The Double (2024) - Final Review

Final review/rating: The Double (2024) - Revenge is a dish best served doubled and with theatricality 

This is 8.5/10 stars ✮✮✮✮✮✮✮✮ from Pandafan🐼

Overall rating:         8.5 Stars Plot:                       8 Stars Acting/cast:            8.5 Stars Couple chemistry:   8.5 stars Music:                    8 Stars Re-watch value:      8 Stars Enjoyment factor:   8.5 Stars

The Double (2024) is a melodramatic rollercoaster of a revenge story, told with lush visuals and an OTT theatricality that may cause the occasional eye roll but somehow works to keep the viewer seated. The narrative is darkly compelling with one high stakes gambit after another, there is the 爽/satisfaction of seeing just deserts being meted out, the villains are interesting, and there is a sensuous slow-burn chemistry between the 'fei chang xiao zhang' '菲常蕭張' CP which made me wish I could borrow Xiao Heng's fan. In concert, this makes for some addictively good viewing.   

There is more than a passing nod to Chinese opera and the gong an公案 'crime case' literary tradition as well. Xue Feng Fei's devious ex-husband scholar Shen Yu Rong has obvious parallels with the infamous scholar Chen Shi Mei 陳世美 from the《鍘美案》/'execute Mei case' who bigamously became Prince Consort and then tried to murder his first wife and two children, and Xue Feng Fei's pet name A'Li 阿狸 and her ultimate switecheroo of identities with the real Jiang Li evokes the《狸猫换太子》/ 'civet cat exchanged for Crown Prince' case. Both are staples of the Justice Bao repertoire. 

However, in The Double (2024) there is no Justice Bao to ensure that justice is served. Instead, there is only Wu Jin Yan's audacious Xue Fang Fei, who must ensure that she and her dead double are avenged. Luckily for the audience, Xue Fang Fei knows how to put on a damn good show as she plays everyone around her like a virtuoso. As for Wang Xing Yue's sexily smoldering Xiao Heng, he is first spectator and than participant in their joint revenge drama, which also doubles as a political chessboard with ramifications beyond the settling of personal wrongs.    

The Double (2024) is far from perfect. There are logic flaws, issues with pacing, places where less would definitely have been more, and some questionable directorial/writing choices, especially in the final arc which left me shaking my head. And while I agree that revenge was taken, I am not certain that justice was truly served in the end. But in the face of these imperfections I found myself imagining Xue Fang Fei cheekily breaking the 4th wall and asking me "are you not entertained?" My answer? Definitely.

SPOILERS AHEAD

Plot: Revenge, served with theatricality

For a spoiler free synopsis, see mine 👉here. 

Wu Jin Yan as Xue Fang Fei

The theme of avenging injustice is one as old as time, and it is the central premise of The Double (2024).  The drama starts with Xue Fang Fei (played by Wu Jin Yan) being framed for adultery and then buried alive by her scholarly and heretofore loving husband Shen Yu Rong (played by Liang Yong Qi). Shen Yu Rong tells her that her beloved father and younger brother have also died, before knocking her out with the shovel he dug her grave with.  

Xue Fang Fei is saved by Jiang Li (played by Yang Chao Yue), the exiled daughter of the powerful Secretariat Director, who herself has been framed for the alleged crime of trying to kill her stepmother and unborn brother. When Jiang Li dies, Xue Fang Fei takes on Jiang Li's identity and engineers a return to the capital, vowing vengeance for them both. She is assisted in her quest by the enigmatic Xiao Heng, Duke of Su (played by Wang Xing Yue), who wants to watch her revenge drama unfold and also has an agenda of his own.  In turn, she willingly becomes a piece (棋子/qi zi ) on his chess board, though of course he soon thinks of her as his wife (妻子/qi zi) as their sizzling slow-burn mutual attraction all but lights the stage on fire. 

And so the curtain is lifted on a revenge drama staged by Xue Fang Fei - "the play's the thing", and she is definitely no hesitating Hamlet. Cue cat and mouse mind games with her ex-husband Shen Yu Rong as she uncovers that he caught the fancy of Princess Wan Ning (played by Li Meng), a psychotic sadist with a penchant for theatric twirling and no compunction in taking other people's husbands (or lives).  And cue theatrics and shenanigans at the Jiang household as Xue Fang Fei takes on 'Stepmother' Ji Shu Ran and takes back what belongs to the real Jiang Li, before exonerating her father Xue Huai Yuan, and then going in for the 'kill', and ensuring that each of the cast of villains get their just deserts - from Magistrate Feng, to Ji Shu Ran, to Princess Wan Ning, to Shen Yu Rong et al.  At the endgame stage, Xiao Heng's vengeance for his father's death also coincides with Cheng Wang's rebellion and the fate of the nation.  

All of this is told in the tradition of high melodrama, with more than a passing nod to Chinese opera and the gong an 'crime case' tradition, and with an OTT theatricality that does not aspire to be subtle. 

Yet the lush visual story telling can occasionally stop you in its tracks - from the beauty of Xue Fang Fei dancing in red in happier days in the snow with her ex, to the dramatic striking of the drum to air injustice/擊鼓鳴冤, to a stark shot of a lone figure walking into an icy stream and blood slowly staining the surrounding waters red, to mirrored shots of the leads reclining as they exchange roles, to the sensuous juxtaposition of Xiao Heng's shirtless swordplay with Xue Fang Fei's leisurely bath, luxuriating in red flowers...   

What works: just deserts, smart smouldering leads, and 3D villains   

For me, the cathartic thrill of seeing just deserts being meted out to the villains was part of what made the first half of the drama so crack-tastically addictive. 

Never mind that there are more logic flaws and improbable set ups than you can shake a stick at. Revenge, as it turns out, is best served doubled and with theatricality. You can't help cheering on Xue Fang Fei, who has been betrayed in the worst possible way by her ex, only to literally rise from her grave and exact vengeance for herself and the real Jiang Li, and to do it with style. 

I also loved that Xue Fang Fei didn't give absolution to those complicit in evil by allowing it on their watch - she doesn't let Jiang Yuan Bai off the hook, first noting that she cannot forgive him as 'Jiang Li' for his 10 years of neglect, and later confirming his suspicions that the real Jiang Li has died and so ensuring he must live with the grief and guilt of this thereafter.   

Another plus of this drama is that the leads are extremely well cast. Wu Jin Yan makes a great Nemesis and is mesmerisingly good as Xue Fang Fei, with her portrayal of PTSD and heartbreak, her baiting and tormenting of Shen Yu Rong, her bold and brilliant maneuvers as she outsmarts her opponents, and the demure twinkle in her eye as she flirts up a storm with Xiao Heng. 

Wang Xing Yue also plays a charismatically knowing Xiao Heng - the perfect ally for the little li cat who occasionally overplays her hand and needs serious backing. It's a pity that Wang Xing Yue gets relatively little screen time, because when he is on, he makes every moment count and rocks some killer eyeliner and solid line delivery while he's at it. 

The flirtatious slow-burn chemistry between Xue Fang Fei and Xiao Heng is also squeal-worthy, and refreshingly, there is no maidenly modesty and adverting of eyes on Xue Fang Fei's part when it comes to appreciating the sexy specimen that is Xiao Heng, shirt on or off.  It was one of the reasons I remained seated until the final episode, and I definitely feel they could have capitalised more on this. 

Ep 34: Candle non-kiss

No doubt the drama gave us that godawful candle non-kiss to get past censorship in episode 34 (and it gave me flashbacks to the infamous parrot kiss in The Long Ballad (2021)), but even the highly anticipated wedding night kiss in the final episode didn't truly live up to the promise of the off-the-charts chemistry of the OTP. Incidentally, c-netizens have dubbed them the 'fei chang xiao zhang' '菲常蕭張' CP, a clever pun on their names and the phrase '非常囂張'/'very flamboyant'.

While the leads put in a compelling performance, it is the 3D villains of the drama who stole the show for me, especially Li Meng's psychotic Princess Wan Ning and Liang Yong Qi's craven Shen Yu Rong. They (and Ji Shu Ran who epitomises Shakespearian smiling villainy "that one may smile and smile and be a villain") are all completely unhinged and given fleshed out backstories. These explain to some extent (but certainly do not justify) their toxic life choices. 

Liang Yong Qi as Shen Yu Rong: A study in craven hypocrisy

In some ways Shen Yu Rong and Princess Wan Ning are eerily similar.  

After all, one has the gall to kill his wife (albeit unsuccessfully) and then expect her to be willing to remarry him so he can 'protect' her, whilst the other has the effrontery to be shocked that the man she has driven to kill his beloved wife will not hesitate to kill her in turn. The level of hubris and delusion of both makes them a match made in heaven hell.

Shen Yu Rong and Princess Wan Ning

The drama also tantalises with what it doesn't reveal. We are shown Princess Wan Ning's horrific abuse as a hostage in an enemy State but her psyche before is not explored, so the question of whether she was born or made a monster is left unanswered (though I remain firmly of the camp that the abuse she suffered does not give her license to inflict abuse on others). 

Similarly with Shen Yu Rong (who is exceptionally well acted by Liang Yong Qi), the drama shows us a craven, self-deceiving, hypocrite/偽君子 who wrestles unsuccessfully with his conscience and inferiority complex in the present, as well as a glimpse of the morally upright man that Xue Fang Fei loved and married of the past, who initially refused the blandishments of Princess Wan Ning. So Shen Yu Rong before and after is depicted, but the drama leaves the crucial moment of his fall from grace to our respective imaginations.     

What doesn't work: Pacing, overkill, and questionable directorial/writing choices 

Ep 11: Mass xianxia hallucinations? 🙈 

Although I appreciated the OTT theatricality with which The Double (2024) was staged, there were many moments when this strayed into excess.  The overuse of extreme close up POV shots was often distracting, and the violence was too much at times, even for a melodrama (looking at you, oft flashbacked scene of the shovel to the head, and you, old lady being fed to the dogs scene). 

Another example is the qin competition at episode 11, when the drama should have relied on the the soaring pathos of the music to make its point. Instead, they gilded the lily with an immersion breaking xianxia-esque sequence meant to demonstrate how devastating Xue Fang Fei's music was. Less would definitely have been more here - the song itself《芳菲落盡梨花白》/'fragrance falls entire, pear blossoms white' was already a powerfully poignant indictment of, and lament for, the injustices suffered by Jiang Li and Xue Fang Fei, incorporating as it does both of their names - fang fei luo jin li hua bai.   

In my view, The Double (2024) also dropped the ball by applying the brakes on the earlier relentless pace and spending way too many filler episodes on the Jiang sisters' petty cat fights over the greasy Zhou Yan Bang, when there were bigger fish to fry. This was anticlimactic after Xue Fang Fei's decisive victories over much worthier opponents. The drama should have just fast forwarded to the showdown with Ji Shu Ran, and then gotten on with unveiling the backstory of Xiao Heng's father and Cheng Wang's treachery, before presenting us with what could no doubt have been a masterfully engineered revenge by Xiao Heng.  

 Wang Xing Yue's Xiao Heng. This shot almost justifies the last 15m

Instead, Xiao Heng's revenge arc is shortchanged. The showdown with Cheng Wang is little more than a footnote and shoehorned into the final two episodes of the drama. 

In the final episode, the drama also chose to add in a completely unnecessary battle with an enemy State with absolutely no lead up, and then gratuitously kills off everyone's favourite sidekicks, Lu Ji and Wen Ji. The whole fiasco was so inane it had me wondering whether they included the battle scene solely as an excuse to give us the sight of Xiao Heng in battle looking tragic and hot, with the broken li cat pendant held between his teeth. 

The official final moments of episode 40 also left a lot to be desired, with the director/scriptwriter opting for a dream-like sequence that was clearly meant to be an artsy open ending inviting viewers to speculate whether Xiao Heng's return is a figment of Xue Fang Fei's imagination. The massive popularity of the series while it was airing had the drama swiftly shooting an unambiguous HEA mere days before the finale was aired, which I could not resist watching and enjoying. But I honestly think the drama should have officially ended on the high of the completion of Xiao Heng and Xue Fang Fei's respective revenges instead.

On revenge v justice, and staring into the abyss

Jiang Yuan Bai and Ji Shu Ran

Last but not least, while I consider that revenge was taken, I am not similarly convinced that justice was served in the end. One of the many wrongs against the real Jiang Li and Xue Fang Fei was the destruction of their reputations, and I feel true justice needed to include having their good names publicly restored and the perpetrators being held publicly accountable for their crimes. This did not really happen.  

Although Ji Shu Ran's perfidy is revealed to all the Jiangs, the real Jiang Li is never exonerated beyond the Jiang family. Indeed the extent of her true tragic end is not revealed even to her family, with the exception of Jiang Yuan Bai (though I suspect Grandma Jiang knew more than she was letting on). 

All things considered, Ji Shu Ran also gets off remarkably lightly. It is not a life for a life/lives in her case - she is able to take refuge in madness. And because of Xue Fang Fei's need to barter for co-operation from Concubine Liu to net Wan Ning and Shen Yu Rong, Ji Shu Ran ultimately gets to live out her days in comfort, surrounded by flowers. So much for getting justice for Jiang Li!

Xue Fang Fei's revenge against Princess Wan Ning and Shen Yu Rong also falls into the category of a private settling of wrongs. While Xue Fang Fei exacts revenge of sorts from Princess Wan Ning with the pregnancy hoax drug that was probably crueler than she knew, ultimately Wan Ning was not held accountable under the law for her many murders and her outsized part in the Xue family's misfortunes before she died at her own hands. 

Princess Wan Ning's death is 'satisfying' in that Xue Fang Fei gets to witness her die in despair, finally forced to confront that in dragging the man she loves off his pedestal down to her level and driving him to kill his wife, she has destroyed the purity that made her love him in the first place and unleashed a monster who has no compunction in cold-bloodedly dispatching her. It's peak #LeopardsAteMyFace.  

Ep 40: Don't look back in anger... or at all 

As for Shen Yu Rong's end, Xue Fang Fei's final revenge is also a private settling of scores as she declines to kill him and dirty her hands.  

Given that Shen Yu Rong still loved Xue Fang Fei (as far as he was capable of loving) and had deluded himself into thinking he could turn back the clock, her walking away from him without looking back is probably the ultimate revenge, and was what goaded him to suicide. The scene of Shen Yu Rong serenading her with a haunting rendition of《芳菲落盡梨花白》on his flute before leaping to his death, and her not even sparing a backward glance on impact, is cathartic to say the least. 

But afterwards, Xue Fang Fei still cannot be Xue Fang Fei - her good name is never restored, she cannot return home with her father and brother as herself, and she must remain 'Jiang Li'. 

So arguably revenge is taken, but justice is ultimately not served for either Xue Fang Fei or Jiang Li. This made me wish for a Justice Bao to right the record - there's something to be said for the gong an genre and its tradition of public judgment of the guilty and exoneration of the innocent.    

I also had some moments of disquiet about Xue Fang Fei. While I was rooting for her the whole way through, I couldn't help thinking of Nietzsche ("...And if thou gaze long into an abyss, the abyss will also gaze into thee"). At times, Xue Fang Fei stares right into the abyss and what looked back at her was troubling. For example, I found her willingness to send a palace maid to Concubine Li and certain death in exchange for the latter's co-operation disturbing. Her repeated (and with apparent relish) stabbing and castration of Magistrate Feng also had me wincing, even though the punishment fit the crime and the drama took pains to portray Feng as an irredeemable rapist and torturer. I guess the drama was going for high drama and bloodlust, and it is less visceral to have her quietly handing him over to the authorities. But I still wished that Xue Fang Fei had been above that moment and could claim clean hands throughout.   

Final Thoughts 

🐼: The Double (2024) is a melodramatic roller-coaster of a revenge drama that delivers some truly crack-tastic moments, proving that revenge is a dish best served doubled and by a heroine with a flair for the dramatic. For the most part, I was royally entertained by the binge-worthy elements - the cathartic schadenfreude of seeing evil-doers getting their comeuppance in spectacular showdown after showdown, accompanied by the delicious side dish of the OTP's smoking hot chemistry.  

It is a pity that the drama did not keep up the pace and the adrenaline that was needed to propel the narrative and which made the first half so addictively good. Instead, it squandered some interesting avenues and then botched the landing with a misconceived final arc, which I do not consider redeemed by the last minute special episode. 

But despite its flaws, I still consider The Double (2024) worth the watch, if nothing for the sheer entertainment value alone. That, and its ability to make me think!

8.5/10 stars ✮✮✮✮✮✮✮✮