Black & White Episode 1

With English Subs; Credit: ooxxTW

This is only Part 1, all the other parts can be found HERE

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I have officially started watching this <3 The first episode was quite intense I must say. It starts off with a Vic Zhou bed scene HAHA what a great start ;) Vic’s kind of like a playboy but he’s also a really good detective but he gets kicked out of his HQ to another one because he slept with his boss’s daughter haha. Anyways his move means that he ends up being teamed up with Mark Chao who he met before as Vic was one of the people hiding while Mark was trying to chase and catch Kingone and that was when Mark began disliking Vic; first impressions mean everything. Also, these 2 are the total opposite of each other because Vic is the relaxed and carefree kind of cop while Mark works really hard to try and solve cases [and a lot of the time he works a bit too hard and ends up ruining the original plans]. So as expected these two don’t get along too well.

There’s more to the episode as a lot of things happened but I don’t want to ruin anything for anyone who hasn’t watched it. And I actually found the Chinese in it to be quite difficult compared to normal dramas so I think I might have to rewatch it with english subs to clear a couple of things ^___^” FAIL haha.

Thoughts?

I think my excitement before I started watching it kind of wrecked it for me because I was expecting wayyy too much but to be honest (please don’t kill me ^_^”) I thought it was only average. I think its because I watch TOO MUCH TVB which means I’ve seen countless numbers of police action dramas and so most storylines involving cops/robbers seem old to me. This is not the drama’s fault or any of the actors because Taiwanese idol dramas are seriously NEVER this intense so it doesn’t surprise me how epic people are finding this. I’m sure I’d feel the same way too if I didn’t watch so much TVB ^^
However, this will not stop me from watching it because maybe the storyline will get better and more unique? I’ve only watched the first episode afterall and first episodes are never that good even for my favourite dramas like Fated to Love You and Wish to See You Again.
As for the acting, I FREAKING LOVE KINGONE WANG ♥ He really stood out and just oh my gosh his facial expressions were so amazing! His eyes seriously freaked me out…that stare was like so creepy. AND OMG did I mention he speaks in KOREAN in the drama?! It sounds really fluent as well ♥ ♥ I also enjoyed Vic’s performance but I’m just not use to seeing him as a playboy, not after his cute shy role in WTSYA ♥ Nevertheless, he has also done a brilliant job so far in B&W. Mark Chao isn’t bad either, I’ve never seen him act before (actually I’ve never even heard of him before this *rolleyes*) but yes, not bad (: Haven’t seen much of the females yet, Janine Zhang appears a little (she’s a forensic investigator) and Ivy Chen also appears near the end but I haven’t watched them enough to opinionate yet.

A couple of caps to give you a glimpse of Kingone ;)

BLACK & WHITE

 

CLICK FOR TRAILER

I’ve just downloaded the first episode but I haven’t watched it yet since I’m technically meant to be “working” on a 3000 word essay D8 I am so excited about it because I’ve heard like SOOOOO many good comments on it and how it’s a breakthrough for taiwanese dramas and Kingone/Vic =D 

This seems to be quite an action packed drama with Vic as an incredibly hot cop while Kingone’s the sexy villain. From what I’ve read so far he seems to be playing a role that’s similar to The Joker from The Dark Knight which sounds so interesting! I love how Vic and Kingone are always in dramas together because I love them both :D

Did I mention Janine Zhang is in this as well? She’s not the best actress out there but I really liked her in The Hospital with Jerry so it’s going to be awesome to see her with Vic. This girl is like so PRETTY, I’m so jealous xD

I can’t wait until I can start watching it…just need to wait another 2 weeks and then uni finishes ^_^ I’ll just have to look at pictures for now….so many hot photo’s of Vic ^^

Teaser ;]

NOTE: They’re all Vic because I couldn’t find proper Kingone ones :(

*drools*

 

Wish to See You Again…extremely underated!

I hate how you never feel like blogging after you finish an awesome drama because you just spend all your time thinking about it but when you do come around to blogging about it you forget everything you were going to type. This is what’s happening to me right now and it’s driving me nuts! I’m also becoming slightly illiterate ever since I’ve been on holidays so my vocabulary has shrunk even more. Soon my english will be equivalent to a 10 year old if this continues. I think it’s a sign telling me to start reading more books >.< Lately the only books I’ve been reading are chinese ones which don’t really help me in any way *rolleyes* Wait do reading chinese subtitles during dramas count as reading? =P

I’ve just finished yet another idol drama. This time I watched Wish to See You Again which I thoroughly enjoyed! I guess WTSYA aired during a really bad time because it was competing with Bull Fighting AND They Kiss Again so the ratings would have flattened out a bit. These 3 dramas are all really interesting in their own ways so if I was living in Taiwan during that period I would have so much trouble choosing which drama to watch. Three of my all time favourite dramas airing at the same time, that would make life OH SO DIFFICULT!

For me, I think WTSYA started out a bit slow so viewers would probably switch dramas after watching the 1st episode. I remember thinking to myself “Oh no! Why did I waste my money on this drama? It’s kinda boring =.=” after watching the first episode but I decided to continue watching because I didn’t want to waste my money but it turned out to be worth it after all.

To be honest, I think there’s really not many complaints about this drama besides the slow start because everything else is perfect. The storyline is original, acting is spot on (Vic/Kingone <3), great scenic views of Taiwan and the OST is love <33 Of course as with any other drama there were things that annoyed me but that’s truely inevitable.  I loved how the plot is based on friendship but mixes in romance within it which creates originality because idol dramas are ALWAYS romance based. I loved Vic <33 His portrayal of XL was close to perfect. Some of his expressions crack me up and he really managed to express his emotions well. He was just so interesting to watch! I also found XL x Nancy really cute <3 BUT I got really annoyed with XL during the end of the drama because he was being really cruel to Nancy. You can’t blame her for being suspicious about LY, like why couldn’t he just tell her about LY and AH? Nancy doesn’t seem like the type of person that would go around telling everyone. And I was also frustrated with the fact that XL always kept everything to himself but that’s also a good thing because it proves that he’s actually flawed making his character more realistic.

I also LOVED Kingone’s portrayal of XM. He’s also improved A LOT. I usually find him kinda boring in dramas but I totally love XM. He’s such a good friend and boyfriend and I love how he makes everyone happy. XM is probably my favourite character in the drama, he’s just so lovable <3

I didn’t know either of the two lead females but I thought they did a pretty good job. I have to mention again how adorable XL and Nancy (Michelle Chen) were together…they made me awww so badly!! Some people didn’t like Michelle’s acting but she didn’t bother me at all. I thought she did very well for her first lead role. And the girl who acted as LY was perfect for that role…she was so beautiful and elegant! Loved her!!

I watched this drama over a month ago so I’m having trouble thinking of things to write but I definitely recommend ALL drama lovers to watch this. Even if you’re not a drama lover, please watch it because it really is worth watching. I promote WTSYA so badly because its so underated and unrecognised, it deserves better!! I should also add the fact that this drama has totally raised my expectations for idol dramas…which is not a good thing because what am I going to watch now???

櫻野三加一 (Ying Ye 3+1)

Another drama finished. I actually never thought about watching YY3+1 because my goal was to watch Prince turn into Frog first but the DVD shop didn’t have PTF so I was left with this or Wish to See You Again. My cousin told me to get this because the cover looked better so I bought it without knowing a thing about it. The only thing I knew was the two main leads =P I guess that’s enough to prove that I watch dramas for the cast and not the plot; one of my many bad habits =|

Plot:
The whole story is revolved around this school called Ying Ye. I think its a college but I’m not sure because some say its a highschool. They wear school uniform but when they graduate it’s similar to graduating from college/university so I’d say its some sort of post highschool place. Anyways, that’s not very important :P So Xia Tian (Qiao En), Ah Jiang (Ming Dao), Fang Wei (Jason Huang) and Bulu (Jason Hsu) all attend Ying Ye and are best friends who grew up together…YAY haha. They are known as Ying Ye 3+1 and that’s where the title comes from. These 4 are all fairly skilled at martial arts and the start of the drama showcases a lot of their awesome moves. Conflict arises when Xia Tian’s dad who’s a police officer loses his gun a few days before his retirement which forced him to postpone his retirement date. Ying Ye 3+1 are all really close with XT’s dad so they all go on a quest to find his gun.

They’re the basics of the drama but a lot of other stuff happens as well. One thing I must say is that the first half of YY3+1 is VERY different to the second half; for the better or for the worse is a matter of oppinion but I enjoyed the first half more. The script was badly written but I liked the way they developed Xia Tian or maybe I’m just biased xD However, I didn’t like how they randomly faded the Kung Fu out of the drama because it was interesting to watch Xia Tian and Ah Jiang fight with their awesome moves! I swear the scriptwriter forgot about XT’s martial arts skills during the later half of the drama because there were a lot of moments where she could have used her skills to get herself out of trouble. That bothered me a bit *sigh*
In my oppinion, if it wasn’t for MingEn this drama would have failed pretty badly.

Cast

Qiao En as Xia Tian
I felt that the character XT was a bit ambiguous but Qiao En portrayed her brilliantly. XT is a bit of a tomboy who seems to be tough on the outside but really emotional on the inside. I don’t like to use the word weak on her because even though she’s a bit of a cry baby I don’t find her weak, she just expresses her emotions in the form of tears very often. The ambiguity within this character is that she seems to be a really different person at the start of the drama compared to the later half. I guess this must be from maturity and a sign of XT growing up. Qiao En really knows how to immerse herself into her characters and she’s just so natural when she acts, you look at her eyes and you can feel XT’s emotions. Since XT is a bit of a cry baby, I turned into a cry baby as well because no one can make me cry like Qiao En can lol. I think I cried in this more than in Bull Fighting and that’s really bad because BF made me bawl *blush* I swear I only cry easily when watching dramas, I don’t really cry easily in real life xD Qiao En is such an amazing actress and I love her to bits!! That line pretty much sums my thoughts up =D I also find her really really pretty in YY3+1!!

 

Ming Dao as Ah Jiang
This is my first Ming Dao series and I like him but I don’t like like him. His acting is average but a little bit better than Joe and Ethan I think. Ah Jiang is just a typical male in idol dramas; mean and doesn’t like to face his own feelings. However AJ can be really romantic and sweet and from some angles MD looks really hot *blush* I also noticed that he’s actually a really good cryer, one of the better guys when it comes to crying scenes^^

 

Jason Huang as Fang Wei
Unlike many other idol dramas, the main male lead is NOT rich BUT there has to be a rich guy in it or else it wouldn’t be a complete drama so the supporting actor is rich instead. FW is like a prince; he’s rich, kind and romantic and at the start he was the one that was pursuing XT. I like his character because he really is willing to do a lot for his best friends but I wish he would compete with AJ to win XT’s heart instead of giving up. Jason’s acting was mediocre but he’s actually a model so I’ll forgive him for that^^
Note: He is like REALLY tall, he towers over MD!

Jason Hsu as Bulu
Bulu is so cute! He seems to be the quietest one out of the four but there’s just something about his character that makes him stand out. Can’t think of anything to say about him at the moment so I’ll just leave this as it is.

Zhang Xin Yu as Xiao Hui
I need to mention Xiao Hui (or ZXY) because she’s coupled with Bulu in YY3+1 and they are adorable together. This is the first time I’ve heard of ZXY and I find her really really cute! Her character wasn’t much of a challenge so her acting was pleasant to watch but I was really hoping to see more of her in the drama. It was quite hard to find more info about her because she doesn’t seem to be very active but here’s her Facebook PAGE

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Half way through the show there’s a major change in the storyline when the character DK appears. To be honest I thought the drama would have done better if they didn’t bring in DK so I was slightly annoyed when he appeared. I would have been fine with a love triangle between Ah Jiang, Xia Tian and Fang Wei. But the scriptwriter changed his mind and decided to create a love triangle involving Ah Jiang, Xia Tian and DK so Fang Wei and Bulu didn’t get very many scenes =/
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Fan Zhi Wei as DK
I don’t want to say much about DK because I don’t want to include any spoilers in this but lets just say DK is a bit of a pot stirer. He doesn’t do it for fun as he has other intentions hence he really frustrated me. I think this is the second most frustrating idol drama I’ve watched with the first one being The Hospital but that’s a totally different story. Why couldn’t DK just leave Ah Jiang alone? xD

Memorable Scenes
I cried way too much watching this so I can’t do what I normally do and list the scenes that made me cry so I choose to use the last part of episode 2 as the scene that left the deepest impression on me. It was the part where Xia Tian and Ah Jiang were about to have some sort of duel and than XT suddenly stops and says “I really hope my prince can appear quicker” and than runs of crying. This was only episode 2 and its like the first time you get to see the emotional side of XT so it was so unexpected since she’s always been so tough. And the look Qiao En had was just really undescribable, that expression of sorrow in her eyes just amazed me.
NB: Before this part XT mentioned how one day a prince will come and help her deal with Ah Jiang the big bully so it was really sad to see her get hurt by him.

After all that I’d have to admit I enjoyed watching YY3+1. It was fun and exciting to start a new drama without knowing a thing about it and it was interesting to see Qiao En as Xia Tian. I finally understand why there’s so many MingEn shippers out there, they really do have that extra spark to them! I now have ANOTHER favourite on-screen couple, surprise surprise. MingEn just seem so comfortable with each other and even though I say this A LOT, I have to say it again; THEY ARE SO CUTE TOGETHER!! Can’t wait until their new drama, even though they haven’t even started filming yet xD Third collaboration=MORE SPARKS! YAY!! Now I’ll just have to see if the DVD store has PTF so I can watch their first collab xD

If you’re a fan of Qiao En or MingDao or both, I highly recommend you watch this. Minus the terrible script, you get to see some very solid acting by the two and some amazing chemistry between them. For others, I guess this would be a nice drama to watch when you’re bored and have nothing to do but I guess there are better ones out there. I’m just so glad I watched this alone otherwise it would have been awkward trying to hold the tears back =P

Some pics to beautify this post up xD

 

Isn’t QE pretty?^^

Fated to Love You

I have FINALLY finished Fated to Love You! I can’t remember when I started watching this but there was a point in time where I was up to date with the episodes being broadcasted each week and then I kind of stopped for some unknown reason. Oh yeah that’s right, I was in the middle of my HSC *sarcasm* So the other day I went to the DVD shop to buy this so I could watch it on a bigger screen instead of youtubing it. That’s my life story =D 

To be honest, I was disappointed with the last 6 episodes or so (in other words from episode 18 onwards). When I first started watching FTLY I absolutely LOVED it!! When I got up to episode 12, I was about to give it the title of being my favourite drama (Note: keyword=ABOUT) but the show started to die down. I think the producers were trying too hard to beat their own ratings records so the drama started to drag a bit. I think they could have cut it down to about 21 episodes. Nevertheless, Qiao En is now one of my favourite actresses along with Ariel and I’m really glad I chose to watch FTLY =D That miscarriage scene was just amazing. I think I watched that scene like over 5 times and it made me cry everytime. Qiao En is one of the few idol drama actresses that are able to act with their eyes. She doesn’t have to speak but the audience will still feel her emotions by looking at her eyes. I just LOVE her eye makeup!! I want her makeup artist =P

So, what I liked about Fated to Love You:

- Qiao En’s brilliant acting skills
- Ethan’s hot body (I’m a girl so noticing these things comes out naturally xD)
- The first half of the plot
- Baron’s character Dylan
- Ji Bao Bei
- Qiao En’s crying skills! Ariel and her should have a competition one day to see who can cry the best, they are both so GOOD!

Things I didn’t fancy:

- The actor who portrayed Anson. He annoyed me so badly at times.
- Some of the unnecessary scenes (e.g. the scene where Anson and CunXi go to the hotel and meets those “sticky note girls”)
- The draggy ending

The actual ending was pretty cliched but that’s expected in idol dramas. It’s actually pretty similar to TKA ending except I liked the TKA one better because it was depicted more naturally. I felt that the ending of FTLY was slightly forced and it was as if the scriptwriter couldn’t think of anything else that could interest the audience so they just thought of something randomly. That was just the feeling they gave me, I could be wrong.

Even though I was disappointed with the ending, I still enjoyed watching this because the first 14 episodes made up for it =P So I can’t decide whether I like TKA better or not because I got bored during the first few episodes of TKA.

Thanks to FTLY, I’m now a HUGE Qiao En fan hehe. Ok, maybe not huge but I will support her dramas in the future and I am planning to buy her book when I go to HK because I like the way she writes. I’ve been reading her blog and I find that she writes like the way she talks not that I’m familiar with the way she talks but you feel as though she’s talking to you when you read her blog and it’s really cool because it’s like we get to know her. With other celebrity blogs they sound really generic? (I don’t know if that’s the right word to use but I can’t think of anything better) Like their PA could have written the entries for them because they’re really simple but Qiao En writes about all sorts of things. And she’s so cute! She made me LOL literally when I read the entry about her eating cat food. That was hilarious! But I’m going to try and limit myself from talking about her blog too much just in case I do something wrong. Do visit it if you can read chinese though^^

They Kiss Again

Just finished watch this today so I’m still all giddly over it ♥

For me, I enjoyed this more than It Started with a Kiss for various reasons:

1) Because ARRON YAN who is like my knight in shining armour gets more screentime and was so ridiculously good looking in it. I was about to scream when he first appeared because I was surprised by how hot he was. I kinda “left” Arron for a while but the love is back now and I’m never going to leave him again =P

2) Zhi Shu FINALLY expresses his love for Xiang Qin. We all knew he loved her but he’s never really shown it or made it obvious. You can see that as their relationship develops, he becomes more understanding of her and learns to accept her flaws. AND we get to see the emotional side of Zhi Shu e.g. when XQ suddenly leaves in the last episode he cries ♥

3) I’ve really come to love Xiang Qin. In ISWAK, I liked Xiang Qin and all but honestly, I thought she was pretty stupid to love Zhi Shu so much when he was such a jerk to her. But now I understand why she loves him so much and have learnt to appreciate the effort she has put in to maintain their relationship. Without Ariel’s brilliant portrayal of XQ this wouldn’t have been achieved so well done to Ariel. Another thing about Ariel is that I don’t see her as Ariel in the drama but I see her as Xiang Qin. This doesn’t happen much because whenever I watch dramas I don’t get absorbed into the characters as much. For example, when I watched ISWAK I’d see a scene with Zhi Shu and I’ll see him as Joe because I know that ZS isn’t a real person and is just Joe but I was captivated by Ariel’s acting so much that I believed in the character XQ. I don’t know if that makes sense but it does to me =P

4) I’m convinced that Ariel and Joe are secretly together =P Everyone was hyped up about them since ISWAK but I wasn’t really into them that much but now after TKA I am finally convinced. They can’t possibly not have feelings for each other, not after all those great kisses ands hugs and whatnot. Their chemistry is just unbelievable. I’m really into drama pairings like MikexRainie, MikexHebe etc. but as much as I like them, I know they’re not together. With ArJoe, I really don’t know. Even if they aren’t together, I swear Joe has something for Ariel. The way he looks at her when he’s talking to her and the way he kisses her shows us that sparks are flying everywhere. I also like how I don’t get the “OMG how can you say something like that” feeling when they say squishy stuff to each other because I swear they mean it =P It’s just so cute seeing Zhi Shu say stuff like that to Xiang Qin because he never shows any emotion to anyone besides XQ. And when XQ says squishy stuff it’s also cute because we know that this is just XQ’s personality. She lives for ZS.
This has gotten me so freaking exited about their upcoming drama “Love or Bread”. Can’t believe they’re working together again ♥

5) The Yu Shu storyline was so cute! I loved how it was a repeat of XQxZS except with a bit of a YS twist to it. I totally enjoyed watching YS and Hao Mei they were seriously really really cute. I also liked seeing Yu Shu grow up and watching him slowly reveal the love and care for XQ. It was really touching seeing him save her from those model agency people and then hearing him say he’ll help/take care of her if she wants to do things at night.

6) Danson gets a role!! I’ve loved Danson ever since Hana Kimi. Even if I didn’t see him in Hana Kimi I’d like him anyway because he likes Charlene =D I find him so cute in TKA since I’m a BIG fan of pretty boys =P

7) Wang Zi from BBT makes an unexpected appearance during the last few episodes. I don’t know about others but I totally did not expect him to be in it. I remember watching some TKA videos on youtube before I watched his episodes and I was like “why the hell is Arron with another girl?!?!” Him and Arron really look alike…they are both so cute/hot!

8. ARRON YAN YA LUN! ♥

Even though I prefer TKA over ISWAK, there were still some parts about it that I didn’t enjoy as much but it’s nothing big.

1) TKA’s OST was pretty poor in quality in my oppinion. There’s a couple of songs on there that I like but none of them WOWed me like the songs on ISWAK OST. The one I liked most would be Ariel’s song (piano version) and yeah the others were pretty plain? ISWAK on the other hand had a FANTASTIC OST. I pretty much LOVED every single song in it and I liked how there was so much variety. To this day, I still listen to it very often because those songs are just so sweet and touching. I don’t think I’ll ever get over them.

2) I prefer Ah Jin (Jiro) in ISWAK because I admired his love for XQ. I’m happy for him because he’s got a girl now but his storyline was kinda boring. I don’t really like Christine…she seems so random? I enjoyed watching scenes with Ah Jin in ISWAK but in TKA his storyline didn’t appeal to me much at all.

In good dramas certain scenes will leave a deep impression on me and I’ll normally remember those scenes forever. Well, I shouldn’t say forever, but they have a lasting effect in my brain =P Normally these are scenes that make me cry and I’ve definitely had my fair share of crying in TKA. I probably used up half a box of tissues during the last episode which was really unexpected because usually last episodes are happy so I never would have thought something would happen to Xiang Qin and that she would try to LEAVE Zhi Shu! I think the whole last episode with them returning to places that held memories of them left the deepest impression on me but there is another one that’s equally as memorable. I don’t think I will ever forget the scene with XQ sitting outside Yu Shu’s room crying over the way Zhi Shu has been treating her. That was such a powerful scene and Ariel was just amazing; words cannot describe how much I admire her acting skills. Must also add the scene where Arron first appears. He seriously electrified and stunned me when I saw him outside Chun Mei’s apartment! I’ll sum him up with one word: 帥

Overall, I’m really glad I ended up watching TKA. I was going to give up on it before because the first couple of episodes weren’t all that exiting but I had nothing better to do so I decided to continue watching. The love I have for it has not surpassed my love for Bull Fighting but it is up there amongst my favourite dramas. What will be interesting is whether I’ll like it better than Fated to Love You. I still haven’t finished that yet so I can’t compare them but I’m really exited about watching the rest of it now.
Something else that interests me is whether Qiao En can surpass Ariel’s AMAZING acting. So far the scene with Qiao En losing her baby has left a deeper impression but I didn’t expect Ariel to WOW me this much with Xiang Qin.
I think I will rewatch TKA in the future^^ Even with all those teary scenes that made me cry, I still think it’s a really bright happy drama. These type of dramas are always worth rewatching on a sad/boring day :D

Wow I just wrote a whole essay o.o I’ll probably think of more stuff to write over the next few days.

edit:

After watching clips of Ariel&Joe at GBA and post GBA celebrations I have decided I’m going to have a MASSIVE ArJoe youtube session tomorrow =D I love my oh so sad life :D
I’ve realised this ages ago but it only just hit me that Ariel is SO DIFFERENT to Xiang Qin! In real life she seems to be quite smart, thoughtful and mature which isn’t really XQ. It’s amazing how she manages to portray someone that’s so different to her so naturally. This girl is just so AWESOME!

To end my massive post…xD

Ariel Lin ♥
Arron Yan ♥
ArJoe ♥