My True Friend (Chinese Drama)

Angelababy’s new C-drama where she plays a rookie real estate agent with a big dream of helping her client finding a little piece heaven of their own. Partnered with another newbie whose cynical personality is a direct opposite to her own, our heroine is clueless that our hero is actually her company CEO’s only son. Their relationship bumpy at first, our two leads’ soon begin to discover they make surprisingly a good team as they work together to find solutions to the many myriads of issues that come up as they work with various clients.

This one reminds me of a feel-good inspirational J-drama with an episodic format that deals with individual cases that our two leads’ encounter. This IS a C-drama after all though, so I think it will be safe to assume we will actually have a pretty strong romance line between our two leads.

I was worried at first that Deng Lun’s (Ashes of Love) role here as a somewhat spoiled rich boy with a good heart would feel stale but I was pleasantly surprised to see that Deng Lun has been able to inject his own charm into the role.

Hope All Is Well With Us (Chinese Drama)

After conquering many obstacles to get married, our two leads have seemingly found their “happily ever after” as our hero achieved great success in his career and our heroine quits her job to be a full-time stay-at-home mom to their young son. However, what seemed like a fairytale happy ending is cracking right under the placid surface as our heroine spiral deeper and deeper into a chronic depression that is threatening to end in tragedy. Unable to figure out a way to save their marriage, our two leads eventually divorce but remain determined to work individually and together to make sure their son is not hurt by their separation.

This one has been out for a bit but for some reason I keep forgetting to write about it. The synopsis sounds a bit depressing and it is a bit since it obviously will deal with some difficult topics (It’s not all depressing though. Our two leads will each have their own love line after the divorce) but I was very intrigued with the story nonetheless. Instead of presenting us with a fairytale romance or how a betrayed woman is able to find new love after kicking her no good ex to the curb, Hope All Is Well With Us tells a tale where some times despite your best effort a marriage can’t be salvaged but divorce doesn’t have to end in bitterness for all parties involved. I was especially intrigued by the heroine’s character, played by actress Liu Tao (Ode to Joy). In Chinese culture, a woman is frequently taught to be “understanding” while one’s husband is out busy earning a living. With that in mind, our heroine’s chronic depression would be seen by many around her as “immature whining” especially since her husband by the standard of Chinese society is the perfect son-in-law (very successful in his career, loves her, doesn’t cheat on her. The fact that he is too busy to even personally pick her up from the hospital would be seen as a minor thing). Most people around our heroine would have trouble understanding why giving up her passion as a set designer would be so difficult…they would reason “Doesn’t women work so they would eventually marry a successful husband and give birth to a son?”

Don’t get scared off by the sad sounding synopsis though. As you can guess from the show’s name, the story is all about showing why divorce doesn’t have to be the end of love so I am 99% certain it will be a happy ending (a real one this time around) for everyone involved.

 

Angel’s Last Mission: Love (Korean Drama, New)

A bit of a trouble maker, our hero, an angel named Dan promises his nagging superior that he will be on his best behavior during his last bit of time on earth before he can finally ascend into heaven. Unfortunately, Dan’s superior’s worry soon comes true when our hero not only misses his time to ascend into heaven but also breaks an important rule. Desperate for another chance to enter into heaven’s gate, our hero promptly agrees to his last mission of playing cupid for our heroine- a rich ballerina who because of her traumatic life experiences, refuses to believe in love.

Shin Hye Sun (Still 17) did such an impressive job playing our blind heroine I am actually rather disappointed that her character won’t stay blind for very long at all. I wasn’t too sure what to expect from this show before I checked it out, but I was quite pleasantly surprised by how solid the acting and the story were. To be honest, I thought the pairing of Shin Hye Sun and Kim Myung Soo seemed rather odd since Kim Myung Soo’s character looked like an immature young kid next to our heroine. However, within the first couple minutes of watching the show it became apparent that the casting was perfect. I don’t usually like troublemaker sort of hero but Kim Myung Soo made his character so charming I fell in love with Angel Dan right away.

My only worry? This sort of story doesn’t usually have your traditional happy ending…but the second male lead does look pretty promising too so I might be persuaded to expend my definition of a happy ending.

Legend of the Phoenix (Chinese Drama, New)

A circus performer whose family owns a well-known troupe, our heroine is hired to perform for the empress dowager’s birthday feast. Promptly pulled into a palace struggle between the grand princess and the empress, our heroine narrowly escapes death thanks to the help of our hero- a strategist named Wei Guang. Falling in love with Wei Guang at first sight, our young heroine is soon daydreaming of riding off into the sunset with her prince charming. However, fate has other ideas and our heroine later becomes the empress’ maid. Mired in palace conspiracies, our heroine refuses to let the darkness around her swallow her moral compass. Eventually catching the interest of the emperor, our heroine becomes a royal concubine and teams up with Wei Guang to defeat the evil design of the grand princess.

For those of you who are following my Rise of Phoenixes translation…sorry, this one has no relation to that novel or the drama. I went into this one with very low expectation but it was actually pretty decent. The chemistry between the two leads was especially cute. However, I am a bit put off by the synopsis that not only promises lots of palace intrigue BUT our heroine will end up marrying the emperor (who judging by the poster is not THAT important of a character). The saving grace is that the show’s synopsis does promise a happy ending where our heroine will leave the palace to be with our hero Wei Guang.

The Wind Blows (Korean Drama, New)

In stark contrast to the sweet romance they had while dating, our two leads’ marriage had turned into mutual dislike and constant bickering. Wanting a child desperately, our heroine finally decides to ask for a divorce when her husband firmly refuses to consider it. Unbeknownst to our heroine, our hero is hiding the fact that he is suffering from Alzheimer’s disease. According to the show’s synopsis, six years after their divorce, our two leads will meet again.

The show obviously deals with pretty grown-up issues and with our hero suffering from Alzheimer’s I am not sure there is a “happy ending” to this. However, with a solid cast of actors, I think there is no doubt that the story will be worth following…even if it promises to be a tear jerker. Oh, it might be helpful to know that despite the somewhat depressing premise, the show does manage to inject plenty of humor where it can.

All text copyright @ www.Ninja-Reflection.com

 

Related Posts