From Repair to Pair (2022)

Stone cold ML meets quirky FL and their story about restoring art pieces!

Didnt know what to expect when i got into this drama, but this was soooo good! Finally a good drama to end 2022 lol .

Female lead dreams to one day become an art restoration person. Her hobby and side jobs includes recreating the old art pieces and drawings. The male lead personality is stone cold, and is good at restoring the ancient art drawings/pieces. Their paths cross because of a fake painting . The male lead is also really famous online for doing live streams of restoring art pieces., but he has never shown his face only his hands. After their "fake" art piece, the female lead wants to become the apprentice of the male lead but the male lead initially was hesitant. They grow through a lot of things together and this bond makes them closer and fall in love.

This is my first drama of this type of genre. I found it refreshing and interesting, getting to learn some history too.

The leads actually had a really cute relationship, totally full of chemistry. I find it quite surprising because in real life the male lead is 14 years older than the female lead. I thought they wouldn't have any kissing scenes, but they did. Even though its not much but I really liked their cute and genuine relationship. ( wish there was more lol)

I watched it without subs

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Some shows are created great, some achieve greatness, this one needs to try harder

Let’s start with the good bits. This Show is watchable. It is not too long. It has swoon worthy moments and a bit of skinship. The ML is handsome and charismatic. The use of antique restoration is an interesting backdrop. If those statements feel a bit like faint praises that’s because while the Show does nothing drastically wrong, there is little substance to sink your teeth into.

Now let’s move on to the not-so-good bits. While the Show is watchable, the plot is tropey and uninspired. It started well enough and there are some nice plot developments early on but then it got tedious and is not helped by some loose storytelling.

There is an overarching thread about antique fraud, but it is not hard hitting at all. To be honest, it is fairly amateurish in execution. Any twists are telegraphed well in advance. Some side plots and scenes feel like busy-work as if they are drawn randomly from a shoebox of plot ideas. Can a show suffer from FOMO?

While the ML is handsome and charismatic, his role suffers towards the last 1/3 of the show. After his confession, his character becomes a bit capricious. I get that people can behave a bit “funny” when they are in love, but his portrayal is stilted and hammy. I’m inclined to blame the director for some iffy instructions. The personality shift does not sit comfortably with his style.

The FL has the feisty, street-smart girl role down pat. Unfortunately, she doesn’t have the experience nor the range yet to give her role real depth. She can smile and cry on cue, but you can sense that she is being told what to do rather than owning the role. This contributes to my next point.

I don’t ship the OTP wholeheartedly. The script would have us believe that they are madly in love, but I don’t sense a strong chemistry between them. Yes, they went through all the typical rom-com tropes, and they say all the right things, but it is not convincing. I also dislike the script’s propensity of leading the actors to the brink of confession and then pull back hard only to have the leads suffer from some misunderstanding in the next scene. All that can be avoided if their feelings are clear. Once more around that blasted mulberry bush we go. As someone who wanted to ship them, it is frustrating and unrewarding.

Speaking of CP’s. I can see the writer wants to push the opposite attracts trope so 2CP is a mismatch and tiresome to watch. Of course, they will get together in the end, the drama gods have spoken! I get more chemistry while watching dough rise.

Sometimes, a show can be lifted by a good ensemble cast but the secondary characters here are problematic. The 2ML won’t take no for an answer and is delusional. The cousin of the FL is the main troublemaker. He is not evil, but he is stupid, greedy and inept. Yet the Show paints him as a loveable rogue. Even though he does so much damage, he is always forgiven and handled with kid gloves. Most of the secondary characters are one dimensional and farmed out to actors with limited abilities. It is not a happy confluence.

The antique restoration theme is largely used as a plot device. They try to make it educational, but the titbits of information soon feel superfluous. They should put a disclaimer before the show to make sure viewers DO NOT try this at home.

Am I being harsh? Yes. I’m not mincing words because the Show is not trying to do better. You can find B grade shows that is hitting above its weight or really awful shows that should never be made. It is the crowded middle that is a quagmire for mediocre shows to sink out of sight.

I don’t believe in dismissing shows just because it doesn’t have top stars or a big budget. I have been pleasantly surprised by a number of second or even third tier productions. Nevertheless, It is a waste when you pair decent actors with a decent production and you still ended up with an insipid mishmash.

OST is serviceable. Rewatch? You jest. Peace out.

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It's all about Cultural Appreciation

A Talented art restorer takes in a student and falls in love with her.

STORY
What I loved the most about this drama is the production. The drama is about cultural appreciation and the importance of preserving history in form of art. I loved all the artwork and the little lessons we got at the end of some episodes. They were really cool. The setting was also so cool. I loved the rural-urban area where the film was shot.
The romantic plot wasn't anything new, but I loved the lack of immature conflicts and misunderstandings, despite their huge potential. Every time I thought the drama was going to make a cliche move, they went all 360 on me and proved that characters in C dramas can be mature when it comes to romance. All the couples were so mature in the aspect of love and that gave it the realism that we never see in C dramas. Both the SML and SFL took their rejections very well, and did not let that ruin their friendships and relationships.

CHARACTERS
I loved Qin Zhiyuan's character so much. He was a total weirdo (The good kind that is cute and funny). His character first comes off as your typical cold and arrogant male lead, but with time, we see that he's actually the cutest guy ever. He had a cute and child-like side that only his closest friend and Qiu Yuan got to see. He was also extremely talented in his field.
Qiu Yuan on the other hand was such a sweetie. She was an ambitious and talented girl who was persistent for what she wanted. She had a massive crush on QZY from the start as he was someone she looked up to in the industry. After a few encounters and conflicts, she becomes his student and her feelings for him grew into love. She was such an authentic character, she had her bubbly personality which brought out QZY's child-like side, and they balanced each other perfectly as a couple. There were sometimes that I could really see the age difference between them, but that wasn't much of a bother.
Zuo Huairen is the first SML I can proudly say that I like. I'm someone who has never found an SML pleasing, but Huairen proved me wrong. He was a mature, level-headed, and kind guy who cherished his friends very much. His character was very pleasing. Gao Shuo and Liu Xuan were also very cute characters, I loved their relationship. Xixi and Youxian were also a cute addition to the drama, their stories didn't drag at all.

FINALE
This is a really good drama, you should watch it. The production, the acting and everything are perfect. I love the music too. Though the story isn't the most original, it has so many other good qualities to overshadow this flaw.

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Don't waste your time. Cheesy and corny RomCom with bad acting

"From Repair to Pair" is last year's RomCom drama released in Dec 2022. I did not watch it and was not plan to watch it. However, I ended up watching it to kill time while waiting for new dramas to be released by iQiYi, Tencent, YouKu, and MangoTV.

I was so disappointed with this drama for the following reasons:
- Bad acting across the board from lead actors, actresses, and supporting cast.
- It was a bad script.
- I was annoyed by Zhang Chao, the ML who played Qin Zhi Yuan, a well-known art repairer, who took in an apprentice, Qiu Yuan, played by Teresa Li.
- Their onscreen chemistry is terrible, and both the ML and FL cannot act. I was annoyed by their relationship and interaction with each other. Especially the ML, whose character is much older than his apprentice but so prideful and acts childishly.
- Qiu Yuan's cousin is a loser, and she bailed him out numerous times; the guy does seem to learn his lesson.
- If I were his girlfriend XiXi, I would dump him long ago.
- I was so annoyed about the series that I watched in 1.5x and 2.0x speed to see the ending. To my disappointment, it was a cheesy and stupid ending.

I give it a 4.0 rating and would not recommend anyone to watch it.

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Light and perfect to see on a rainy day

I was looking for something light and slice of life type, so this drama came at the right time for me

The story is interesting - although I think it lacked more scenes over the topic - and the characters are nice. Overall, the chemistry between the actors worked, they seem to have gotten along well off camera, which was evidenced in their performances together, but I think because the actress is 11 years younger than the actor they probably didn't want to put anything "more adult" or "spicy" (idk which word i can use to describe), so the "romance" part here it's pretty slight. I believe they show how much they love each other by trying to protect each other and doing things for each other. I would say if they had a love language it would be acts of service lol.

The FL is my fav character from this drama, she is very adorable and smart. Beyond charismatic and beautiful! Worked well here, I liked it. I also liked her evolution as a person, she matured a lot.

SL was the worst part of this cdrama. In addition to being extremely clingy and boring, he thinks he can interfere in the FL's life because he grew up with her. Tbh, i'm getting sick of this type of SL, they think they "own" the women who are their friends, as if they were their property. He's a joke. I really liked that ML made fun of him.

ML is ok. Cold-hearted type, but with an detail: he is very introverted, and i liked that. For me, she brought light into his life and that was lovely to watch.

My consideration is that one is a drama to watch with a light rain in the background and pretensions left aside. You won't find super chemistry and an adult romance or super plots, but you will laugh, get to know a very interesting area and find the construction of the novel cute

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Série légère, courte avec une jolie romance

Une série légère, située dans le contexte des restorateurs de peintures anciennes.
Un cold restorateur de génie rencontre 1 (très, trop) jeune FL qui veut à tous prix devenir son apprentie. Elle va le devenir et ils vont faire face à un trafic de faux, devenir un couple et résoudre les pb familiaux.

Réalisation vive, animations (endings) sympas, cela permet d'apprendre pas mal de choses sur la culture et la beauté des peintures chinoises.
Bons acteurs et story cohérente.

J'aime beaucoup le ML, mais je suis gênée par le CL (le age-gap est trop visible et le personnage de la FL très très puéril).
L'ensemble est agréable à regarder mais ne restera pas gravé dans les mémoires...

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