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| Bao Chu Jie is always rescuing the incompetent Da Lung. |
The problem with me when I watch dramas is that by the time I get to the last 5 episodes, I like to do what I call "fast-forward". What I do is skip the boring, stupid parts... which is about 75% of the stuff and guess what? It's smart! Once I fast-forwarded the ENTIRE drama and I still understood the entire plot. When I re-watched it without skipping, I felt like I already watched it and I didn't miss anything the first time around. ^__________^ Talk about drama-watching-pro-ness. LOL
Anyways, so I finished watched it like 2 weeks ago, so it's a little stale in my head.
The beginning of the drama is pretty captivating? A boy, named Xue Hai, lives in China and is going to leave for Taiwan for his college education. His older sister is screaming and all dramatic like, "NOOOOOOOOO. YOU CAN'T LEAVE!!!" And you see him walking out with 2 rows of servants/maids beside him and his 2nd eldest sister who's trying to hold back the eldest sister from running after him. From this you can tell that Da Lung IS FILTHY RICH and his eldest sister is very very very protective of him.
So he goes to school and his eldest sister follows him to help him register at the school and all. Well that’s her excuse anyway, it’s obviously portrayed that she didn’t want him to leave so she’s making all these excuses to follow him. When he gets there, he realizes that his sister registered him under the name Da Lung, which is supposed to be a really ugly name. My Chinese really sucks, so I’m not at the stage to be able to judge Chinese names. I think sometimes I might find them weird but I most the time I can’t tell if the name is a boy or a girl unless it’s really obvious! But for me, I think Da Lung sounds better than Xue Hai. LOL. Like Xue Hai sounds really strange to me... but apparently, Da Lung is supposed to be this really embarrassing name.
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| Dorky Da Lung |
So anyways, on top of this “really embarrassing name”, he also carries an under-bite, a really ugly mushroom haircut, thick nerd glasses, and some ‘60s spenders. When you see this guy, you think ABSOLUTE DORK/SQUARE/NERD. He rooms with 2 pretty nice guys, they are his friends and they do “include him” in their events. So at school, there’s this really mean girl named Chen Bao Chu, people call her Bao Chu Jie because everyone is scared of her, no one wants to be her friend, no one wants to get in her way. But OF COURSE, Da Lung is this innocent boy who doesn’t know better and he’s all like, “Everyone deserves a friend. Even Bao Chu Jie.” So you know... they fall in love blah blah blah.
So Da Lung is this really filthy rich guy, remember? So why does his sister need to change his name? Because he’s so rich, she doesn’t want people to know who HE REALLY IS and like cause trouble. You know... like kidnap him and hold him hostage for a ransom or something. So Da Lung basically lies to everyone about how poor he is and because he is so protected by his sister for like 20 years, he doesn’t experience much. For instance, he doesn’t know how to ride a bus or pay at a restaurant and so he just blames it on the fact that he’s really poor and never got a chance to do any of that stuff.
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| Da Lung and his two roommates confronted by Bao Chu Jie. |
Bao Chu Jie, who ends up being his girlfriend for 3 years or something, also believes that he’s really poor and she doesn’t suspect anything. She doesn’t care that he’s poor since she does truly love him. HER MOM, however, is working her ass off to pay off debts that her husband left her with. And so her mom is all like, “YOU HAVE TO MARRY A RICH GUY.” And Bao Chu Jie is all like, “It’s my life... yadah yadah yadah...”
So the day that these guys graduate from college, Bao Chu Jie and Da Lung are supposed to meet up with each other. Da Lung wants to propose to her on that day so he bought a ring and waited for her at the designated place. And...
...she never shows up.
WHY?!
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| Bao Chu Jie is the aggressive one in the relationship. |
Because on her way there, she got into a car accident. LOL. As in, she’s running to their meet-up spot and gets hit by a car. She’s immediately shipped off to the hospital and of course, her phone is not with her nor would she hear it even if it did ring. However, BEFORE she left the house to meet Da Lung, she wrote a note to her mother saying, “Mom, I’m going to break up with Da Lung and go marry the guy you want me to marry.” Does she really want to break up with him? No, she only did it because her mom threatened her if she didn’t break up with him, her mom has “connections” and so she can make sure that Da Lung won’t graduate. *rolls eyes* If you have such powerful connections, why the hell are you struggling with debt?! So anyways, Bao Chu Jie makes a fake promise to her mom so that her mom won’t interfere with Da Lung’s graduation and once Da Lung graduates, she plans to run off with him.
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| Bao Chu Jie's mom gives Da Lung the note to read. |
So basically, Da Lung plans to marry her. And Bao Chu Jie plans to run off with him. But neither of them knows each others’ plans. So since Da Lung doesn’t see her, he goes to her house to see her. It turns out that she isn’t there. Instead, her mother opens the door and goes, “What are you doing here? She already broke up with you!”
And Da Lung is like, “What?! No she didn’t! She was supposed to meet me today!”
And the mom goes, “She was going to meet up with you to break up with you! She’s in Europe right now and she’s going to marry some other guy.” The mom lies that she’s in Europe so that Da Lung doesn’t try to look for her. Because if she’s like, “Oh my daughter is in a car accident,” then obviously, he’s going to go to the hospital and look for her.
Da Lung doesn’t believe her. And so her mom goes to grab that note that her daughter left her which says that she’s going to break up with Da Lung. And Da Lung knows her handwriting and so he totally believes the note. She’s absolutely heart-broken. And he goes out into the rain and there’s his dramatic scene of him on his knees, crying and wailing in the rain and he shouts, “I PROMISE NEVER TO TRULY LOVE ANYONE EVER AGAIN!”
So retarded. But it’s an idol drama. I didn’t expect much.
Next scene. 3 years later.
Da Lung is all grown up and he’s turned himself into a hottie and a player. AND BOY is he so hot. The moment I saw him, I just saw all this smoke coming out of him. Seriously man. I wouldn’t mind being played by him. LOL. And he’s such a bad-boy now because he doesn’t really love anyone, he just hooks up with girls and make them fall for him.
So three years are lost.
What has changed in this time frame?
Da Lung
-becomes really hot
-looks like a normal person- loses the glasses, ugly (cute) mushroom haircut, ugly ‘60s clothes
-becomes a player
-DEEP DOWN INSIDE, he still loves Bao Chu Jie
-he and his family officially move to Taiwan
-he works for the family corporation now
- he changes his name back to Xue Hai
Bao Chu Jie
-she becomes really close to her Xue Zhang (Xue Zhang is like classmate from a higher grade. Mind you, this Xue Zhang is probably her only friend, other than Da Lung)
-she continues to look for Da Lung to clear up the misunderstanding 3 years ago
-she no longer lives with her mother... I don’t know why?!
-Xue Zhang helps her find a place to live
-Xue Zhang also finds her a job... a DJ at a radio station
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| Xue Hai looking mighty smexy. |
So one day as Xue Hai (remember he changed his name?) is driving in his $2 million car, he turns on the radio. OMG. And guess what radio station he turns on? Bao Chu Jie’s radio station! He hears her voice and immediately recognizes it.
He gets one of his secretaries to get as much information about the DJ as possible. And the truth is revealed, the DJ IS BAO CHU JIE. Now what? Well, a NORMAL person would just go to the radio station and confront her. “Hey. You ditched me 3 years ago for a rich guy in Europe. WTF?! Well, guess what?! I’m filthy rich too! If you married me, you wouldn’t need to be working at a shitty radio station!”
BUT. OF COURSE. What is logical in an idol drama?
Instead, Xue Hai goes and BUYS the entire radio station and therefore he becomes her boss. Bao Chu Jie does recognize him but Xue Hai denies that he’s Da Lung and because of his major transformation, she believes that he’s only a person who looks like Da Lung and not Da Lung himself.
Xue Hai has this brilliant plan. He wants revenge. He claims that he doesn’t love her, in which he clearly does, because if you don’t love someone, why go through all this trouble. So his plan is to make her fall in love with him and then dump her the way that she dumped him.
So how does this plan work out? Does she fall for him?
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| I would say they look really cute together, but I want him all to myself, lol. |
It’s a hard question to answer. She doesn’t exactly fall for Xue Hai because Xue Hai’s personality is all like in-your-face-I’m-a-rich-bitch-I-can-get-any-girl-I-want. I think she only weavers at times when Xue Hai resembles Da Lung. For instance, if they’re on the bus and Xue Hai regurgitates what Bao Chu Jie said to him three years ago on a bus. Then she can’t help but to treat Xue Hai AS Da Lung. And who can blame her? I mean, in front of her is a man who looks exactly like the guy she loves. And he says all these things that remind her of him and bring all these memories back to her that she associates with Da Lung.
So throughout the entire drama, she has this internal battle with herself and she basically just tells herself that she can’t fall in love with Xue Hai because he resembles Da Lung. And she kind of forces herself to like Xue Zhang instead. Her Xue Zhang has been in love with her for like a gazillion years but she only been treating him like a good friend.
Xue Hai gets frustrated because he’s thinking, “Yo. Why don’t you love me?! You love rich guys, don’t you?! I eat money. I shit money. I’m made of money. Why don’t you fall in love with me?”
And well, here’s the dramatic irony. The audience knows that Xue Hai = Da Lung. We also know that Xue Hai is only a bastard because he believes Bao Chu Jie left Da Lung 3 years ago for a rich guy. And we know that Bao Chu Jie had no intentions of doing so then and she is still now in love with Da Lung.
I use Da Lung to refer to the boy Bao Chu Jie went to school with. And I use Xue Hai to refer to the guy that reminds Bao Chu Jie of Da Lung. They are indeed the same person but they have very different personalities. So I can’t exactly use the names interchangeably. Da Lung is not Xue Hai. Why? Because Da Lung is sweet and innocent and he doesn’t possess any qualities that Xue Hai has. But Xue Hai CAN be Da Lung. Why? Because Xue Hai original character is this sweet boy but he changes into this jerk because of a tragic love incident he experiences three years ago. I hope that clears something up?
So how does this all go down?
Well, Xue Hai spends a lot of time with her, trying to woo her and all and she’s all like, “Get away from me!” Xue Hai pretty much just stalks her. Eventually, she breaks and she goes, “I can’t stand looking at you because you remind me of Da Lung.”
And he’s like, “Why does Da Lung mean that much to you?”
And eventually slowly, very slowly, as in not all of this happens all at once, Xue Hai starts to find out the truth about what happened three years ago.
So what does he do after he realizes that he’s misunderstood her all along?
See, a NORMAL person would just say, “Yo man. I’m Da Lung. Sorry for being such a bastard this entire time.” LOL.
But. NO. The drama takes another route and puts the audience on another roller coaster ride. Xue Hai “pretends” to contact Da Lung and he goes to tell Bao Chu Jie that Da Lung is now happily married and she should stop looking for him and let him live his life in peace.
So basically, Xue Hai tries to get Bao Chu Jie to forget Da Lung and make her fall in love with him. and now you’re thinking... isn’t that what he’s been doing the ENTIRE time?
Not exactly. Before, he only wants Bao Chu Jie to love him so that he can take revenge. Now however, he wants her to ACTUALLY love him and to let go of the old Da Lung.
Now, I’ve kept the plot pretty simple because 1. I’m no good at explaining things and 2. Because there are too many useless side plots and 3. I can’t remember to explain everything. LOL.
So here’s another character to bring into the plot. Her name is Mo Li. Mo Li is a classmate, who studied with both Da Lung and Bao Chu Jie three years ago. Mo Li’s dad is the principle of the college. Da Lung’s/Xue Hai’s older sister is friends with Mo Li’s dad. Mo Li is portrayed as this really beautiful and elegant girl that makes every guy fall to their knees. Now Da Lung’s/Xue Hai’s older sister wants to hook her up with him. She’s interested in him but he doesn’t like her that way. So now that they meet again 3 years later, she knows that Xue Hai = Da Lung.
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| Da Lung and Mo Li |
So one day when Mo Li goes to visit Xue Hai at the radio station, she bumps into Bao Chu Jie and of course the subject of Da Lung comes up. And Mo Li goes, “Don’t tell me you don’t know Xue Hai is Da Lung. It’s why you’re working here, no? You only want to get closer to him.”
And she’s like, “WTF?!”
So she goes to see Xue Hai and slaps him in the face like 3 times or something. And now shit finally freaking hits and freaking shitty fan! Geez! The truth is all out. Everyone now knows everything!
Bao Chu Jie goes, “How could you see me in so much pain and not tell me that you’re Da Lung?”
And he goes, “Because... I thought you left me for some rich guy... blah blah blah.”
And she goes, “So all this time, that’s how you saw me? You didn’t trust me? You thought I would just leave for you another guy?”
And well... I mean, can you blame him? If I saw a note that you wrote to your mom about dumping me, and I had no idea you were in a car accident, I would also believe what your mom said about you leaving with some guy to get married. Geez.
So Bao Chu Jie doesn’t forgive him and decides to quit her job at the radio station so she doesn’t have to see him anymore.
JUST WHEN I FREAKING THOUGHT THE DRAMA WOULD BE OVER...
There’s a fire at the radio station. And the only person left in there is Bao Chu Jie.
Xue Hai rushes up to the station to save her. And I think this is pretty much the only scene that made me really teary. So he goes up to save her and some piece of burning wood falls on his leg and he’s trapped. And Bao Chu Jie tries to get him out and he’s like, “No. Just go before the fire gets too big and you can’t get out.”
And she’s like, “No I’m not leaving you here alone.”
And, okay, I have to use Chinese, because it doesn’t sound as good in English, “你不要理我！快走!” And she’s like, “要走，我們一起走! 要死，我們一起死!” Of course, it’s really typical but it still made me cry. They acted out the scene really well.
And Xue Hai is like, “No. You’re not going to die here.” And she’s like, “No, I’m not going to let that happen.”
And Xue Hai goes, “No matter if it’s Da Lung or Xue Hai, just know that they both loved you and still love you. 那就夠了.” And she’s like bawling her eyes out.
OUT OF NOWHERE! XUE ZHANG COMES and he’s like, “BAO CHU! WHERE ARE YOU?!”
And Xue Hai yells out, “She’s here! She’s here! Come get her!”
And basically Xue Hai is still trapped under the piece of wood. And Xue Zhang pretty much has to pry Bao Chu off of him and carry her out of the fire and she tries to fight him off but can’t. And Xue Hai and Bao Chu Jie are just crying their eyes out as they’re being separated between life and death.
Personally, I would end the drama end. I would kill off Xue Hai, why? Because it’s most realistic. I mean, the fire is pretty out of control. I don’t see any firefighters in sight. He should die. And Bao Chu Jie and him already got the closure they need.
BUT. INSTEAD.
Unexpectedly, I say unexpectedly because the drama doesn’t show any of this, Xue Hai is in the hospital, with no any-kind of degree burns whatsoever. Funny. Xue Hai is rescued, I’m assuming by firefighters and he’s in an unconscious state. Xue Hai’s two sisters are absolutely miserable because the only son in the family is in a coma. Bao Chu Jie goes in and talks to him and he wakes up... -___________________-. Sorry about how blunt I’m making this. I’m just going to cut the icing on the cake because this is taking way longer than expected. LOL.
So he wakes up and guess what? He loses his memory! He goes back to being Da Lung again and he forgets that he was ever Xue Hai and he even forgets who Bao Chu Jie is. He forgets everything and just goes back to Da Lung before he even met Bao Chu Jie. I don’t know why he would lose his memory...
So Bao Chu Jie does all these things to try and make him remember who she is but everything fails. Then Da Lung gets kidnapped by some people who want money from the family. Bao Chu Jie goes to save him. I think she actually does save him. And they both end up in the hospital. And when Xue Hai wakes up, he remembers everything and everyone again. BUT, he pretends to forget who Bao Chu Jie is. Why? Because he thinks that he made her suffer enough and he doesn’t deserve such a nice person. -___________-. ARGH. Stupidity at its best.
I forget what happened, but eventually Bao Chu Jie realizes that it’s all an act. She catches him and she proposes to him, lol. He says yes. They get married. The end.
SIGH. Wow. That took a while.
So what do I think about this drama?
See. I watched this drama VERY reluctantly. Why? Because Rainie’s acting (the actress who plays Bao Chu Jie) can be really annoying. I’ve seen most of her other dramas and they do get on my nerves sometimes. So I sort of vowed never to watch a Rainie drama again. But then SHOW LUO (the guy who plays Da Lung/Xue Hai) is in it and I’ve never seen any of his dramas before so I decided to give this a try... but VERY reluctantly.
The drama does have its moments that make me smile, cry, laugh and really appreciate the piece. However, there were HUGE loopholes in this drama, not as much as 霹靂MIT but, nonetheless, still loopholes. This entire drama is built off of ONE dramatic irony. What is it? The fact that Da Lung believes Bao Chu Jie left him to marry a rich guy. The beginning of the drama is slow, mainly because the director is trying to build memories for the both of them to reminisce later on in the drama. The middle of the drama is okay, the pace picks up a little but it gets repetitive. Xue Hai’s stalking gets on my nerves a little. The end of the drama is slow, why? Because I want the drama to end and it doesn’t. A lot of the scenes near the end of the drama are just them crying by themselves and thinking about their memories together. And this is where the director just plays a bunch of flashbacks. BORING. I can’t stand overly-used flashbacks, especially if they’re just a collage of happy times spent together.
The final scene is kind of cheesy and lame. It’s not that I disagree with them getting married but I did hope for a grande finale but instead I got this low-budget wedding and really cheesy lines. Ew.
Loopholes. I’m still asking the question why Bao Chu doesn’t just tell Xue Hai straight up why she didn’t like him. I mean, Xue Hai stalks her and she goes, “No leave me alone.” And Xue Hai asks, “Why can’t I love you? And why won’t you give me a chance?” This is the most perfect opportunity for her to just say, “Because I love a guy who looks like you. I’m still looking for him. I can’t love you.” Why doesn’t she just say that?! Instead, she gives all these ambiguous responses.
Also. Why does Xue Hai turn into a jerk? I can understand a playboy but if he’s going to make Bao Chu Jie fall in love with him, why doesn’t he just be a rich Da Lung? Be a Da Lung again but flaunt your money in front of her? Why be a jerk? I don’t understand.
And Bao chu Jie’s mom, where the hell did she go? She just disappeared off the face of the planet? What happened to marrying Bao Chu off to a rich guy to help pay off the family debt?
And even if those aren't loopholes, let's say the director just wants to write the story that way, I mean, the audience can't control what the director wants to write, right? I've written stories so I know it's hard to fill in every gaping hole with some kind of logical and reasonable explanation and so most the time it's just best to leave it and hope the audience doesn't notice, lol. So putting all loopholes aside, it still doesn't explain what I'm supposed to get out of this drama. I'm not expecting some life-changing enlightenment, obviously. I do expect some sort of lesson, moral, theme of any-sort... you know... just so it doesn't feel like I wasted 14 hours of my life.
So was I supposed to learn that ugly and nice people can change into hot bastards because of love? Or is it that true love can never be forgotten in one's heart? Or is it that nothing can stop true love even blatant lies and a heart-for-revenge? Or is it that you can never hate someone that you truly love even if you try? Or is it that people just need to stop getting into car accidents and amnesia to cut to the happily ever after?
Honestly. I didn't get anything from it. Usually I get SOMETHING out of any kind of crap-waste-of-a-time-movie/drama, not saying that this drama is crap but... I just didn't see any message. The drama did touch on money... I guess the lesson is money can never buy true love. Yeah, that's probably the stupid message. Or maybe we aren't supposed to read any messages, maybe it's supposed to be one of those relaxing-take-it-easy-let-your-brain-mush kind of dramas.
Overall, the drama is good. 5 being average, I would give this a 6.5/10. I wouldn't watch it again... all the amnesia and roller coaster runs drove me crazy. Some parts I just wanted to jump through my computer screen and like... strangle the damn people. I really do appreciate the beginning of the movie. The character development of Da Lung and Bao Chu Jie are amazing. I love the beginning of the series... I thought the beginning would be the part I hate the most because they're acting all stupid and rebellious, lol but it turned out to be the opposite. I prefer the beginning much more than the ending. Although the drama is only 14 episodes, I felt like I was watching a 30 episode drama, all I could think was, "WHEN ARE THESE PEOPLE GOING TO STOP FORGETTING EACH OTHER?! AND WHEN ARE THEY GOING TO LIVE HAPPILY EVER AFTER?" Because at a certain point in the drama, you can pretty much tell if it's going to be a happy or sad ending.
Like I said before, the drama DID have its moments where you think, "Wow. This is absolutely beautiful." and "Wow. This is absolutely brilliant. How did they come up with this?" But those moments were brief, it didn't take long for the cliche dialogue to ruin everything.
I think a lot of Rainie Yang and/or Show Luo fans would absolutely adore this drama. They make a cute couple, and they do have chemistry, too bad the script couldn't have been a little bit more concise and to-the-point.
