Of Swords and Parasols

While not all of this is confirmed yet (well, just Joe Cheng in Skip-Beat, I think) I shall now voice what shall now doubt be unpopular opinions on a few upcoming dramas.

Hua Wu Fei Xue:  Eva Huang.  Eva Huang in a period drama.  Eva Huang in a period drama where her character is a thief.  Eva Huang in a period drama where her character is a thief who has two former friends turned enemies interested in her(not a fan of love triangles, but I love "friends/lovers/family turned enemies" the way some love "enemies as lovers" and/or love triangles.)  So far, I am so in love with this, you have no idea.  (Eva!  Period drama!  Thief!  Friends turned enemies and romantic rivals!)  And then I get to the part where her co-star is Mike He, and my unpopular opinion of "No!  NONONONONO!" rears it's ugly head.  I realize it's unfair of me, but Devil Beside You turned me off Mike He to an unbelievable degree.  It doesn't help that I'm clearly supposed to think he's hot stuff and can't think of him as more than passingly cute.  Also, why do all his costars seem to hate him and not want to work with him?

Skip-Beat:  This rumor has been floating around for a while, but apparently it's now mostly-confirmed that Ariel Lin and Jerry Yan will star as Kyoko and Ren.  There's also a rumor that Joe Cheng will be Sho but is backing out because Jerry wants  his (Joe's) screentime reduced, but I suspect the Joe Cheng part is a publicity stunt.  Ariel Lin I approve of.  Heartily.  Jerry?  You know, I could buy him as Sho (I suspect they'll age the characters anyway) but Ren?  Nuh-uh.  Again, probably unfair of me, but while he was likable and had himself some very nice arms in Meteor Garden, he couldn't act there at all.  From what I hear, that hasn't changed.  For a character like Ren, who operates about 90% off charisma and attempts at being stoic and standoffish with some angst and perfectionist tendencies mixed in, that's kind of a bad thing.  (Were I to choose a Ren, it would be Kingone.  And Kingone and Ariel would be an awesome collision of cute.)  I also can't help but think that the insanity and humor will be tuned down too much.  There's something about twdramas (too reserved, maybe?) that keeps them from ever really reaching the depths of humor and crack and insanity jdramas and manga reach, and Skip-Beat kind of thrives on that.  Skip-Beat also isn't a romance, but I've never seen a twdrama that wasn't focused primarily on romance.

BUT!  MORE POPULAR OPINIONS!

Love and Bread:  Ariel Lin and Joe Cheng.  Apparently set in the country and Joe is poor.  This is all I know and all I really need to know.  Except they made Ariel gain weight for it.  STOP MAKING HER GAIN AND LOSE LOTS OF POUNDS!!!  Seriously.  I'm still recovering from the fact that they made her lose weight for Legend of the Condor Heroes.  I'm worried that when I watch it, she'll be in danger of getting blown away by a gust of wind.  I mean, has the girl ever had a co-star whose pocket she couldn't fit into?

I also want to see Rainie Yang's upcoming dramas.  Again, not as big a fan of Rainie as others, but I like her well enough.  Miss No Good has her as a jewelry store owner who gets a makeover.  I'm not sure why it appeals, but it does.  Superstar Express has her playing the anti-Rainie Yang character as she's supposedly  somber and anti-social.  (Her character in Strange Tales of Liao Zhai was pretty serious, so I'm sure she can pull it off.)  It also has Jiro Wang as her love interest, which has to be the most random pairing ever.

There's also Clue Collector and Paper Rose.  Both have cool names, one has delinquents turned high school detectives and the other has Ariel Lin, and that's about all I know of either.

I think, though, that this is about equal to the total number of twdramas I've ever been interested in.

So, most of the dorama portion of my f-list seems to be doing "top 10" lists.  calixaand lesbiassparrowtold me to, so I shall, though it's possible that several I hope to watch soon will shake it up. No pics or MVs from me though, I'm afraid.

TAIWANESE DRAMA CREATES SCANDAL BY CONFIRMING THAT PEOPLE DO, INDEED, HAVE SEX ON THEIR HONEYMOON!!

Ok, seriously.  Apparently, It Started With A Kiss 2 is being called the Lust Caution of the dorama world for a bed scene in thefirst episode.

Uhm...right.  This is an idol drama.  If there's more than kissing and necking and Joe's chest and Ariel's shoulders, I'll...I'll do something drastic.  Like...I dunno...some dorama thing I violently oppose doing.  I'm sure others can come up with a worse fate for me than I could myself.  Besides, Ariel seems to be trying to start up a career in mainland Chinese dramas, and they're awfully conservative there(hugs are the wuxia equivalent of sex, after all...)

Here is an article.

Frankly: I feel cheated.

I love the thing, but the ending, and lack of resolution to virtually every major plotline makes me mad.

No really, it will.  It is so giddy and chipper and energetic that it should make you want to rip your eardrums out to escape, yet it's bizarrely appealing and addictive.  VERY addictive...I think the last song I listened to over and over that was absurdly giddy and hyper yet too addictive for my own good was the opening theme to the Spiral anime.

The music video of the song in question:

 

Just finished DBY and...err...
I was going to watch The Little Fairy next, but I suspect I'll want to squee over it with calixa and forgottenpolishin IMs when I watch, so I'm saving it for when I get back home full time.  Taking The Guts of Man instead.

DBY info is actually dated, as I typed this up at work last night but couldn't post it until now.  Commentary is through ep 8, I'm up to 14 now(hey, there's not much to do out there except watch something, stroke the cats and read, and reading makes it difficult to stroke the cats)

Ithink it's time to accept that It Started With A Kiss is probably the only twdrama that I'm going to love and adore, everything else seems to just be "like well enough," at least that I've seen so far. 

DBY is one that, as far as I know, pretty much all the dorama fans on my flist have watched.  To be honest, I'm not sure what I think about it so far.  The scenes with Rainie Yang and the guy she likes are just boring.  Her scenes with Mike He are(thankfully, as they are the main pairing) better...they have decent chemistry, but aren't grabbing me yet.  The only part I've really liked so far is when his father shows up, and their scene right after that.

Mike He's hair isn't nearly as bad as I was led to expect...confiscate his hairspray and most of the problem will go away...a trim will fix the rest.  He's cute enough, I guess(I know a lot of the flist really likes him)  But any time he does the "evil grin" thing, all the cute is gone.  And Rainie...honestly, I like her character well enough, but her expressions and reactions are, so far, too over the top for me.  And her daydreams are boring, so far.

That said, there's nothing WRONG with it exactly...just too much of some things and not enough of the things that work so far...the story is amusing enough, though, given the start and her daydreams, I can't help but compare it to ISWAK, and then it comes up lacking.

But we'll see.

(hmmm...i think this is my first non-Firefly post today...)

BTW, for the ones who've mentioned being impressed with my speed: I watched all of Remote in one day, and all but the first episode of Kekkon Dekinai Otoko in one day.  With the rare exception, I tend to just marathon things...