3
Zogitt
Australia
Această recenzie poate conține spoilere
You will either love this or drop it because it is polarising
You know how some dramas gives you a rollercoaster ride as the story develops and race towards the conclusion. This drama starts off like that but then it hits the flat bit and never goes up an incline again which is a shame as there were potentials but it got bogged down by "messages".
On the surface, it was a story about 4 pairs of lovers. Some have a fairly smooth run, others much more torturous. In between there were corporate battles and business shenanigans. If that was not enough, gun toting drug runners created havoc along the way. Did that sounds confusing, yes, it was.
Like many c-dramas, the start was promising. The first episode was like an action movie. Guns, stunts and explosions filled the screen. It was done well and definitely not your typical meet-cute.
The first half of the show largely settled down to more standard rom-com plots with the usually push-pull and discovering of new feelings. It was also quite interesting to see the progress of designing a new garment and the steps it took to turn the design into a successful product. If the writer stuck to the same plot then I would have given it a much higher score.
The wheel start to fall off around the half way mark. The plot took a silly turn with the drug king pin running amok which reinforced certain "messages" and allowed the ML to play the gung-ho hero one last time. That was pretty much the end of the 1OTP's romantic development though. By then, they were so fated, it was casted in iron and encased in concrete. The problem is that the focus now moved to the other 3 pairs and unfortunately, two of the three pairs were more than a bit cliché with Ning Weikai scoring the worst own goal I have ever seen in any drama! C'mon, writer, you can do better than that. I won't spoil it but it involved a dress and a letter. On the other hand, the relationship between Chen Yayi and Chen Zheng's was fun and organic. Quite refreshing compared with the other pairs. Chen Yayi was outstanding and her characterisation was even better than the FL at times. How she refused to play ball with Chen Zheng just because he was a rich playboy made her a much stronger character. Even as the two developed feelings for each other, she was always grounded and put Chen Zheng in his place when he tried any tricks on her. Honestly, if they separate out their storyline, jazz it up a bit and turn it into a 16 episodes drama (a la k-drama), I would happily watch it.
As I mentioned before, the process of developing a product in the fashion industry was quite interesting but a lot of that disappeared around mid show. While there were some dirty tricks being played between competitors from the start, the second half was all talking. scheming and a race to see how low can their tricks go. Lots of planning and boardroom scenes but there is not a lot of meat. A few drawings were pushed around and a whole product line was created by the next episode including swanky shops. Everything boiled down to scheming and backstabbing. I suppose that would be okay if the show was 40 episodes long (instead of 50) as you can actually see where all the plots converged around that point and if they had stopped it there, it would have been a decent conclusion. However, the "message" really took over the last ten episodes.
I suppose it is time to talk about these "messages". It is not unusually for c-drama to push some messages about Chinese culture or pride in Chinese achievements but this show had many such messages and they were pushed quite hard and with little subtlety. While they were ever present throughout the show, It really amped up in the last ten episodes. When instead of just talking about faceless scheming foreign companies, they actually hired two blonde haired Chinese speaking foreign actors to play the villains and they were bad to the core. Obviously, the domestic audience might well love the patriotic storyline but others might find it too heavy-handed and sounded like propaganda. Your mileage will differ. When seen from that angle, It was odd to see Audi cars everywhere as they were obviously a major sponsor as were other international brands that appeared as PPL.
The OST was ok. Fairly generic love songs and background music. Nothing jarring with the audio which was a plus.
Re-watch value is low as it was a simple, well telegraphed plot. Some of the early action sequences might be worth a second viewing.
On the surface, it was a story about 4 pairs of lovers. Some have a fairly smooth run, others much more torturous. In between there were corporate battles and business shenanigans. If that was not enough, gun toting drug runners created havoc along the way. Did that sounds confusing, yes, it was.
Like many c-dramas, the start was promising. The first episode was like an action movie. Guns, stunts and explosions filled the screen. It was done well and definitely not your typical meet-cute.
The first half of the show largely settled down to more standard rom-com plots with the usually push-pull and discovering of new feelings. It was also quite interesting to see the progress of designing a new garment and the steps it took to turn the design into a successful product. If the writer stuck to the same plot then I would have given it a much higher score.
The wheel start to fall off around the half way mark. The plot took a silly turn with the drug king pin running amok which reinforced certain "messages" and allowed the ML to play the gung-ho hero one last time. That was pretty much the end of the 1OTP's romantic development though. By then, they were so fated, it was casted in iron and encased in concrete. The problem is that the focus now moved to the other 3 pairs and unfortunately, two of the three pairs were more than a bit cliché with Ning Weikai scoring the worst own goal I have ever seen in any drama! C'mon, writer, you can do better than that. I won't spoil it but it involved a dress and a letter. On the other hand, the relationship between Chen Yayi and Chen Zheng's was fun and organic. Quite refreshing compared with the other pairs. Chen Yayi was outstanding and her characterisation was even better than the FL at times. How she refused to play ball with Chen Zheng just because he was a rich playboy made her a much stronger character. Even as the two developed feelings for each other, she was always grounded and put Chen Zheng in his place when he tried any tricks on her. Honestly, if they separate out their storyline, jazz it up a bit and turn it into a 16 episodes drama (a la k-drama), I would happily watch it.
As I mentioned before, the process of developing a product in the fashion industry was quite interesting but a lot of that disappeared around mid show. While there were some dirty tricks being played between competitors from the start, the second half was all talking. scheming and a race to see how low can their tricks go. Lots of planning and boardroom scenes but there is not a lot of meat. A few drawings were pushed around and a whole product line was created by the next episode including swanky shops. Everything boiled down to scheming and backstabbing. I suppose that would be okay if the show was 40 episodes long (instead of 50) as you can actually see where all the plots converged around that point and if they had stopped it there, it would have been a decent conclusion. However, the "message" really took over the last ten episodes.
I suppose it is time to talk about these "messages". It is not unusually for c-drama to push some messages about Chinese culture or pride in Chinese achievements but this show had many such messages and they were pushed quite hard and with little subtlety. While they were ever present throughout the show, It really amped up in the last ten episodes. When instead of just talking about faceless scheming foreign companies, they actually hired two blonde haired Chinese speaking foreign actors to play the villains and they were bad to the core. Obviously, the domestic audience might well love the patriotic storyline but others might find it too heavy-handed and sounded like propaganda. Your mileage will differ. When seen from that angle, It was odd to see Audi cars everywhere as they were obviously a major sponsor as were other international brands that appeared as PPL.
The OST was ok. Fairly generic love songs and background music. Nothing jarring with the audio which was a plus.
Re-watch value is low as it was a simple, well telegraphed plot. Some of the early action sequences might be worth a second viewing.
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