I've been in a bit of a drama slump recently... or so I thought, before I remembered that I was following two currently airing dramas, which is probably two more dramas than most people watch at a time. lol. Anyway, one of those dramas, Fall in Love with Me, also known as Excuse for Aaron Yan Fanservice, just ended, so here are a bunch of randomly strung-together thoughts because the drama was such a mess that I don't want to spend more time thinking about it than I have to.
The actors
* Aaron played the only role he's any good at -- the jerk who may or may not really have a heart of gold -- which is honestly fine with me. If something works, milk it for as long as you can. Unfortunately, I don't really like how he's styled. When he's in disguise as Xiao Lu (the persona he takes on so he can secretly help the OZ advertising company), I like the hairstyle and glasses, but the clothing is just a disaster. (He once wore a sweater that said CROISSANT. I kid you not.) And when he's normal as Lu Tianxing, he looks snazzy in suits, but the hair is just a no.
* Tia Li is still lacking in expressions 9 times out of 10, but she did a much better job than I thought she would. Not as much of her "careful posing before line delivery" shtick. Thanks to this drama, I came up with a way to survive watching her scenes, which is to not look at the screen when she's on it! That way, I don't have to personally witness her wooden acting and her emotionless face. It's not like the drama was so captivating that I had to keep my eyes glued to it or anything.
* Surprisingly, I think Tia's at her best when she does crying scenes. If you remember that scene from Office Girls, when she's silently crying while washing off her hands in the restroom, you might see why. (It's funny how people always point to that scene when they try to argue that she's a good actress, though. Uh. That's one scene. Out of hundreds. She sucks in anything else.)
* Can somebody give a round of applause to whoever played Lance? (Wikipedia says the guy is Victor Kao, also known as Gao Yingxuan. I don't think I've seen him in anything before.) Yeah, I realize I have a soft spot for the older-brother characters, but the actor did a really good job portraying the guy who should have it all made but who gets shafted by his mom and little sis all the time. Too bad they had to turn him into the villain, but I can definitely see how he got there.
* Anyone who claims that they don't love Uncle Fu (Lu Tianxing's butler/confidante) is a liar. This character was one of the best parts of the drama.
The writing
* SOOOO BAAAAD. I don't think anybody expects super good screenplays from SETTV, but this was a new low for them. They pretty much just re-used the "crazy female antagonist" trope from Miss Rose and then decided that they didn't want to take that route and turned Lance into the villain. Sadly, Lance turned out to be the best-written character. lulz.
* I was originally quite happy with the female lead Tao Lesi, because for the first few episodes, she wasn't annoying at all, despite being played by Tia Li. Sure, she was a little uncertain being the boss of her advertising company, but you could see that she had a vision for the company and that she was willing to move forward and stuff.
* Then, in true SETTV fashion, they completely screwed her character over by making her the most passive female lead ever, just watching the love of her life get married to someone else. And the worst part? The male characters encourage her passivity. Lu Tianxing and Leo seriously just tell her to sit there and watch while they make the decisions and try to get everything under control. WTF, SETTV!? I mean, I get that Aaron is the crux of the drama, but come on.
* Also, it was a little hard rooting for the OTP, because I could not, for the life of me, understand what Lu Tianxing saw in Tao Lesi, apart from her being the younger sister of the guy he used to idolize. That's how bland Tao Lesi was. I think even the writers realized how fail of a character she was, because she was such an unimportant part in the finale episode.
* On the plus side, I did almost sob during episode 3, when the OZ people were filming that commercial with Auntie Jing and it had Xiao Xiao Bin's dad and youngest brother. What can I say, SETTV knows how to tug on those heartstrings. If only they put this much effort into the actual plot.
The music
* Yaaaay, the saving grace of SETTV dramas! The whole drama was pretty much Aaron Yan songs, which I'm totally down with. I had the ending theme, "That's Not Me," on repeat for a few days, and once Aaron's DRAMA album came out (five of the songs on the album are featured in Fall in Love with Me), I went and downloaded it almost immediately.
* I really liked the combination of upbeat opening theme and serious ending theme (continue reading for video embeds). SETTV did something similar with Just You, and it worked really well.
Both the opening and ending have official MVs, but I didn't really like either of them, so here are the TV-size videos. Please excuse the crappy English in the first video. xD
Opening Theme: "One Out of Two" by Aaron Yan, G.NA
Click to view
Ending Theme: "That's Not Me" by Aaron Yan
Click to view