Drama Rating: 5/10 Neck Score: A+
Basically season 2 is a peace offering to everyone who hated the betrayal of the first season, to give us anyone worth liking, while banking on the fact that the main couple has crazy good chemistry. So, it was a redo with the same characters in an alternate reality where he doesn't fake her medical record to make her think that she has leukemia and that he's her bone marrow match so he can trap her into marrying him. None of that. Instead he's just a stalker. The least of his crimes from before. A low key stalker who takes advantage of them getting into a scandal (because he is rich and she is famous) to trick her into an engagement to "save face" when it's actually to get her to actually marry him... so it works... kinda. At least he didn't cause the scandal. You have to then look passed the references they make to the original, like him cancelling the plan when the scandal happens, hinting that he was still capable of that, he just didn't need to this time (face palm). Whatever, I guess it's something of progress.
Instead of being a D-list level actress, she's a rising starlet in this one, which makes her scandal with him more plausible. And she's already friends with Chu Yan, which was a big change, and one I didn't like as much, because that meant that Chu Yan wasn't being a salty bitch to her at first, which was my favorite. Instead he was being a salty bro to Yi Zhou, because for some reason they weren't friendly, and there was some petty bickering there. It was just okay. I was glad that that bit of love triangle ended quickly, because I was more interested in Chu Yan meeting his own love interest. I miss her being a bad-a biker chick. She was a rich cosplayer/designer in this one, with a pretty big change in character, but oh well. I still liked her. I did like that they made all of the other couple's love stories less weird this time around too, they managed to make the personal assistant Wen Li way less awkward, keeping only his good qualities too.
The other major changes were that the villains were completely replaced with two other people who were way more normal, although still pathetic. Rather than being absolutely crazy, they needed to only be overly bitter individuals all too eager to blame their misfortunes on the rich and famous. At least they acted somewhat mature. But they weren't needing to cover up for the multitude of creepiness in the male lead, just a little, so they could be more normal. So the main conflict doesn't come from crazy villains, it comes more from real life, so that is a bit better.
In fact they changed the whole dynamic between the main couple even. In the first season, he had all the power and was a bit of a tyrant who had to be forcefully changed. Because they were in a fake engagement (not marriage) and she was a fairly popular actress, she had way more power than she had before, and instead of being a tyrant, he was chasing her and actually trying to win her a bit. A lot more push and pull.
They did like to reference the first one a lot, especially at making role reversal twists to key moments, such as the slow driving scene, the amnesia, and even the swimming pool scene. So really the whole thing was both fan service and a peace offering. I would say that if you had interest in the first and were warned against it, this one is a lot less problematic. However, since it constantly references the first season, you might enjoy this one more if you have seen it, but mostly to appreciate the jokes at its expense and how they've fixed it. But then you'd have to suffer through the first one. It still makes sense without it, so only watch it if you are morbidly curious, like me. You don't even have to watch this one. But if you want to watch any of them, the second season it a lot less messed up, so probably better. I don't think anyone even got drugged in it, so that proves it's an improvement.
Also, the ending was so cute (I guess, it got me grinning more than I expected) that any weird crap it pulled became forgiven a bit. It was way more chill than the first season, so that's not too hard. But still. It was cute, ok?!
