197. Refresh Man 後菜鳥的燦爛時代 (2016) Taiwanese

Aaron Yan, Joanne Tseng, Lene Lai, Jack Li, JR (Jian Xiao Ru)

Drama Rating: 4/10     Neck Score: A+

And so ends another Aaron drama... completely ridiculously... well, it's not Fall In Love With Me bad... but it was way less good than the start of the show, when I was actually excited for it.  I think everything went down hill after they were all racist and stuff.  It was all icky after that.  They couldn't come back from that.  Not really.  It was too horrible and inappropriate, etc.  Then the show got shortened, so the plot made less sense... but it probably would have been draggy and ridiculous if it had been 20 episodes, it would have just made more sense in the pacing department maybe.  I did really love the chemistry of the main couple.  Having seen one too many bad/no chemistry couples as it is, this was very important to me.  I loved how their relationship developed both in the past and present, with those flashbacks to high school that made the present more meaningful.  I hated some of the weird cheesy stereotypes it insisted on following.  Also, why was everyone in love with that girl.  Also, way too many FILWM cameos.  We had Jack Li and Aaron, but then we also had Lance.  Tsk tsk, that's too many.  At least the Oz in this one actually did stuff and worked their butts off, on the fear of getting fired and all.  I also liked how Jack Li actually did stuff instead of just staring off into the distance.  He was a little bitca who I hated, but at least he tried.  I especially loved how out OTP made out all the time once they got together.  Good job.  But, the only thing this show had going for it was the OTP and love story, and definitely not the rest of the plot.  All the office politics stuff was boring and then they got racist- yuck- so really the show could have been 10 episodes, with just the love stuff, and it would have gotten at least an 8, but since it had all that boring and racist stuff, it is only a 4.  A mediocre show with a good OTP (despite how dense and dumb she was when it came to love) and Aaron's pretty neck.  Also, what the heck was that breaking the 4th wall at the end.  Ew, no.

Refresh Man: Falling In Love With Aaron Again

I have to say that I had my reservations about starting Refresh Man, because FILWM Syndrome.  But then I really like Joanne Tseng.  But I guess that even with the whole FILWM thing and the Instagram thing, deep down I still love Aaron, so I thought I would give it a try and see if it would make me fall in love with Aaron again.

And it has.  It is just different and fun enough to make it awesome.  It defies some of the typical stereotypes and is about more than just the romance, although that is obviously a large part of it.  It is about self-improvement and getting out of stagnation, etc.  It's also about revenge or rather making her fall in love with him.  You know, good stuff.

So, here are some things that make this show pretty great so far:

2015: The Year of Sexy Necks

Every year I make a calendar for myself, so I get exactly what I want and that sense of accomplishment.  I usually have a different theme each year (such as smiles or flower boys), and this year I decided to use my list of the Top 10 Sexy Necks as the general theme of 2015's calendar.

There was so much I could have put in here, and so many ways to do this, but I finally decided to count down to the number 1 on this list, and use the two remaining months for the other honorable mentions and general hot guys that I like and wanted to use.

Bromances Continued: 6 More Recent Drama Enhancing Men Relationships

If you're anything like me, you can't get enough of bromances, so here is a list of more bromances that have warmed my little heart and caused me delight recently.  Some of these are just recent for me (as I am currently watching them) but some are current dramas that just keep getting better as the bros keep loving (whether they want to or not) each other.

A Perfect Couple of Episodes, Until it Suddenly Undergoes a Genre Change

So we start watching a Romantic Comedy Korean Drama, and we all know now that after episode 12ish that all the sudden the crap will hit the fan and no matter how funny the drama started out, it will suddenly be a melodrama (just think how Emergency Couple was supposed to be a RomCom, but the whole second half was complete melodrama... which was actually so much better than the comedy was).  I don't know if this is a case of the dramas being "Anthony'd" (King of Dramas reference) or if the basic plot has to do that to complete itself, but seriously.  When I start a RomCom, I'm looking for comedy and romance, not melodrama.  Not sad stuff.  Funny.  With kissing and couple cuteness.  Fluffiness.

I don't know what it is about Chinese/Taiwanese Dramas, but they seem to take the genre changing even more extreme than is typical for Korean Dramas. It's not even funny how all romantic comedies start out cute and funny and by the second half of the show they are suddenly melodramatic.  I've come to just accept that fact, but recently, there has been too many over the top genre changes for my taste.

Fall in Love and Then Get Forced Onto the Crazy Train for an Epic Crash You Can't Look Away From

I take it back.  Just You should never be compared to Fall In Love With Me, because that one was actually consistently good, while Fall In Love With Me turned into one of the worst most badly written dramas I have ever seen.  It couldn't even decide what the plot was, it changed so many times.  It was like... so bad.

What started out so good has become something so incomprehensibly bad that it became unrecognizable.  Seriously, the only way for us to get through it was to tweet to each other while watching it, sitting next to each other, mind you.

Just You vs. Fall In Love With Me- two chances to see the same hot neck

It seems like everyone in my drama circle is watching Fall In Love With Me, which they probably should, because Aaron Yan.  Yep, that's the number one reason.  Jack Li is probably reason number 2, if that wasn't already the Aaron Yan OST.  I guess you could shove that into reason number 1, but I'd prefer to make it number 2 and Jack Li number 3.

Aaron Yan and Jack Li both have amazing necks.  In fact, Jack's neck bumps him up from a cute guy to a hot guy.

103. Love Family 有愛一家人 (2013) Taiwanese

Chris Wang, Jack Li, Serena Fang, Amanda Chou

Drama Rating: 4/10     Neck Score: A+

Why, oh why, Taiwan?  It started out boring, and then got decently good, and then went so dramatically drawn out that there was no way that couple could actually get back together again because he was being a noble idiot to the point of being an outright d-bag (complete with the side swoop d-bag hair) but no they wrap it all up in the last episode magically and fill it with cheesy crap hoping we'll forgive them.  Happens every time.  But, I do have to say that the bromance in this was the best in the entire world.  Sheng Ren and Long Shi were the best.  That bromance literally make everything worth it.  The part that bugged me the most was how she faked it, that really cheapened the whole emotional experience that we all went through.  She's one good actress... boo!  The writing was so bad in the last quarter that it almost ruined the earlier experience for me.  But they do love to drag things out, don't they?  Never making it so bad that you want to die, but always snatching happiness right at the moment it could have happened, right until the very end.  It's very frustrating when you've already sat through 60 episodes of fun and cute only to be tortured with 11 episodes of bitter misunderstandings before they lamely get together at the end.  Boo.

89. Fall in Love with Me 愛上兩個我 (2014) Taiwanese

Aaron Yan, Tia Li, Jack Li, Beatrice Fang, Kao Ying Hsuan

Drama Rating: 2.5/10     Neck Score: A++

It makes you fall in love with it and then turns into a train wreck.  The horrible, terrible train wreck that you can't look away from.  It's  completely awful writing.  It might be one of the worst written dramas that I have ever seen.  What makes it worse is that I loved it at first.  So much that I made all my friends start watching it.  Then it suddenly turned into a completely different drama.  It basically stole the horrible second half of Miss Rose manipulation plot for a while.  It changed plots so much in the second half that you completely forgot the first half, what was going on, and who the actual main characters were supposed to be.  Then, to make it worse, it tries to wrap everything up in a moralistic bow at the end, fixing things that cannot be realistically fixed, and redeeming people who can't be so easily redeemed, all in the space of one episode... impossible.  It was the lamest, preachiest, most horrible ending I have ever witnessed.  Seriously, what were the writers thinking?  Like a beautiful train wreck where you can't look away we finished it, making fun of how awful it was the whole time.  If it hadn't had been Aaron Yan, I might have just given up on it.  But it was seriously so bad that I stopped caring what happened so it all became funny, then it was ok.  I wrote a post about the first half, also talking about Aaron's previous drama Just You.  I also have another post here about how bad the second half was.  Spoilers included, but since I would never recommend this drama, I don't feel bad about it.  It is a seriously bi-polar drama.  So good, so bad.

52. Love Around 真愛黑白配 (2013) Taiwanese

George Hu, Annie Chen, Jack Li, Elleya Tao

Drama Rating: 7/10     Neck Score: A+

When I realized that Taiwanese dramas only go once a week and that I had to wait to watch more Just You, it prompted me to start watching this, which started around the same time.  George Hu is hot.  He has a sexy voice, face and when I read his bio, that only made him sexier.  He is like manly and cute/baby-faced at the same time while Aaron Yan is sexy and cute at the same time.  I mean George Hu looks so cute and baby faced but oozes sexy manliness at the same time.  HOW?  He plays the son of a former gangster in this one, and meets Annie Chen when she is dumped at his hotel when she catches her boyfriend cheating on her on his birthday.  Having just been recently dumped himself, he stands up for her and punches her boyfriend.  Then they become friends, helping heal each others pain.  They also figure out that she's the Radio DJ that he is constantly calling because of his ex-girlfriend.  He is the sweetest man in the world, but also super savvy because of his gangster background.  He protects her, and sneakily helps her when her radio station is in danger because of funds.  Then we have childhood friend and nerdy accountant played by Jack Li.  Love him.  What I like about the plot is that the romance is really realistic.  She over thinks everything, and everything is awkward.  They are friends who fall in love.  Nothing super formulaic or cheesy.  It does get a little hookie at the end when the family drama tries to ruin everything, but they both stay so cool that even the stupid noble idiocy thing doesn't work.  Loved it.