John Hart

FLAWLESS

I recently completed Teng Cong Cong's TO THE WONDER, a six hour movie pretending to be a TV series. It has two minor story flaws but is otherwise a masterpiece.

SEND ME TO THE CLOUDS is flawless. Another masterwork. Some directors take 8 tries to achieve this fascinating yet simple take on love, life, and death. TCC nails it on her first try. WOW.

I'm not going to say much more because it will oversell it.

I will warn viewers this is Arthouse, and all that entails. Arthouse films sometimes have no budgets and so they up the shock value at certain moments to keep you awake. A classic Arthouse trick is to have one shocking 'sexy' scene, if you will, which China seems to avoid at all costs. The scene here isn't gratuitous but I do feel it was an arthose trope more than a story need.

I will say I've never seen our lead actress in anything but will now seek her out the way I did Zhou Xun. I'm also a nutjob for Yuan Hong. who looks bland in his MDL photo but was a DELIGHT in REBEL PRINCESS. He needs to be very popular yesterday.

That's it. It's only 98 minutes. Somber tones, tough subject matter, handled with genius.

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GOOD FUN but it could have been great

Hi,

I won't spoil at first but then draw a line when the spoilers begin, okay?

In general this was a good idea and a lot of fun to watch. Watching two strangers get stuck with each other -- and all that entails -- was super fun, especially since this is a Chinese drama. If you've watched the trailer and are interested, I'd say it's good enough to watch and that you'll be happy (enough) that you did.

You'll like the leads. Especially 'the boy' who does some serious heavy lifting here. He essentially plays two characters with two character arcs, which means he plays four 'individuals' and does so really well. In fact this aspect may be the best part of the series.

I was a little disappointed with 'the girl' because. well... she came off as a little too girlish. Young bright eyes but she's a big reporter. I think I needed more of a Lois Lane, you know? And she didn't seem to be a strong enough actress until the last quarter of the series where her red sad eyes finally made her truly compelling. Apparently I wasn't the only one who found this actress weak because I gather the producers dubbed her voice with a different actress, which in America is verbotten but maybe people in China don't care. Still why bother having two actresses playing one character when you could simply find a better actress in the first place. Hmm. But she's okay and enjoyable in the role just the same.

***************************** SPOILERS BELOW *****************************

There were actually a lot of things that bothered me in this series. Nothing big as much as little pesky issues.

The first was they simply never explained this time overlap thing in the first place. Going to the internet and studying up on time travel was simply an embarrassment of story telling. Every last word regarding entropy and overlap was painfully juvenile writing. These two kids are not experts and so they neither know where to look for information or what to make of what they've found.

Science fiction has a well worn tradition of an 'expert', which is an old male scientist with white hair whom they consult. They could have modernized this cliche by having a blind genius of a scientist woman in wheelchair, a former client of the lawyer who is sort of in on what's happening to them and trying to help them. Sometimes I get this strange feeling that the Chinese are so new to producing any movies or TV that they're literally still in their early days of all this.

The next thing is related an absolutely critical to explain: where did the origami 'bird' come from and why it is magical and why did it pick on these two crazy kids? Just because it exists doesn't mean it 'is' yet. Like the monolith in 2001 you must explain what it is, where it came from, what it can do, and why it is doing it. Or what you're watching feels like a silly Saturday Morning cartoon.

Okay, now, early in the story our leads were aware that there was a 'girl' in 2022 as well. This girl would be perfectly aware of their situation since she's already lived through it. She'd be a CRITICAL source of information on what to do about their dilemma. For reasons that make no sense our couple avoided her like the plague. Because the writers did not wish to reveal her predicament yet. The problem is --

-- you can't do that. The couple would seek her out. And so by episode 3 or 4 you MUST deal with this issue. I would have simply had her GONE. Without a trace. POOF! What happened to her? Where is she? Nobody who knew her knows. This creates a GREAT mystery and allows the story to move forward without pretending the characters wouldn't look her up for help.

So basically LOVE IN TIME is an interesting premise that isn't properly set up to be utterly engaging. The origami bird and ignoring the girl in 2022 for too long kept me out of the story because the viewer needs to know what's what with these critical details.

The story was laced with many subplots to... frankly... make the story last 24 episodes. They were okay themselves but rather cumbersome and clutter. A lot of names and faces and events to keep straight, especially when they'd try and try to change outcomes. In general all the characters were interesting and well played, but I felt it all distracted from --

-- a more interesting drama that could have happened with our girl and her two boys. What if this story had been about how the girl first falls in love with the boy she can only see for 40 minutes a day... but over time... she finds he's more about fun than being serious... and that... she begins to fall in love with the boy in 2021 more?

That would have been a fascinating portrait of a girl who fools around with a better version of the boy she thought she first loved. A real live LOVE TRIANGLE but with this unique twist. Imagine her cheating on the man she loves with himself? I think this would have been more interesting and worked even better.

So LOVE IN TIME is really okay and worth trying. But I think there's a better series hiding inside this concept.

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Story and Pacing mangle an otherwise interesting project

I found this series to be so inconsistent I'm simply going to list observations.

1. The first episodes bait and switch the viewer. They imply this series will have lots of fight scenes. They basically fade away by Episode 10ish and are GONE at the finale, where you'd presume they'd come back for a big finale.

2. Our three lead actors (as shown on the poster) spend too much of the series with stoic faces, making it hard for us to care about them. This creates a problem where supporting characters accidentally SHINE --

3. -- like Song Yi. The scene she pouts in is gold. I really want to see more of her after this. The same goes for --

4. -- the underused Empress, Yong Mei, who is even more stoic than our heroes but she's such a gifted actress it doesn't come off as cold but intensely compelling. I'm now desperate to see her film SO LONG, MY SON but can't find it with English subtitles anywhere. (!!!)

5. I've heard Wang Yi Bo is legend. His character is the Chinese answer to Mr. Spock and (brace yourself) I saw no story reason for him to be in the series.

I believe our lead cast should have been Gao Bing Zhu, Wu Si Yue, and the Empress. Gao should have already been in charge of the CIA, Wu already in charge of the guard, and both at each other's throats because of this mysterious Clan wreaking havoc in the Kingdom. So two characters with opposing careers -- suspicious of the other -- falling for each other in the process. I'd have made Song Yi someone who had a crush on Gao, and I'd have her married to the Crown Prince who would have eventually been revealed as the leader of the clan.

Do you see how 'clean' that cast is? LUOYANG doesn't understand that, in this story: less is so much more.

6. Oh, I took a one night break from this series and saw Huang Xuan in the movie MY COUNTRY, MY PARENTS. It's an anthology pic and he only appeared briefly in the 2nd Story called THE POEM. It was funny to have my break 'ruined' by his presence but I knew I'd keep an eye on his future projects too.

7. The visuals are stunning, but the merciless wide angled cameras and relentless candle lit rooms are way over done. STAR WARS fans believe awesome production values are more important than solid story. As I've been saying since 1977 -- you're SO wrong about that. That said -- there are two GINORMOUS sets in this series you have to see to believe.

8. You have to give it up to the people doing the background music in this show. They were completely over the top and utterly out of control. If someone said, "Pass the soy sauce please" you'd hear all these background noises and music cues suggesting they had said, "Kill them... kill them all." It was an artificial way to raise tension where drama was clearly lacking at times, but (amazingly) the music wasn't so obnoxious to make one abandon the series.

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High quality filmmaking, Solid Acting, Mediocre casting, Storyless Story

Hello,

For us Westerners China has this very frustrating style of romantic story telling. I had to go into spoiler mode to explain myself.

In the West screenwriters are aware that a romance cannot be the only plot of the story. In fact it can't be the main plot. You need something bigger and more compelling than their love. In this case it's boy and girl meet, boy falls for girl, boy invests a lot of time and effort to get girl to like him, she finally does, boy mysteriously disappears, boy and girl reunite.

That's not a lot. Consider CASABLANCA. Man tries to run a business during a war and not take a political side. A fugitive shows up and begs for help. He doesn't want to but with the fugitive is an old flame that broke his heart into a thousand pieces. Man tries desperately not to fall in love with her again and discovers that the right thing to do is to set her and her fugitive free, taking a political position because... he loves her enough to let her go.

See the difference? The love story is buried inside a plot full of risks, twists, and turns. BEST SUMMER almost doesn't have a plot. Yes it's a different style of story but young lovers exist within far more compelling plots than simply eyeing each other.

So what makes matters worse for Western eyes is that if you're going to have a movie just be about a couple -- for the love of God -- at least have them kiss at the end. I've since learned that real Chinese people can see 'kissing' as 'sex', which in the West is laughable and ridiculous. Yes, if the two are kissing in a hotel or a lovely bedroom, I get it. But if they're standing in a public park by a tree -- grow up and let them have a kiss.

Regarding kissing, a funny side note here about something that happened in this movie also happened in THE GREAT CRAFTSMAN. In this film there's a kissless love happening and the girl can no longer stand it and LUNGES at her boy and plants one on him anyway. An extremely mild form of assault. CRAFTSMAN did the same thing and had Wallace Huo LUNGE at Yang Mi to offer her an unwanted kiss. Yet that series ends like this film -- without a final kiss.

Sorry but WTF? How does Chinese culture consistently omit a consensual loving kiss but seem A-OK with a kind of rapey kiss? If anything this should be reversed. Am I crazy? Is the rapey kiss allowed because sex won't come of it? Seriously?!?

So, now with all that out of the way, I'd say the actors were pretty good but the production was great. On a limited budget they made this thing look like a major motion picture. The photography was GORGEOUS. And some people don't get photography. They think if they see pretty mountains and sunsets THAT is great photography. It can be, sure, but the real test is filming the mundane in a cinematic way -- which this movie never stops doing.

The score of this film is lovely too. It's just such a shame that all of this skill was wasted on a one ply toilet paper script. The script was so thin you could see through it and watch another film at the same time.

Please don't think I'm mean person. I did love the characters and wanted to see so much more with them. But the idea this story was once much longer as a drama boggles the mind.

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MUST SEE and so damn close to the best C-Drama I've ever seen!

(I'll warn you when this review drifts into spoiler territory.)

My first C-Drama was RUYI'S ROYAL LOVE IN THE PALACE back during Covid. I consider it a 'long form' series which means more than 12 episodes, and it's still the best long form series I've seen out of over 30 series. BLOSSOMS SHANGHAI had the potential to beat it, but dropped the ball in the final episodes. Fortunately, the ball is merely a small marble.

I like to follow actors around, and RUYI's Xin Zhi Lei (Princess Jia) brought me to BLOSSOMS SHANGHAI. I've seen her play various roles, but her strength is duplicitous vixen. Or sweetheart serpent. In this story she's a WEAPON and deployed perfectly in each frame. This series should land her some great roles in the future.

Thanks to TO THE WONDER (best short form C-Drama I've ever seen) and INTERLACED SCENES, I also came to this series to see Ma Yi Li. Anything she's in is gold and she doesn't disappoint. She's full of her usual passion, emotion, and broken dreams.

I see from her many credits that Tiffany Tang is legend, but she's a new actress for me. She had absolutely no problem sharing the limelight alongside Xin Zhi Lei and Ma Yi Li. I particularly enjoyed when she delivered lines with food in her mouth, lol. I will try to watch some her work soon.

Anyone who is a fan of world class strong female leads MUST SEE this show. To have them all in one show is a WOW.

Also new to me was none other than our lead male playing Mr. Bao, Hu Ge. In this series he's doing his best to be the Chinese George Clooney. Hu Ge plays a local legend in Shanghai, a man that can survive anything.

He survives the roaring 90's stock market. He prospers in various businesses. Under the guidance of the charming Uncle Ye he can handle almost anything: except the three aforementioned women. And one I haven't mentioned yet.

(Entering light spoiler territory)

You see, Blossoms Shanghai is a highly unique and perfectly executed love quadrangle. But by 'perfectly executed,' I don't mean it's as lovey-dovey as you'd expect. Some consider this a serious shortcoming of the series. I actually found it refreshing, realistic, and poignantly moving for true love to be so unrequited all over the place.

Kind-hearted romantic C-Dramas have a way of pairing up all sorts of characters into couples at the end. Nobody leaves 'the prom' without a date.

But in BLOSSOMS, I felt for every woman who felt Mr. Bao was out of her reach -- just as -- I felt for Mr. Bao who had a woman (or two?) always out of his reach. Uncle Ye made a point of repeating that you can't mix business with pleasure, and man did this series slam that idea home.

Great credit is due to the legendary film director Wong Kar Wai and the cinematography. This claustrophobic series lurks behind behind walls, peeks thru windows -- and yet -- manages to put you alongside these characters as well.

You will not only love every lead in this series but outright adore every supporting character. I mean every one of them, including the cigarette guy. The depth to these characters is why the show takes about 5 or so episodes to get rolling.

These people become your family and you'll miss almost all of them at series end. I'm certain most of these actors will never look this good again. The camera work and lighting and staging and costumes and set design is off the map great.

I wasn't familiar with the period pop songs throughout but they added to the carefully crafted atmosphere. And I enjoyed the Morricone inspired moments in the soundtrack score.

So why not a perfect 10 score? (9.5 isn't bad, mind you!)

1. The story is (kinda) much ado about nothing. It's a soap opera of sorts, that focuses mostly on money instead of mating. So this series bounces people off each other instead of lips. I made up a term for this series: People Opera. And it's a really great People Opera. But at the end of the day, it's just a story about a man, a street, everyone on it and their country -- trying to grow in stature. As Tina Turner once said, "What's love got to do with it?"

2. The other shortcoming is that the story kinda chickened out at the end, in the romance sense. As great as the final goodbye was between Mr. Bao and Li Li in Ep 27, I felt these two had a little more to say to each other -- about each other -- and I felt cheated. I felt this broken heart's club needed a first kiss -- that was tragically their last kiss as well.

3. Also, the final shots of Mr. Bao in the fields with electrical transmission towers simply didn't land right for me. The way we saw Miss Wang slowly leave Huange Street -- chatting with the cigarette dude -- is really how Mr. Bao needed to leave the series. His buying land thing came off as flat and irrelevant.

4. Also, the show hinted that the new elevator operator was like a young Ah Bao and that Bao was transitioning into an Uncle Ye. Perhaps they should have pursed that literally, by Bao saying goodbye to that street and inviting the young man to join his land venture. By inviting the boy off that street that seems to destroy lives, it would be a sign that the one thing Bao doesn't recommend is becoming a Mr. Bao.

And now some picky stuff --

1. The story starts with a car accident, to explain the real world scars on Hu Ge's face he got from a tragic car accident that nearly killed him. But I didn't know that until deep in the series. And so I was confused as to why Bao's face had those scars in flashbacks the occurred before the story's car accident. These needed to either be digitally removed, or explained away regarding a childhood bully who beat him senseless. It was lazy and jarring to leave the scars there.

2. Li Li's last words to Bao are her name. She says 'Li Li' and then runs up some stairs. Huh? Normally her departure might have inspired him to say 'Li Li' as in he had something more to say to her. It demonstrated to me that as amazing as this goodbye scene was -- and totally worth rewatching -- WKW still didn't quite nail this scene as I suggested earlier. Like the scars, it was just sloppy.

3. The series starts slow. Despite the appearance of a frenetic pace, it introduces a ton of characters and it takes -- I don't know -- 5 to 7 episodes to become addictive.

OVERALL: drop what you're doing and watch BLOSSOMS SHANGHAI. It's an extremely special experience.

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Bit off more than it could chew, but still rather TASTY

So I'm a story guy, and a very picky one at that -- and unfortunately the story could have been the strongest point of this piece but unfortunately ended up the weakest element. Not weak, because the idea was really good -- but I gave the story an 8 because it didn't quite perfect master it's impressive and lofty goals.

Of the story --

1. A magical element is introduced into the story. My problem is we don't know why it was dropped off on the road, nor why it was picked back up, nor why it was easy to again find. Too easy and convenient. The story would have been stronger if something a character did made the mailbox come into existence, and something bad they did made it go away again. It was just a writer's device to get the story rolling.

2. I found it rather difficult to keep all the characters straight between the two time lines. Perhaps there were too many?

3. Because the magical element wasn't explained, the 'shifted' resolution was loose end city. I think they hoped that with all the razzmatazz between timelines we wouldn't notice, but we did. (Someone said the same in comments.)

4. I could have used a little less violence. We get it, gang warfare, but so much fighting conflicts with the many romantic elements of the show. It would be like if WEST SIDE STORY was almost half musical, half Fight Club.

Of the rest --

Loved the actors. I was wondering when I'd see Ren Youlun of MAKE A WISH fame. In both series he's great at being frustrated in stressful situations. I guess it's his thing. I was also great to see his MAKE A WISH cast mate Chen Hao Lan as the kind teacher character.

Wang Ying Lu is adorable as Ye Hai Tang, the girl with the Dad from Hell. She also had quite a range. I just wish someone would hand her a damn sandwich. It's bad enough watching a young girl being mistreated by a brute, but the fact she's a small twig of a lady made me cringe each time she was struck. One sandwich a day, Doctor's orders.

Zhou Yi Ran was a standard issue C-Drama cute boy, but at the same time he wasn't generic. He was new to me (Like Wang Ying Lu) and they both did a lot of heavy lifting in this how.

Then we're treated to some great supporting actors sprinkled about two time lines. Too many to list, but standouts were Rat, the guy that played his boss and pool hall owner, the chubby security guard, and the mean/not so mean boy at the school. Which ever company produced this didn't have the big names like many shows but they found some really solid actors.

The photography was really great. So many Chinese shows present China as perfect and beautiful, which is ridiculous because the prettiest city on the planet has... outskirts... run down ghettos. This series got real with locations.

The music was okay but overused a bit in such a short series.

I made one funny rating -- I said this show has a very high rewatch value. I don't see this because it's perfect. I'm saying the confusing narrative may make better sense on the second pass, lol

THE BIG PICTURE -- I recommend the series to anybody, but it's not as good as short series like TO THE WONDER and FORGET YOU NOT and INTERLACED SCENES, which didn't bite off more than they could chew.

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Rather interesting and good... but not great

Greetings,

I'm stunned no one has written a review yet. Maybe it will encourage people to try it, since the show so far is pretty good.

1. I've watched this dynamic director before with LOUYANG. He's less about nuance, more about keeping things moving. My only annoyance with this director is his overuse of flash-zooms. I don't know what they're called but it's like you're watching something in the distance moving and then BOOM you're a lot closer. It's fake exciting and upsets my stomach. I will say in Episode 36 there's some amazing camerawork with drones in a forest during a chase scene.

2. My silly nickname for this piece is BULLETS OVER BURMA.

3. I felt this story suffered from... umm... gender imbalance. I wanted to see more of the women they had, like the Geisha and the ballerina. More romance between the obvious suspects. This plot would have benefited greatly by balancing the political inhumanities with romantic humanity. Speaking of that plot --

4. -- the idea of a man losing his memories and spending 40 episodes slowly recalling them was too complex, too drawn out, and kinda not worth it's central plot status. Personally I stopped caring at the 2/3rds point. That said --

5. -- the story becomes more addictive the deeper you go, but you must get about a third of the way in to stay in. I'd recommend watching two episodes a pop. Two episodes at a time would also help keep the MANY characters in your head, especially if Chinese names are hard for you to remember.

6. There's a weird moment where a character dies. She is laying on the ground grey as anything. What's weird is that it doesn't look like her, and so you're left wondering if said character is secretly still alive. The man that discovers her dead on the ground would know the difference. (Was the actress too busy or spooked to play dead?) I will say if this character is actually dead, it's a crime. She was one of the best and had that 'humanity' thing mentioned above.

7 . The music is a mixed bag. The background music is solid, but the two main songs belong in the credits only, but unfortunatelykeep appearing in the story itself. One is a riff of Bond's YOU KNOW MY NAME and when it appears in the show it's painfully out of place. If I were the producer of this series, I'd have made the ending credits song the opening song and composed a sad ballad for the ending credits, something most Chinese dramas of this seriousness level do with success. (Find an episode of IMPERFECT LOVE and play the ending titles. You'll want to watch the show it's so beautiful.)

8. Our lead actors are good but our story wastes them in countless talky exposition scenes. To me that story is too ornate for it's own good. Still, the actors are otherwise very talented. Xin Zhi Lei is stunning (as usual) but she -- like so many of the cast -- spends a lot of time reacting to what others say instead of doing anything. Luo Qiu Yun stands around corners or with her back to others and does the exact same reaction about 100 times. I'm not kidding. A subtle turn of the head, a subtle roll of the eyes -- over and over and over again. She's very cute/sexy/pretty but it gets old as hell.

The lead male is a little flat, like an athlete they begged to act. He has this great walk I've never seen another Chinese male actor have, which is kind of leading with his pelvis and simply commanding any room he walks into. He had a difficult role to pull off and was okay, but I felt there should have been more to him somehow.

Here is a special shout out to Dong Xuan/Michelle Dong who does wonders with exposition. She's new to me and lends this series a dignity and centered performance. I want to see more of her.

9. The overall production values are quite good... which makes me wonder why more people haven't seen it. Budget wise this show strikes me as a big deal.

10 . I'm completely unaware of the history of this period. From a Westerner's perspective it's all so new. And sad. I started a discussion below in the comments and the History Buffs shared some very interesting perspectives. I'm happy I'm watching the series and seeing things from this perspective. For those who fear it is propaganda, it is in the way any film about Good Guys VS the Nazis are.

11. Most Chinese Drama's I've watched end poorly. Like the story ends but the series drones on a bit, sometimes for episodes. This series ended properly in a satisfactory manner. Not my fave series but I'm happy I watched it.

I know I don't sound very enthused but it's a solid 7 for me at the moment. Don't let my critical self dissuade, give it a shot if you're looking for something a little different.

UPDATE -- I've since seen WAR OF FAITH and preferred that, which dropped this overall from an 8 to a 7.

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A Pleasant Enough but Non-Esseental Anthology Love Letter to Shenzhen

With all anthology shows -- this collection of short stories go up and down in quality. The bad ones are still okay, but the good ones are keepers. The connecting theme is the people and wonders that make Shenzhen 'a city of miracles'!

So really this series is a pep-rally for the Chinese, repeating the Chinese trope of work hard, work together: we succeed!!

Hmm. A bit simplistic. Not everyone gets to succeed. Life is full of people trying and failing. Life is musical chairs, where not everyone gets a chair. This propaganda tone places rose-tinted glasses over the human condition.

That said, I didn't choose this series as my 'next great C-Drama'. After having just watched the amazing BLOSSOMS SHANGHAI, one of the best C-Dramas I have or will ever see -- I wanted something light and fluffy. To lower the bar kinda very low, so that my next serious C-Drama would be better than THE MIRACLES. My goal was achieved.

Understand a lot of writers and actors and directors -- and crews -- put a TON of work into these short films. It kinda breaks you heart to know that some of them should have been chosen to become solid 90 minutes. After 35 C-Dramas under my best, I recognized a lot of quality actors throughout. So it's not an utter waste of time.

I can only recommend this show as a pleasant diversion. If that's the mood you're in, give it a try.

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THREE ERAS, ONE ERROR

Since this journey travels across time and is divided into three books, I'm going to review each 'book' as a I go.

REPUBLICAN ERA

I've seen a handful of these types of stories, and I can report with relief this isn't a bloody massacre of slayings and endless torture porn. Yes, there are some violent moments, but they're not exploited for cheap sensationalism.

This is really one of the best love stories I've seen in over 25 C-Dramas. I believe it's not as good as Crystal Liu and Wallace Huo in THE TALE OF ROSE, but it may be better than the leads of REBEL PRINCESS, and that was a killer love story.

The thing is the chemistry felt so real here between Jelly Lin and Ryan Cheng I wonder if... maybe... it was real for a reason. In fact it was so good I now understand why so many viewers were displeased by BOOKS 2 & 3 of this series. When you have this good a romance, you can't believe it ended in 11 episodes!

By the way, Jelly Lin is WHY I'm watching this series. Her roles in A DREAM OF SPLENDOR and IMPERFECT VICTIM made trying this show mandatory. She is TERRIFIC and has a very long long career in front of her, and I'm convinced she will be the heiress to Li Qin's roles when the time comes.

Liu Yijun turned in a quality performance as mob boss Zang. Instead of being a mean ruthless bastard (stereotype), he's actually remarkably understated and human. Sure, when push comes to shove, he erupts == but ironically he seems to be a man of peace.

I've seen the transition from this story the next now. I really wasn't ready to leave this story, but the times -- they are a changin'.

COMMUNISM ERA

In one sense I understand why viewer were disappointed with this era. Communism just ain't as sexy and stylish as the Republican era. But the real appeal of part one is the same appeal here: a truly great romance.

So anyone who trashes this segment still has a crush on the prior couple and neglected to move on AND/OR they have a bias against older actors and communism.

I'm here to assure you Segment Two is NOT a reason to drop this series.

The male lead Liu Yi Jun is as amazing as he is unrecognizable from his role in IMPERFECT VICTIM. People may have hated him so much in that role he begged for this one.

Tong Yao was hard to recognize from her role in RUYI'S ROYAL LOVE IN THE PALACE, because that series was a showcase of China's best female talent at that point. She's no mean girl here, and along with Liu Yi -- delivers a graceful understated performance. Their littlest looks will send romantic chills up and down your spine.

Great supporting actors here as well. Yang Yu Ting as the old bitch party leader, Zhang Ye Zi as our female lead's sister in law and childish watchdog, Zhang Rui Han as an apparently bi-polar troublemaker, and Hou Yan Song as the best friend who struggles to change with the communist times. His last moments on screen were a masterclass in nuance.

I must say there's some SERIOUS social commentary about how cruel and judgmental the Communist party can be. It's presented as a cult where party members can harshly judge you for even the mildest semblance of individuality. What really sucks is that young party types can tear into older citizens like they're filth, profoundly disrespecting their elders.

The series implies that when the working class was given the keys to rule the rich and educated, they lacked the proper skills to do so. Like making a 3rd grade student 'educate' their teacher.

I found it confusing how this series got by the censors, but have since learned as bad as they're showing things -- it's only the tip of the iceberg. Therefore, despite this series appearing to be objective, it's sugarcoating the real history and therefore is propaganda. It's like showing Nazis arguing with themselves in pubs but never mentioning the Death Camps.

I bluntly disagree with any reviewer that this segment is in any way a let down. The show clearly warns you it's about 3 different eras, not one, and this second story -- as different as it is from the first -- deserves just as much praise.

ROARING 90s

Of the three era's depicted, this was the error. Despite good intentions, I believe it was poorly conceived.

Like the last two segments, we have a romantic couple, which helps tie these three stories together. That and the fact FL Wang He Run is a relation to the families in these three stories. This is my first exposure to this actress, even though MDL claims I already know her from RUYI'S ROYAL LOVE IN THE PALACE, but it pains me to recall which character she played.

Anyway, she's quite good, and she reminds me of Crystal Lui but 8 years younger. I recently saw the ML Eric Le Yang in IN SPITE OF THE STRONG WIND, where he was rather quirky but entertaining. Here he's more geeky but just as much fun.

Both do a great job and offer a new coupling twist. Where the prior couples had cultural barriers preventing them from them from quickly becoming couples, here the problem is the couple themselves. They're not an obvious match of chemistry. These two strain the expression of opposites attracting.

But there's a message here about capitalism, one that resonated the same in THE YOUTH MEMORIES: big money makes good people do evil things. I know Westerners might scream 'Commie Propaganda!' but just one glance at America's President.

What goes wrong here is hard to pinpoint. My gut tells me that the fashion industry was the wrong industry choice. Or that using a tiny little company instead of a big one wasn't wise.

My other complaint is what I like to call WRITERS WRITING ABOUT WRITING. I've been a creative writer my entire life and observed other creative writers. The insecure writers insert a character into the story who is, themselves, a writer. They do this so that at the end of the story the struggling writer becomes famous and beloved. Like I said: INSECURE.

Our male lead is a teacher struggling with romance and career. That's fine. But towards the end of this segment it's revealed he's a writer, and not just a writer but a 'great' writer -- and the cemented this segment as a misfire and disappointment. Dear Wang Wan Ping -- the writing in your first two segments was extraordinary, never make this mistake again!!!

Apart from the actors and writing, this segment was clearly rushed and rather sloppy.

-- In Episode 25 at the 4:25 mark, PUSH PLAY and you'll see a woman in glasses leave the scene and TOTALLY bump into something offscreen and then stumble back into view. This was a flubbed take. Did they run out of time and money to re-shoot? It would be sad if that's a yup.

-- In Episode 26, around the 8:40 mark -- a fly circles the dinner table and our female lead swats at it from offscreen, another failed take. She wasn't supposed to do that because she wasn't on camera.

-- There was a moment where our ML lead leaves something by a door on the floor, he knocks on that door, and runs off. Our FL opens the door and is already looking down instead of out. Normal people first look out at who might have knocked, not down at what possible package was left. My name for this is a CHARACTER READ THE SCRIPT violation. A failed take.

The series ending was rushed as well. We needed the Aunt from the previous story to ties things together better. To speak to our FL and share the perspective of generations. Although a family heirloom re-appears again, it failed at tying everything together in a powerful way. This writer needs to see THE LAST EMPEROR and learn how to plant and pay off a prop more dramatically at story's end. This story had that chance and completely blew it.

Also, I think it would have been very cool if some of the dialog in this home was echoed over the three different generations. Suppose each female lead asked each male lead, "What do you think of this dress?" and she spun around -- IN THE EXACT SAME SPOT as all the other female leads? What if each male lead walked up to the same window and made the exact same statement like, "There must be a better way."

Such moments would have tied these stories tightly together and whispered to us, "The more things change, the more they remain the same." I think THAT message is what this series meant to say, but if it did -- it was barely a whisper.

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Great Cast, Underdeveloped Relationships

I watched this for Xin Zhi Lei and Huang Jue, only to learn that Zhao Li Ying is a big deal too.

This is a rather simple story about an older sister that sacrificed her future to secure the future of her younger sister. Younger sister becomes a successful actress and brand ambassador, whereas older sister is stuck in an unpleasant life in Myanmar. Older sister's husband decides to extort money from the saved younger sister, and chaos ensues.

Having slept on this film, I think I see a major story issue problem. The husband was a device to introduce desperation and violence to the story, to keep it from being a thoughtful character piece. And that was a huge mistake here. His character should have been erased entirely.

In screenwriting there's a very important question the writer must answer correctly: who's story is this? I don't believe it was the younger sister's story at all. I believe it was the older sister's story of sacrifice given paid off with filial abandonment.

The evidence here is the final scene where the sisters are hanging out together at a street vendor, kind of like best of friends. Well, if they were capable of being such friends, why weren't they already on this page together? Why did older sister show up so mad? Clearly she was dismissed and forgotten, but as the awkward mid-story flashback revealed -- they left on good terms.

I also believe the casting should have been reversed, where Xin Zhi Lei was the big famous actress and brand ambassador, since... she already is one, lol. I would have made the victimized sister more sympathetic, less attractive.

This is that tragedy when a rough draft isn't refined but made into a film instead. The film is certainly watchable, and the direction and production values are solid -- if not sometimes compelling -- but I have so many other Chinese films I'd recommend to someone before I'd recommend this one I'm sorry to say.

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Not perfect, but still a RECOMMEND

Watching a show about PR firms at war with each other over clients? Doesn't sound that great, right? And if I told you there are four romantic couples at various stages of coupling, de-coupling, or re-coupling -- I'd understand if you yawned.

So this show isn't about the premise. It's about the very interesting characters. You will become attached to them and start to hope this series will have a Season 2 maybe. The Gray Whale firm ends up feeling like family, but we also feel for Song Jia's character as well. I will miss them all.

So if I'm this attached -- why only 8.5? Again, Public Relations is only so interesting. Also, the lawyer couple didn't quite work. The show devoted a lot of time to their Mom/Son confusing relationship, but it seemed to go in circles to the point I wanted to see more of the young office girl and the young rich boy instead. Those two simply had a more interesting story.

But now that I've dealt with the show's weakest point, the strongest was our leads Tang Chen and Shou Bing. Song Jia is what dragged my eyes to this show and that girl doesn't disappoint. Fans of SHE AND HER GIRLS won't recognize her here, not at first anyway. But as the story progresses you'll see her stubborn self rise and it's another gem of a performance.

Jin Dong's 'Tang' was new to me and ladies -- he's easy on the eyes. I'm a Wallace Huo man myself but Wallace just may be too good looking for his own good whereas Jin Dong seems more like an actual normal man. You'll absolutely adore every second Tang and Bing spend on screen together -- and they're why this imperfect series get a RECOMMEND from me.

I love Tian Yu's 'Old Sha'. I remember him from JOY OF LIFE but find his performance here very endearing. He's got a sweet Nathan Lane thing happening and really delivers as Tang's best friend in the world.

It was so refreshing to watch a series that didn't have a soundtrack of pop songs pummeled at me non-stop. I think they had 2 songs, and they were only played once. That background music was gorgeous, however, and sets an example of how most shows should use music.

The set designs were appropriately bleak in corporate settings. The informal sets were much warmer, including the nicest hospital room I've ever seen. You hope to get sick enough one day just to be in it, lol.

Three negative notes --

1. Xin Zhi Lei fans will see her in the opening and go OMG and wait to see her appear. The wait is surprisingly long and her stay is surprisingly brief. Almost a bait and switch scenario for fans like me, but she finally got to play a role of a nice beautiful girl instead of a serpent. And what happens to her is so simple and yet so heartbreaking. It's a shame she wasn't made into an actual supporting character.

2. There's a disturbing misogynistic tone that pops up enough times to mention here. You'd presume the series was written by a man and will be shocked to learn it was written by Li Xiao, the feminist A TALE OF ROSE scribe. I just didn't like how Tang would grab Bing. How Bai Ying was dangled before men as (let's face it) 'virgin' bait. And the worst was when moments after a character was in the process of being raped -- there's this God Awful scene in an elevator with the victim that was played for yucks. That one scene prevented me from giving this otherwise solid series a 9.

3. If you devide this show into 4 acts, the second one -- where the new firm is put together -- felt padded at times. It also ran too comedic, straining the more dramatic tone of our leads. But since the first quarter and the second half moved along nicely, I can look the other way here.

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CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS AND A DOG

Overall, a very smooth journey with only minor bumps. Good story, great acting -- RECOMMEND as a brief diversion between longer more intense series. Bullets --

1. I don't know if its Chinese censors or Chinese sensibility, but I find so many of these C-Dramas set at a tone that's as intriguing as it's non-stressful. In American TV, we're assaulted with sex and violence to keep us awake, which if seen at night can make it harder to get to sleep. In China, even in a murder mystery, the settings are simply gentler, the people more normal than 'Norman Bates'. Can't deny I feel relaxed afterwards and ready for good sleep.

2. I know it's a translated title, but I just don't like it. Too technical for this piece. Something softer like DREAMS OF A GIFTED NOVELIST or THE WINDMILL MURDER. (We learn where this title comes from in the final episode, but the payoff isn't worth.)

3. It's hard to believe the female lead here is the same female lead from TO THE WONDER. (And I suspect I'll have the same reaction after BLOSSOMS SHANGHAI, which is next.) Here, Ma Yi Li's understated performance could be mistaken as phoned in, but instead is perfectly suited for her troubled home life.

4. Actress Lan Ying Ying was driving me crazy. She seemed so familiar, but in an American actress way. Each episode I could almost identify her. Then I was like, no -- she's very similar to Zhu Zhu from TALE OF ROSE. But then nope again -- until I realized Lan Ying Ying was in ROSE. Lan grows more and more interesting each time she returns. Such a great role for her. Also, a great ROSE reunion with her and --

5. Tong Da Wei. I forgot that I was introduced to Tong in THE DISAPPEARING CHILD, and so this is my third outing with him and now I'll watch anything he's in. Like Lan, just plain terrific.

6. Christine Zheng's performance is so... moving. It's not that her acting is exemplary. She just nails the role. She wouldn't hurt a fly, and we love her for this. To me, she's the Chinese answer to Elizabeth Hartman, an obscure but great actress from 1960's America. While we're on the look alike thing --

7. -- Liu Huan's portrayal of our FL's husband is great, but I'll be damned if he isn't the Chinese answer to Anthony Perkins. (That's the second reference to Norman Bates in one review.)

8. It's cool how there are two mysteries that divide the series in half EXACTLY at the halfway point of the middle episode. This makes this 15 episode series fly.

9. One picky note is that the series dispensed with characters or mentions of them a little too eagerly. The cop's husband falls out of the story completely in the second half, where a phone call between them could have reminded us of his persisting relevance. Similarly, the lady in the wheelchair had an arranged marriage fiance who disappeared from the story more out of convenience than much else. You'd think Wheelchair would be spend a lot more time complaining about his selfishness, but the story had a romance to tell and cleanly pushed this man out of the way.

This last note is a little spoilerish --

10. Again, this was an enjoyable diversion and frankly I'd like to see the 'Master' and her partner return for another mystery, joined by the separated husband, their daughter, and the cops good friend 'on wheels'. Plus we'd get to watch our FL's journey towards sensitivity and love.

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HERS STORIES is a more accurate title of this charming little film

Overall an extremely well made little film about a Mom, her daughter, and a young lady neighbor This should have been a 24 episode series, at least.

1. The cast is excellent. SHE AND HER GIRL FANS will love seeing Song Jia playing her smart but emotionally stunted self, with her now classic hand gestures. IMPERFECT VICTIM fans will be amazed at how lovely and fragile Zhong Chu Xi is in comparison to her frustrated cop role in that series. And (apparently) newcomer Isabella Zeng is terrific as the young daughter trying to navigate her way in the adult world of patriarchy, demanding mothers, annoying Dads, Mom's new boyfriend, etc. Really all the men are just as great as the women -- KUDOS to the casting agent.

2. The story isn't really much but a slice of life of women in China. Like a quality Woody Allen story, the story relentlessly pursues social commentary on topic. Woody is obsessed with infidelity, whereas HER STORY focuses on feminism issues. I'll say if 7 dashes of a spice does it, this had 9. It didn't ruin the recipe, but two dashes could have been removed and only made the 'discussion' tastier. Again, that's why I say this should have been a series where all these interesting women topics didn't have to be crammed into two hours.

3. The costumes, sets, lighting, camera, music -- they were all top notch. When those are this good you don't really notice them at first. Halfway through the film I realized they were all perfect. Watch this filmmaker and her crew.

4. Both posters for this film are TERRIBLE. It's neither a bright Disney affair nor some exotic floral journey. The Mom, Daughter, and friend need to share a poster, that's it.

4. To talk more about this film makes it out to be more than it is. It's just a very good little film. You watch it to observe these characters bump into each other. I've seen many American arthouse films fill a movie with quirky weirdos and sh!t goes down when they get together and eat. It's a sort of tradition of these types of films. Well, it happens here too -- BUT -- it doesn't feel like a sitcom stuffed with weirdos but instead real people in real situations.

Makes a perfect matinee. Don't hesitate. See the comment fields to find a subbed version.

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First time I've ever said this: the series is too SHORT!

Greetings,

Daisy Li showed up midway in A DREAM OF SPLENDOR and stood out in an already fantastic female cast. Short, scrappy, moody, pretty with big ears -- what's not to love? That's why I decided to give this micro-series a roll.

This series is decent but it suffers from a bumpy premise device. A Book of Fate makes all the rules in this story, and we don't know why the book exists, what rules it must follow, what rules it can break -- and eventually -- it came off to me as a device making all sorts of twists possible instead of believable. The twists also came too many too fast.

Whereas most series seem to be longer than they need to be, this series was too short. I think somewhere between 12 - 20 full length episodes would have covered it. But I chose this series as a bit of bubblegum between more serious series and the sweet taste lasted the entire time, so maybe shorter was the right idea.

I can now say that Daisy Li should be getting more lead roles. She's looks 23, is actually 31, but whenever she lowered her voice in pain and sorrow you FELT her actual age and it was perfect. Yes, she's likely going to get impish roles for the next few years, but I hope they give the edge she sometimes had here.

Speaking of an edge, this series had a little too much choking and stabbing of women for my taste. I love many Chinese romantic dramas because they pull back some on violence, but in just the three years I've been enjoying the 'sex' and violence have been ramping up to Western media excess.

(I put 'sex' in quotes because actually the ramping up there is good. No, I haven't really seen many sex scenes. What I have seen is couples actually kissing instead of the story going out of it's way to removing kissing from romances. My favorite scene of this short series is a great kiss. Wife and I have rewatched it about 10 times, lol.)

The male lead here was generic during the first third of this series but came to life afterwards. I'll keep an eye on his career too.

All in all a satisfying tale, but I wish the entire book thing was simpler instead of jarring. (I would have gone with a lady that talks to her in her dreams and begins appearing as a ghost in real life.)

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REVENGE THRILLER BANKS INTO A FASCINATIONG WHODUNNIT

A young dude kills a young lady in a vicious way. Fisherman Dad is pissed and plans to avenge his daughter's death. This man doesn't care who knows his quest because he's willing to die as long as the killer dies first. Our ML is tearing the place to shreds in a really scary yet entertaining way because Daddy Don't Take Prisoners.

But just before this long movie's middle it struck me -- wait -- they never showed us the killer killing the young lady. And all of a sudden we're inside a fascinating whodunnit. I won't drop any hints here but tell you the quest for the killer makes this a THUMBS UP to watch.

What I will say is the movie slightly fumbled the reveal of the executioner. We discover that someone inspired the killer to kill the young lady, but the inspiration was fumbled instead of compelling. Once you've seen this film -- and you should -- see my comment below that says REVEAL SPOILER and tell me if you agree.

I watched this because of ZHOU XUN (RUYI, IMPERFECT VICTIM, IMPERFECT LOVE, etc.) and ZHOU YI RAN (TO THE WONDER). They didn't disappoint.

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