Watch for main leads
The synopsis turned me off...plastic surgery? No thanks. The poster with the leads drew me in. Male lead isn’t the typical “pretty” “gorgeous” type everyone fawns over. He is also older. If anything like Dating in the Kitchen, I wanted to try.Sure enough, I enjoyed it. The business side of it showed some brilliance in ideas. Like other stories, there’s the schemers and conspirators trying to oust the top guy. While there’s some crazy twists, there’s some nice surprises that are noteworthy.
Synopsis seeming to focus on plastic surgery is wrong. Except giving the idea that it’s dangerous if not done right, that plot was gone right after one of the sisters had one. I guess how a person changes not just physically but mentally fits in.
Janice Wu as the kind sister Xiaoting was excellent. She encounters lots of degradation but handles them with her head held up and a maturity beyond her age and experience in work field. Edward Zhang as Lian Sheng turned out to be exactly the character I wanted to see. He is very matured, quiet and thoughtful. Their meeting should of never happened and as it goes with Chinese dramas going around circles when if they simply ask, lots of dumb runaround would be avoided. His disguise at initial meeting is hilarious and he’s perfect. From there, the relationship development slowly made its way to one that was so beautiful. She’s young, he’s a lot older yet when he fell first, it was just adorable. Their chemistry was so good and I appreciate this a lot in artists acting ability. There’s a twist that springs out late that adds spice.
The supporting cast were good, when not annoying. The second leads were immature and their relationship was weird. Writer sort of dropped them towards end. The nice thing added is that there were no super evil characters, slappers, screamers (well, that’s more of kdramas to be fair). It was a pretty smooth storyline and I watched all the way through..even un subtitled few last episodes.
I could actually go back and rewatch this. It’s a 9/10 for me.
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This review may contain spoilers
Only here for the lead, can skip the rest haha
Only here for the leads!Storyline; Twins sisters Tao xiao ting and tao xiao di make their way to Shen Zhen. Older sister Tiao xiao di is materialistic and thinks that having a pretty face will get you anything. So she decides to get plastic surgery to become more attractive to meet those rich second generation. She even changes her name to Tao fei er. Her younger sister on the other hand is hardworking and not afraid to do the hard work. The male lead is an elder gentlemen who becomes the ceo of On nuo company. The previous ceo was his buddy and passed away due to heart failure, but he had an extra marital affair. The video of the evidence was in a usb and somehow the usb gets picked up by female lead. This starts their super cute and hilarious encounter. The male lead acts like a blacklist motorcycle driver who's from hong kong. His accent is so funny ( coming from a person who understand canto :)
He is basically there for the female lead when she runs into trouble, and supports the female lead in her lowest points. The female lead's true ,genuine , simple, persistent attitude slowly attracts him. He begins to want to tell her the truth.
The other ongoing story is the twin sister who got plastic surgery . You honestly could skip her parts because she is manipulative, selfish and takes advantage of her sister. She basically lies her way through trying to be with On nuo company's younger ceo. Also that young ceo is also annoying character. His character likes the female lead and consistently annoys her... but of course the female lead does not like him. The twin sister basically though she can use her beauty to get everything.
I loved the story between the lead. The male lead is not your average xiao xian rou or super good looking, but I really liked him( haha maybe because I'm getting old) He had a great maturity to him! He was also very supportive of the female lead. The two's relationship is very sweet and natural not cringey at all .I liked that you were able to witness the female lead's growth and struggles. It's a good balance between romance and work life, but honestly would be better with out the twin sister. Also another annoying part was the evil dude in the company, Doing a lot to sabotage the company... He was pretty successful and almost like a main character. I could care less about the company rival and drama inside.....
Love Janice Wu
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It's much more than the tropes it appears to be
An unusual romance pairing but executed beautifully, a plot filled with some great life lessons and values. Interesting corporate politics. It doesn't end on the usual "idealistic marriage ending" that many Chinese dramas have and it makes it a realistic and down to earth watch. Many parts of the dialogues give a sense of wholesome goodness. Male lead has very interesting expressions and non-verbal cues sustaining the audience attention. Soundtrack is particularly good and sets many scenes into the right mood.Was this review helpful to you?
Disappointed for second lead couple
Before I wacth all episodes , this drama is one of my favorite drama...... But after I wacth all the episodes, I don't really like it anymore.... Caz I was so disappointed for the second lead couple.... They end is so cruel.... I was aspecting that they will have good ending...but sadly they have bad ending.... Like they sparete make me cry so hard tho... Like the second main lead boy don't even care abt her , like wth dude.... If this drama give the second lead couple a good ending this drama can my favorite one.... But sadly....I so disappointed ☹️😞Was this review helpful to you?
Doormat & Manipulative
45eps of what the heck?Story: identical twins in big city. One is blindly naive & gullible = doormat. Second yearns for bigger than life existence at any cost. But first she plastics herself to differentiate from door-matted sister. Lots of manipulation and just revenge for big chair.
Acting: ML solid, FL is child like, SML- go back to commercials. Don’t try An adult role kiddo. All the rest were okay
Music: blerg
RW: please not again - had to skip eps just to finish.
Summary: tale of emotional abuse, narcissism, and spoiled-neglected humans. What I NEVER saw:
-FL character development-same simplicity from eps1 thru 45 - WHY?
-ML is more mature and zero - minimal physical contact - not realistic for any man.
-SFL - way too much time spent on her horrible emotional abuse upon any that got near her, especially her sister. Who got special treatment of abuse to satisfy her ugliness.
-SML- he’s just way too young to carry anything but grocery sacks nonetheless chairmen of a company role.
Watch and skip every other. Drama should have been shorter - but product placement was far more crucial.
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This review may contain spoilers
It was good until it wasn’t
I’m a big fan of Dating in the Kitchen so I was excited over this drama. It started off pretty good, I binge watched the first 30 episodes and then I found myself skipping a lot. First of all, the synopsis says that the sisters are twins but in fact the “pretty” one is a year older. The story starts by showing you how vastly different their personalities are. One is sweet and innocent the other one very self centered and materialistic. Of course I truly hated that sister lol. Both the male and female leads were fun to watch and their chemistry was there. I thought the romance was going to be a slow burn, start off as friends and then the flames would ignite the screen but sadly it wasn’t so. There was alot of tender moments such as hugging and the longing gaze once they got together but no kissing. Seriously what the heck??? Sorry there was one accidental peck on the lips, you know, the trip and fall on his lips type of thing. And that was it. A lot of time was spent on the business part of the drama and it’s evil characters. A lot of back stabbing, plotting, miss understandings. I hated the second leads. The “pretty” sister was like I said self centered. The nephew was spoiled and whinny. Too immature for his role as a chairman. The last few episodes brought on too much anxiety and I found myself skipping, skipping, skipping to the end to get a happy but bland ending.Was this review helpful to you?
CUTE main couple, but second leads are PAINFUL to watch!
As many people recommended, in the comments/reviews, skip the scenes without the leads! I regret not doing this sooner and waited until the last 5 episodes before I began skipping scenes, maybe if you are new to watching (Asian) dramas you can watch the scenes of "villainous" characters, but don't waste your time.Janice Wu and Edward Zhang are both great actresses/actors and the age gap was not very visible so it made their relationship easier to watch. They were cute and did well in their parts.
Cass Gai and Victor Wang portrayed the antagonists in the main leads' relationship/social life. While Wang's character grew at the end Gai's did not. Throughout most of the drama, they made me want to smack them though and scream at them to wake the heck up. On the bright side, the relationship between the sisters (played by Wu and Gai) was decent and Fei Er's toxic-ness is not too unique or crazy. I was scared that it was going to be similar to the relationship between the two female leads in Another Me (which I dropped cus Chen Du Ling's character is [redacted] [redacted] [redacted]), thankfully Gai's character was not all too bad and still treated Xiao Ting decently, especially when they are not in public, however, still skip her scenes unless you want to be angry.
The ending could have been extended, some side characters were just forgotten without hinting at what their life would be like and could have made the scenes with the main lead a bit longer.
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