns herself to her current circumstances and promises to her brother Rong Qi to stay as Fu Chou’s wife for a year. The entanglement becomes even messier as Man Yao finds more information on all the plots planned by the various men around her.
Man Yao’s principles are very simple – treat me sincerely & don’t make use of me. Throughout, she maintains the principles, and realised that sometimes life is not so simple. She misunderstood so many things and people, regardless of her sincerity & honesty.
Rong Qi’s story is a really pitiful one. He has no will to live on his own other than to protect Rong Le. His only happiness was spending time with Rong Le but he has to send her away to protect her, and could not tell her the truth. He seems to have regretted giving up Rong Le at times, fully jealous of Wuyou when he realises that Rong Le/ Man Yao has totally fallen in love with Wuyou.
Fu Chou’s character is strangely weird. Perhaps his upbringing to thrive on self-inflicted violence shapes him into the complex general, cunning but emotionally retarded when his love is not returned. His obsession to “own” Rong Le just drives her further away as she totally despises dishonesty. Han Xiang – totally in love with Fu Chou since young, is the complete opposite. She is willing to sacrifice everything for Fu Chou, and does not expect anything in return other than him being happy. Practical, but not so loving & kind to herself.
The ultimate villain of the story is a woman scorned and seeks revenge at all cost. Rong Qi’s mother – Fu Yuan with the assistance of her trusted aide Eunuch Lin Shen. The confrontation between the villains and all key characters exposes all the plots & provides bigger surprises. Enough said. Otherwise, there won’t be anything to look forward to this series! 😀
The songs in the series are not too bad. The opening theme is a fully instrumental piece, which is extremely enjoyable. Another is 若雪 Ruo Xue, in dreamy bell track.
Conclusion 6/10
There are many flaws to the stories, and many decisions made by the characters are not very rational (especially if it is in the olden days). The acting is sub-par, and there is no chemistry between Aarif Rahman (portraying Wuyou) and Zhao Xueying (portraying Rong Le/ Man Yao). After watching Aarif Rahman in Empress of China and Princess Silver – my final conclusion – he can’t act, period.
Fu Chou who is portrayed by Jing Chao. His acting is over the top, the same that I saw when he was portraying Ling Yunche (the guard) in Ruyi’s Royal Love in the Palace.
The only one that I think can act very well is Luo Yunxi, portraying Rong Qi. His facial features & eyes are very expressive, almost telling a story on its own. His acting show subtlety with intensity. Unfortunately, this character is just too tragic. He should move out from playing tragic characters to try different styles.
The rest of the casts are forgettable. With flawed story-telling and sub-par acting, you can practically give this series a skip unless the actors or actresses are idols of yours.
Cheng's Musings 
I can see that you are a fan of Jing Chao 😀 While the free TV channel is broadcasting this series very recently, I actually re-watched part of the series in bits and pieces. I have to agree that Fu Chou’s character has more development than his brother Wuyou, although Fu Chou still did not give me the impression that he is yearning for the truth. Rather, the focus seems to be on revenge. No through any fault of the character, as he has been brain-washed – very pitiful.
It is indeed wonderful if you can read the novel and able to appreciate the intended emotions (imaginary or not) in a book, and able to compare the book vs the series. From what you have implied, the novel has a tragic ending for Wuyou & Rongle. New info! Perhaps the story makes more sense with such a conclusion.
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Am not sure if you understood the story plot here, and thee are some interesting findings which you may wish to know in this production.
Again, this is a very meticulously put up artistic production. The story is a bit surreal but the characters are very very much alive.
You may not like Aarif Rahman in period attire, but he CAN act, the problem here, as I see it, is his character ceased to develop way too soon. The script writer and director are responsible.
The main storyline rests with Wu Chou, aka Fu Chou, the general and twin (unidentical) brother of Wu You.
This is a story of colored revolution and Wu Chou is being brainwashed to hate his family right before the story begins. Yet, he still owns a conscience and yearns for the truth, someone like Rong Le. The more Rong Le rejects him and WuYou for lies and deceit, the more yearnings for her by Wuchou. If you cannot come to grips with this, you miss the whole plot.
This is not a love story. Rather, somewhat like Nirvana in Fire, Princess Silver is a story about family, filial love and honesty.
The characters are well chosen with the exception of Aarif Lee, originally intended for Xu Zhenyu but who was pre engaged in another series. Aarif Lee does not LOOK the part. Compare the father and other brothers: King of Qi, Crown Prince, Prince Chen and Prince Regent (Fu Chou aka Wu Chou). The actors all look somewhat alike. All of them gave marvellous performances. Jing Chao as the other male lead gave an acting master class here. The Crown Prince and Prince Chen also splendidly portrayed. Only if, in Nirvana in Fire, the two young nobles Jingrui and Yujin had similar level of casting, that series would never had such a SLOW start. The director of Princess Silver did a splendid job in putting in a lot of circumstantial drama, while in Nirvana in Fire, everything was left to VERBATIM.
A few years in between saw such advance in direction in Chinese drama!
Sophie Zhang is a tad too young to carry the lead role. Yet she acted well and had great chemistry with Leo Luo.
The props and shooting are exceedingly beautiful especially the epic scene in a snowy countryside where they scattered the ashes of the mother of WuYou and WuChou. The ending was altered to bri g WuYou and Rongle togather, but indeed, the original novel has a much more convincing ending.
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