The Remarried Empress Live-Action Series Episodes 1-3 Preview

if you're my sister, flipping Sovieshu off every time he appears onscreen. That's a good thing, because it means that this live-action adaptation of Alphatart's work is doing it right. The Remarried Empress, particularly in its early parts, is a story about a woman wronged and how very casually that happens at the hands of her husband.

Navier and Sovieshu, the empress and emperor of the Eastern Empire (as opposed to the Western Kingdom), were betrothed and later married as children. Now, several years into their marriage, they are still childless, something which seems to bother Sovieshu; in an early scene he needles her about wanting to announce a pregnancy, and later she remarks about being in the fertile portion of her cycle. Whether or not this has any bearing on why Sovieshu decides to take a mistress isn't discussed in these three opening episodes, but when he's with his mistress during Navier's fertile time, we have to wonder if he's simply given up on her.

The mistress Sovieshu brings home is Rashta, a runaway slave he finds in the forest while on a hunt. Sovieshu's prurient interest in her is immediately apparent: he clearly wasn't going to bother to save her at first until he caught a glimpse of her body. While he tells Navier that for the first time he felt his heart flutter (which is frankly horrible to say to your wife), the implication seems to be that a rather different part of his body was engaged when he glimpsed Rashta's legs. After installing Rashta in the palace, Sovieshu immediately launches a campaign of humiliation against Navier, siding with his mistress over the empress and culminating in an act of utter betrayal at the end of the third episode.

Among the fanbase, Rashta is often nicknamed “Trashta,” and that's something the TV show tries to grapple with. While Rashta does become more conniving over the course of these episodes (enabled by Sovieshu), the first episode goes out of its way to remind us that she is, first and foremost, a victim. We see her being beaten, the scars on her back and her malnourished state, and the way her former master treats his slaves in general. Rashta's not completely blameless as the story goes on, but she also shouldn't be blamed for taking an out from her terrible life when one was presented. She thinks she's Cinderella, and in another series, she absolutely would be the heroine – it's worth remembering that in early Sleeping Beauty stories the prince is a married king and his wife is portrayed as a witch the young ingenue must defeat in order to snare her husband.

Rashta's bad, but the real monster here is the emperor. It helps that Se-young Lee plays Rashta with a perfect mix of innocence and calculation, with the latter taking over the longer she's enabled by Sovieshu and his servants. Ji-Hoon Ju's Sovieshu is smarmy as all get-out, and the choice to often have him shirtless under his blazer is a good way to drive that home. His smug face is infuriating, particularly when paired with Min-A Shin's Navier. Shin is absolutely perfect – her body language conveys how tightly she's holding onto her emotions until she's able to release them, and she has the fake smile of a gracious wife down pat. We only see her true smile when she's with Queen, the mysterious bird who brings her messages from an unknown friend, and as these episodes go on, the toll holding herself together takes on her becomes ever more apparent.

While her ladies-in-waiting notice (head lady-in-waiting Eliza and the brash Laura are both very well done), the only person who truly sees Navier is Heinrey (Jong-suk Lee), the prince of the Western Kingdom. Without spoiling anything, he's been watching her for a while now, and he's also the only person of high enough rank to stand up for Navier. Their wordless official first meeting in episode three is exquisite – and his first appearance, as the subject of a rumor acted out, hilariously portrays him as a cowboy walking into a saloon and meting out justice. That, and Queen's body language, are some of the best comedic touches to ease the tension, though Dae-Hoon Choi's McKenna (Heinrey's attendant) adds a lot with his exasperation as well.

The setting and costumes are lush, with the palace looking much like Versailles or a European castle of a similar age. The costumes are a little odd despite their beauty, with each character seeming to embody a different time period; for example, one of Navier's ladies wears 18th-century gowns and shoes while Navier's dresses are more mid-20th century and Eliza skews Victorian. It works better than I expected, though, largely because the rest of the series is so good.

Navier's story is really just beginning. We have a sense of who everyone else is, but she remains a little hidden, because that's what she needs to do to survive a situation that has shaken her to the core. She doesn't so much need Heinrey to save her as she needs someone to give her the strength and permission to save herself – and with the final scene of episode three, that's just what's about to happen.