ettie-dramatic

The Little Show that Could

To be honest, My Page in the 90s is a drama that probably would have been shelved into a corner gathering dust for the complete lack of resources that it had. Four changes in directors, such a tight production budget that they only had one song on the OST, practically little to no marketing budget.

Many will find the drama too kitschy and campy at the start but that’s PRECISELY why I got into it. It was always meant to be a send-up of worst drama tropes and it is hilarious if you watch enough dramas (it even has the truck of doom!)

But what me made truly love it was the amount of heart it had. At the core of it is a heartfelt story of female empowerment (go normalising periods and pads!), learning to love a person because he/she sees you and believes in you (and vice versa) and learning to enjoy every small ordinary moment you have with your loved ones.

Was the cinematography & direction excellent? It had some pretty moments but it definitely came off as low cost in its sets etc (which I didn’t mind since I thought it was fairly reminiscent of the era anyway). The editing was definitely choppy at certain bits but again, with the revolving door of directors, it’s amazing that it even flowed as a story. Was the story amazing? Contrary to reviewers who thought that the ending was lazy, I actually thought it was one of the more “complete” ways of ending a transmigration story instead of the abrupt did they or did they not meet again, was it a dream nonsense. At least we know for sure that it was Gao Haiming who lived through an entire lifetime of a book to finally meet Lin Huan’er again in her universe.

The acting of the entire cast was decent, but much like how the marketing promotions for the show was carried entirely by the leads, the drama is likewise hard carried by them. Both Chen Xing Xu and Wang Yu Wen more than rise to the occasion. Their acting chemistry is so natural and so fun that it puts a smile on your face just watching them together. And when the drama takes a sudden veer into angst, they are so believable as their characters that you just cry along with them. Word of warning - the last 4 episodes is just a complete sob fest, but in the best of ways.

Would I watch it again? Absolutely yes, but with a fast forwarding of the second lead storyline and much more lingering on the happy and sweet moments between the leads.

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Wow the World - the healthiest, most stress free variety show

I’m not a huge fan of most Chinese variety shows. Even when some claim to be “healing” variety shows, there will always be some unnecessary drama being stirred up or maliciously played up to given “tension”. There’s also a lot of jostling for attention among cast members with a strong feeling of one-upsmanship.
Wow the World is the opposite of all that. It does genuinely seem to want to have the cast members be at ease and comfortable. It’s also wonderful to see how the “generation gap” is addressed - mostly in a humorous tone but also respectfully.
I couldn’t stop laughing in the first episode when Chen Xing Xu first appeared. I had only just gotten to know him as an actor through Love Between Lines and it blew my mind how completely different his actual personality was. (Which also then made me realise how tremendous an actor he was to so convincingly have people believe that he was this cool, domineering persona based on his more recent and well known dramas.) At one point I was actually wondering how he could possibly survive in the entertainment industry given how introverted and socially anxious he is. But through him, the beauty of this variety show is very clear- in the ending episode, he volunteers an ending remark and chokes up as he shares that he had always wanted to bring his family travelling and he never thought that he would be comfortable enough to travel with anyone else. However, through the show, he has truly found a family that he wants to see the world with. He then quickly apologizes for speaking out of turn or spoiling the mood. But then his Wow the World all immediately interject to reassure him that what he said was valuable and that his sincerity brings a lot to the show.
That sense of family and just different pairings makes all the difference. Although the show definitely could do with fewer indoor games and more actual interaction with the local environment like the Sicily leg (which was truly beautiful), the dynamics in the cast made for such a comfort watch. (The leaks for Wow the World 2 show that the production did take the feedback quite seriously so it’s shaping to be a same same yet different show. Hopefully it will not lose the heart and charm of the first season.)

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