This has Wong Jing's trademarks all over it

TVB: What should we do for a TV drama?
Wong Jing: Hear me out. It's the 90s, there is this night club where the girls there sell their bodies for cash but they are not called prostitutes, we can't call them that. Then we have some goldfish there that men can only look at and not touch, but later they get touched, then we have this girl sell her virginity because that's what horny men wanna see. Add in a few triads and drugs and cops, this will be a hit!
TVB: Dude...
WJ: I'm bringing back Monica Chan
TVB: F yeah! I'm in!
WJ: And we'll play all the popular HK cantopop songs from the 80s and 90s!
TVB: Whoa... what about licence fees...
WJ: I know the owners, I'll call in some favours
TVB: Dude! This is gonna be a hit!

Update: ending sucks

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Boring af!

So boring! Man like wtf were the producers thinking? A young Justice Bao is all good but come on, a 10 year old kid as Zhan Zhao running around with a sword and doing dangerous stuff? No! What were they smoking?

The worst part is that it all takes place at an Inn and I could tell it would not deviate from that inn because I am 10 episodes in and they are still there investigating the same single case. I know this is a young Bao Zheng who has yet to become an official, but they make him look incompetent as he is stuck in this inn trying to unravel a murder mystery while being unable to leave due to the outside being too dangerous, all the while being protected by a 10-year-old. Geez.

It started off looking really promising but hot dang the mystery has no pulling power and I got so bored so I am going to drop it. The whole point of Justice Bao is that he solves multiple cases - one after the other - using his wit and intelligence to showcase his abilities, but this drama is clearly focused on one case and one location. This could have worked but only if it wasn’t associated to Justice Bao. Why do this?

But the worst sin of this drama? None of the female actors in it are memorable. They are all just a mush and nobody stands out at all. Wait I take that back, there is one girl Zi Fu Er who played Bai Ruan Ruan who clearly had a main role but was… sadly… ugly. They somehow managed to make a pretty girl look ugly, and that in of itself takes effort.

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I love watching Kent Cheng

This is a comedy drama and I just love watching Kent Cheng in action. He has always been great to watch act, and here in this role he is witty, smart, experienced and really had great comedic timing. He stars as a wealthy business man that has a highly dysfunctional family with a son that won’t listen to him, a girlfriend who he won’t marry and a daughter who hides stuff from him. One of the best scenes was when he finds his daughter, played by Kelly Fu, living in poverty in Hong Kong because she divorced her cheating husband - a husband Kent forced on her - and when Kent finds out he sarcastically replied, “Such a small problem and you never told me?” Just pure gold!

Kent’s quips are also on point, just so sharp and with no hesitation and he doesn’t filter his emotions either. Watching his interaction with each member of the cast is just so funny, especially with Edwin Siu and Archie Sin.

The main driving plot so far is that Kent was abducted and was threatened by his kidnappers to give them money or else. They even threw in a line “someone in your family made us do this”, to which Kent grew suspicious of everybody in his inner circle. Episode 5 brings this plot point to a “conclusion” but Kent is not convinced so this is still the main drive of the plot.

So far a very entertaining drama. I can’t wait for more episodes next week!

Episode 6-12: Kent will a still on top of his game. All the best scenes have him in it and when Edwin Siu is with him and they banter back and forth it is just extra special. The story so far has some twists and turns but as this is a comedy, it doesn’t go too insane. The abduction is now old news and no longer a driving plot point.

The biggest stereotype this drama throws out there was how the IT guy could do everything to do with computing. Hacking, Photoshop, video editing… the IT guy could do it all. And the best part was that he was the ONLY IT guy in the entire company. I know that this is just a comedy so it was done for comedic reasons and as a plot driving device, yet I kept shaking my head at the ridiculousness when everybody went up to him with all problems related to using a computer. This is like expecting a baker to know how to fix an oven when it breaks and how to make a Consommé.

Amy Fan, for now, is by far the most annoying character in the series for me. Damn, her character just sucks. So much nonsense is caused by her and her… secret son? I hope she gets her just desserts.

Episodes 13-17: man I am getting so sick of the love themes in the drama. Edwin Siu and Kelly Fu have a love theme sang by Edwin himself but it is an awful song that sounds like Edwin is trying to summon a demon through a straw. Then we have Archie Sin and Yuki Law who have a romance going in the drama and they also have a love theme that is sang by both of them. The song is a cover of a classic and the both of them butcher it, like just ruin it with their incompetent singing. Both love themes play almost every time the couples are onscreen and when there is a pause during their conversations that it not only becomes predictable but also incredibly annoying. What on earth was the sound producer thinking?

Amy Fan is the girlfriend of Kent in this drama but she keeps acting all chummy and friendly to this guy played by Felix Ng. I’ve waited ages to find out what relationship they have because they act like they were having an affair behind Kent’s back but are never given a chance to explain. Later we get a chance to find out when Kelly asked her what exactly their relationship was, but Amy refused to reveal it saying “what does it matter?” It matters to the viewers dammit! Don’t tell me you are mother and son and it’s “normal” for you guys to act like that? Geez just reveal it already!

One thing that did change for me though was the most annoying character was no longer Amy but Raymond Cho. As the character of the son to Kent, he is rude to employees, feckless and idiotic and doesn’t listen to his father’s wisdom. Instead he made so many stupid decisions that his father had to help him get out of, and later for some stupid reason he teams up with his father’s competitor to teach his father a lesson, even stealing an important document his father could use to defend himself against a false claim of recipe plagiarism. What son would do that purposely to their own father? Wtf? When Kent decided to teach his son a lesson by making him bankrupt I was fully onboard. Raymond can get stuffed! What a stupid character.

Final update: what just happened? I watched the final 3 episodes and I am still getting over how bad the ending is. Yuki Law - as the granddaughter of Kent Cheng but not really - did a sudden heel turn and took over Kent’s business when Kent signed over everything to her as insurance when he went for heart bypass surgery. Yuki took this opportunity to take over the entire company and made huge changes, fired a bunch of people and even took over the main home. Her excuse was that she knew she was not really Kent’s granddaughter since she was 8 and she was only doing what her grandfather taught her.

Suddenly, in the final episode we find out that Yuki was only doing it to teach her grandfather a lesson so he would change and for the family to get back together again because the conflict within was pulling all members apart. Why did she decide to do it all of a sudden? Because - and get this - she was reading an online novel written by some Korean called Harry Park, that just so happened to be about a family in the same situation they were in, so Yuki thought that by following the plot of the novel it would also solve the issues in her family. Wtf? And this somehow works! After Kent finds out about this, he quickly accepted it and all is well. Do you know what a real old cranky Chinese man would do in real life? Curse the granddaughter because that is some BS you don’t do to your family.

I know this is supposed to be a happy ending but come on, this is so contrived and out of left field that it requires effort to write something this bad purposely. If it wasn’t for Kent this drama would be a steaming pile of crap.

And Raymond Cho stilled sucked at the end. Man, his character is so lame.

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