Handsome Siblings, pretty much all pics

[meganbmoore]

Up to...uhm...ep 15 or so in Handsome Siblings.  I'd do squeeing and such but don't quite feel like it, so instead, a bunch of pics, mostly only up to this point, with some commentary.  Some get bigger when you click on them.

*whistles*  People get displeased at their pet falling in love.
 






(note: this caption is the only one that could really be called a direct spoiler)
To save Orchid from them(because they'll leave her alone if he doesn't love her anymore) and also to save his own life(they cast a spell on him that would eventually kill him if he really fell in love at the beginning) he agrees to a spell that will kill his feelings for her.


Then he cries after the spell is cast(though you can't really see the tears in the pics)





Little Fish and his girl, Murong Xian, meet when she rescues him in a kinda Tarzan-like fashion.  Then they do this mid-air dance thing wuxia productions like so much:




After Orchid recovers from her illness(read: that his master's gave her):








So dying to find out what's happening here:





I love this scene...she keeps trying to get anything resembling humor or a conversation out of him then wishes Little Fish were there to entertain her, and he's all(mentally) "but...I don't know how to talk to girls...just get bossed around by them"




First meeting:



Tournament hijinks.  

Thanks to that curse, his heart is literally going "tha-thump, tha-thump"





All prepped to fight...then can't even let her fall...then she's all "uhm...what just happened?"





Little Fish gives her a fake sword so she'll think she's killed him and he can get her to say that she likes him.  Unfortunately for him, his sidekick isn't bright enough to realize what he's up to and is all "but...the sword goes in and never comes out!"







Also, Orchid and Little Fish have this really fun BFF friendship going fromn the start, even when he has a crush on her:







This is how Flower's masters dress Orchid up after kidnapping her.  I like the look but am glad it's only temporary:

Comments

[calixa.livejournal.com]

I gotta say, Fan BingBing is incessantly beautiful. I like how she's more of a star than Vicki Zhao or Ruby Lin now, and those two got all the attention after Princess Returning Pearl...

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Yeah, she is. It stands out here because(evil mother types aside) all the other women are "LOOK! CUTE!" and she has more of a quiet, classy look. She's also the female lead in Heroic Legend, the one I really want to see that has no subs...

Course, I know nothing about PRP or the other 2 actresses...

[calixa.livejournal.com]

Oh, Princess Returning Pearl. It was like... the HYD of china circa '99 or so. Really huuuuuge series that pretty much everyone and their neighbour's dog watched, about two girls whose identities accidentally get mixed up and one of them ends up becoming a Princess (when she's actually not) and the other one (the real princess) becomes her maid. Fan Bing Bing played the maid of the... maid, haha. That drama propelled almost every one of it's actors into stardom. In fact, the actor who played the Prince, Alec Su, was in a version of Handsome Siblings a few years back with Jimmy Lin. That's the one I saw - though personally I hated the girl who played Fan Bing Bing's character.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Ok, that sounds a LOT like the plot in Lost in the Chamber of Love...

I think I've seen that version referred to as "Legendary Brothers" or something(I think what I'm watching is much more loosely based)

I can actually easily see myself hating Orchid if she'd been done differently...if they'd gone with a "cutesy" actress or "perfect and pure"(like Crystal Liu) I probably wouldn't like her, but Fan Bing Bing plays her as just a nice upper class girl with a bit of a temper and there's never any sense that she doesn't fully understand and appreciate what's being done for her and she never demands more than she has any right to.

(procrastinating work for a bit again)

[calixa.livejournal.com]

You're right, it does, but it's actually quite different. PRP was mainly set in the Palace and was a quasi-comedy about a spunky girl adjusting to royal life with some romance thrown in. Much more emphasis on the relationship between the girls and their father, the Emperor; versus LITCOL which was more about the romance. I think both are based on actual literary works, though.

Yeah, I get what you mean. Crystal is beautiful and all, but whenever I look at her all I do is wonder if there is personality behind that pristine face. Don't hate her, but don't really care, either.

Re: (procrastinating work for a bit again)

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

I suppose the question is: would I like PRP, and ar there subs? (because it sounds good)

Crystal, I think, is right now getting cast a lot because she have these perfectly innocent, pure looks, much like ZiYi Zhang. You like them more because they end up in stuff you want to see anyway and do a decent job than because you really likethem on their own merits. It'll be interesting to see if either actress(and others) is still getting roles in a few years when the youthful innocence wears off. In contrast, I forget her name, but the actress who played Yue Ru in CP was making the transition from "cute" to "striking" and Fan Bing Bing has a classy elegance that stands out more than her attractiveness, so for both, I'd be more surprised to see them NOT get roles once they're a bit older.

Re: (procrastinating work for a bit again)

[calixa.livejournal.com]

You might like it, it borders historical fiction but is in essence dramatized chick-lit (based on a book by a very popular Chinese romance novelist). But it's fun. I have no idea if it has subs.

Zhang Ziyi doesn't really look innocent to me - she has what I think is the perfect face for icy wuxia heroine roles. If her popularity drops off, it'll most likely be of overexposure, IMO.

The thing is, once these girls lose their 'cuteness' they're done. Cute is money so far as Asia is concerned. Only so many roles require statuesque/classy beauties and FBB pretty much has the market on that one. Which, again, is why the industry is so saturated with Rainie Yangs and Ariel Lins and Crystal Lius, there's a bigger market for that kind of thing.

Re: (procrastinating work for a bit again)

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Yeah, ZiYi Zhang has picked up the "icy" look, but if you go back to CT/HD or Musa it was the "innocent" bit that was carrying her a lot, and they're still milking the "youthful beauty" bit.

And the cute part is why I cute get as attached to so many dorama heroines as others seem to...too much relying on cute and not enough on characterization or ability. That's actually part of why I like period dramas...the k and j period dramas I've seen seem more concerned with actors and actresses who can pull off the role well, and cdramas tend to at least balance them out so that I don't feel like I'm drowning in cute, whereas most modern pieces tend to just find the cutest actress they can and rely on the cute to make you like her.

[dangermousie.livejournal.com]

I skipped over the little captions (and if you know my spoilerphile tendencies, you know how much it means I am dying to see this, if I am bothering not to spoil self) but those pictures are incredible....


*sigh*

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

actually, I very carefully avoided anything specific that could really be called a spoiler...if you've seen a couple wuxia movies, then there's nothing referred to that you shouldn't expected.