Falling into Your Smile (2021)

Cute and Inspirational From Beginning to End

I have to admit, I was not one of the countless drama-watchers waiting tirelessly for the premiere of this drama. But it’s true that some of the most unexpected things are the most precious. As a sucker for Cdrama rom-coms,I can confidently and lovingly say this about Falling Into My Smile. It has stolen the hearts of many many people, including myself. I can’t exactly find any words to describe this drama; It’s perfectly cute, funny, and inspirational, tackling both problems that normal people like us face daily and problems that idols encounter during their career.

Story-9.0

There haven’t been many E-sports Cdramas, but most of them that aired were very much enjoyable to me. Falling Into Your Smile doesn’t have the most unique storyline, but I was pleasantly surprised to be presented a drama with minimal plot holesn and boringness, and that kept its strong foundation from beginning to end. (The gaming scenes were also very cool, but were also quite skippable. Fans were brought ‘into’ the computer, and we watched the fights take place.)

Adapted from the web novel ‘You’re Beautiful When You Smile’ by Qing Mei, Falling Into Your Smile delves into the world of E-sports, a professional online gaming sport that started to show prominence around the world, especially China. Just like the drama, the novel is full of sweet moments, and although some bits here and there have been tweaked, the drama is a pie served to us with just the right ingredients and the right amount, with no piece missing.

As I’ve watched more dramas, something that always stands out is how much inspiration this drama has given me; The motivation to help someone or do something for myself and the world, the inspiration that emanates from a certain character or the story itself. Right now, you’re reading a review of a very inspirational story. Perhaps not everyone will feel this way, but Falling Into Your Smile provided so much inspiration and happiness to me.

Falling Into Your Smile is perhaps the cutest and loveliest drama I have seen to date. (girl who has seen 90 Cdramas speaking here!) While other Cdrama rom-coms focus heavily on the love story between the main couple, Lu Sicheng (ML) and Tong Yao (FL)’s love story is also perfectly balanced with the strong bromance. This powerful friendship between the members of ZGDX not only provides smiles and laughs, but also shows us all the sides to a friendship, from trust, teamwork, and forgiveness.

Unlike other E-sports dramas, though, Falling Into Your Smile explores a more sensitive and harmful side of idol fans. The characters had to overcome major criticism on social media that threatened their well-being, confidence, and careers. Although this is no new problem for us veteran drama-watchers, tension was everywhere during these scenes as we rooted for our favorite characters.

Cast-9.5
Boom! Xu Kai does it again. Amazing acting? You bet! (Not to mention those smiles and teasing...) This talented actor portrays Lu Sicheng, a supposedly cold male lead, so well. Unlike other Cdrama cold male leads, though, Lu Sicheng gives off quite warm and especially caring vibes, attributes that make us a lovable male lead. Xu Kai certainly proved to us that he can slay any role, from those perky male leads in historicals to a cold but very caring modern male lead. As Falling Into Your Smile was his first modern drama (besides the Republican drama Arsenal Military Academy), he certainly has started on an amazing note.

I do not usually follow the lives of Kpop or Cpop celebrities, so I had minimal knowledge about Cheng Xiao when I started this drama. But, like her lovely singing, her acting was very natural and extremely cute! But even though Tong Yao is cute and sunshiney, she is not at all a damsel in distress. Her expressions and actions are direct. Cheng Xiao executed Tong Yao to her best, and although her acting wasn’t the most breathtaking, she took a major step in her acting career when she chose to portray Tong Yao. When the scene becomes intense, so does her expression. Tong Yao’s stern and persistent expressions can also shut someone up, while her bubbly but intelligent side makes you want to pull her to your side. I will definitely follow up on her future dramas because she certainly deserves more praise and attention from drama-watchers, not just Kpop and Cpop fans.

This chemistry is bloomingly strong and fiery. Xu Kai and Cheng Xiao couldn’t have done better showing us Lu Sicheng and Tong Yao’s cute and loving times together.

Without the supporting characters, Falling Into Your Smile would not have had that exploding spark. The pie is served to us on a golden platter: A cute main couple, another cute second couple, powerful bromance (from all teams, really), caring friendship between Tong Yao and her ‘gui mi’ (best friend) Jin Yang, and familial love as well. Did I really just list almost all the most important relationships in our lives? This drama is so well rounded when it comes to these relationships.

Please allow me to take some more time to gush about Lu Sicheng’s teammates and best friends. They. Are. The. Best! Rather than providing awkwardness when it comes to our leading couple, they were necessary for their relationship to progress. Don’t even get me started with Lu Yue or Pang Zi. These boys are a necessity, not just some supporting characters you can throw into the mix, and they were expressed so well. We followed them on their journeys of growing up, realizing that success is never without failure. Oh, the lessons we learn from dramas that seem so simple!

OST-11
FIYS’s OST deserves a solid 11. I never expected to fall in love with this soundtrack this much, but I have. Don’t be surprised when you look into my listening history and find all of the songs played over and over again. Or if my non-drama-watching friends complain about me forcing them to listen to these songs and them also falling in love with them. I think I’ll never be tired of them. With heartfelt emotion and meaningful lyrics, this rom-com’s songs are the toppings of this magnificent pie.

Rewatch Value-8.5
Oh, those sweet scenes? A definite yes! As someone who rarely rewatches dramas, so many scenes in FIYS tempt me.

Overall-9.5
Countless hours and days gushing and blushing over this drama wasn’t for nothing. This pie is wonderful, amazing, magnificent. Perhaps Falling Into Your Smile will be my favorite Cdrama rom-com of 2021, and we’re only a little over halfway through the year. The drama was cute when necessary, hilarious in other parts, and most importantly, inspirational.

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Warning: Beware of Diabetes, it includes so many sweet moments.

Wanna have some good laugh, a full dose of fluff with adorable pairing with excellent supporting characters? Falling into your smile definitely won’t fail you… to fall for its charm.

The story isn’t magnificent itself (it offers nothing new) but I fancied its pace, progress, relationship dynamics, the portrayal of friendship, how characters are written and their interactions happen. I wouldn’t consider it as fully plot-driven drama, it focuses more on the characters’ life-development-problems they face. There isn’t a specific evil antagonist here but it portrays the cruel reality of how social media, obsessive fans can play the role of antagonist with being so much toxic to the extent.

It’s not necessary to have information or have much interest in gaming to watch it, you can take it just as an individual romantic comedy.

In terms of chemistry, I felt the spark and they are just so cute together. I can’t imagine Chessman or Smiling without Xu Kai and Cheng Xiao. A classic example of a bickering couple, their fights are entertaining, the quintessential foundation for their relationship. The fact the progress in the relationship between them is very realistic surely adds more points. It does have an arc where it becomes more serious but it’s just for short time... it never stops being rom-com.

Tong Yao is just ambitious, hard-working, not to forget soo adorable, though due to her expressions she seems oblivious :’). But her development, the way she reacts to situations is genuine, I would rather say her character is rational plus human-like (The thing many drama writers forgot to make characters who can be considered as humans). Lu Sicheng can’t be considered a cold lead at all, he is just straightforward and honest. He does have different shades in nature...He can make mistakes but also admit when he is wrong. He has flaws as any normal human being can have with being a three-dimensional character. He can be very lovable, warm, tender when he is with Tong Yao but very austere and responsible as a captain of the team. Ah I forgot the important thing he is such a tease lol xD

Loved Xu Kai’s performance, was vigorous, lively. His smile is icing on the cake. I’m not fully satisfied with Cheng Xiao’s acting. As she has almost the same expression (Which looks like she’s confused) most of the time. I’m not so sure about her game ID as she doesn’t seem to be Smiling much (no pun intended). But I can let that slide as most of her previous works are in reality/variety shows and relatively she’s new in acting or maybe it’s her character that doesn’t allow her to have many expressions. Though there are particular scenes where she impressed me. Special mention: Ending scene of 26th episode and opening of 27th episode.

In technical aspects, it doesn’t have any problems when it comes to camera angles, editing, color palate/grading. Though I’m not a very big fan of dubbing and it bothered me here, it is overdubbed (Means without the original voice of actors), Especially with Xu Kai, It’s ME because it’s hard for me to hear three different voices from the same person as I have seen him in Court Lady and ALP very recently. Korean dubbing it all out of place. Sound effects are on the point with being funny many times, really liked the OSTs they wouldn’t have been more adequate. 'Heroes' give me goosebumps with its bg music, 'Follow the light' is my favorite among them with Chen Zhuoxuan's vocals

I really liked the animations of games, it has a different feel and vibe. It’s more satisfying than just listening to the commentary and actually visualizing what’s happening in the game, plus the graphics were good so more than enough. Talking about the cinematography of the show it’s not stunning but definitely decent, and as it’s about gaming it doesn’t need to be very beautiful.

This drama has one character without him… sure it wouldn’t have been this fun, and he is no other than Fatty (do I really have to explain the reason why?) His expressions and reactions are priceless plus he encounters some situations all time where he’s like ‘Is this dream?’ ‘Am I sleepwalking?’ ‘Why me?’ He just makes the drama more funny and enjoyable. He is unquestionably a show-stealer for me, and one more reason to smile. Not just him but I love all team members of ZGDX every character is colorful and with an interesting secondary couple that is like the cherry on the top.

Fun facts: After ages, any C-drama managed to stay on the trending list (on MDL) for a long time.
The end credit song 'Soulmate' is a duet by our leads Xu Kai and Cheng Xiao.

This was the end of the review.
Now if you are curious about different information as drama is facing a lot of dispute from c-netizens (Its douban rating is 3/10) some basic information about it:

It is adapted from the web novel that is implicated of plagiarism, the writer added real-life events without any consent from the people. Professional players spend 16-17 hrs every day training. They don’t really have any time to do other things as they have no time left, let the fact of having a romantic relationship aside. Unreliable portrayals and lots of inaccuracies of professional Esports players, the online gaming community, how things work out there. It is written by people who totally have zero idea about professional gaming. China has one of the largest gaming communities and Esport is becoming more widespread day by day. It has become a delicate topic to handle and for all these causes, drama receiving hate from c-netizens and gaming communities.

But people forgot at the end of the day... Its main purpose is entertainment as it's just a drama.
See you next year ;D

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