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Black & White taiwanese drama review
Completed
Black & White
7 people found this review helpful
by Jasmine
Feb 26, 2016
24 of 24 episodes seen
Completed 2
Overall 9.0
Story 9.0
Acting/Cast 10.0
Music 8.0
Rewatch Value 4.0
I watched this drama because I was feeling the action/mystery thrill after Love Me If You Dare. I've always known that Black and White was a huge hit in Taiwan back in the day and watching it 7 years later is pretty fun because there are so many actors/actresses that I know and love. Lets split the romance aspect and mystery aspect into two. The romance aspect of this drama was just terrible. I had no clue why this person liked this person, and so on and so forth. It wasn't even a love triangle, it was like a huge relationship web mess. This person liked this person but changed their mind and began to like someone else then they stopped liking that person and started crying for yet another person. Did that sentence really confuse you? Well, that's how I felt about the relationships in this show. I love romance dramas;they're literally my favorite drama. However, since the relationships in Black and WHite were so messy, I would've preferred no romance at all then or just focus on one couple. Unlike Love Me If You Dare, the romance wasn't balanced well at all. Apart from the romance, the mystery plot was really tight and suspenseful. The show kept me guessing with them every step of the way. They wanted me to suspect one person? I totally fall for it then boom the bad guy was someone else. Is that really the truth? Nope, plot twist right ahead of you. When everything finally came together, I was mind-blown at how big the deceptive web reached. You really need to watch every episode to get all the seemingly meaningless clues that add up when you step back and finally see the whole story. Cast was amazing. Seriously. Mark Chao and Vic Chou were both very versatile in their acting since they had to portray many conflicted emotions. Neither one is what they seem on the surface; they're the black and white, Ying Qiong (Mark) seems to be the straight laced, honorable cop while Zai Tian (Vic) seems to be the goofy, careless cop. Though true to some extent, this drama flips all their ideals around and throws them obstacle after obstacle. The female cast was strong. I loved Ivy Chen's portrayal of a misunderstood mafia's daughter. And contrary to popular opinion, I liked Sonia's character. Janine did well too. On a whole, every actor/actress fit their part perfectly. I'm a little conflicted about the soundtrack. In some scenes where they play the upbeat songs I thought I was supposed to feel happy but the scene ended up being very serious. So although I liked the songs, they clashed with the emotions of some scenes. In the end, I think this was a wildly unpredictable with a stellar cast, and the plot did not drag at all. On the negative side, the romance plot was too all over the place. Re-watch isn't high purely because there were so many plot twists and knowing them now, it wouldn't be as interesting the second watch around. I highly recommend this drama, especially to those drama viewers out there where you like to try and link the clues together. If you want good romance, however, this isn't the drama for you. (8.5/9)
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