272. Attention, Love 稍息立正我愛你 (2017) Taiwanese

Joanne Tseng, Prince Chiu, Kuo Shu Yao, Riley Wang

Drama Rating: 6/10     Neck Score: A+

I both loved and hated this one, because it was cute and fun, and it also drove me nuts.  How many excuses can they give to make a couple clearly in love not be together?  That is basically the plot of the show, a twist on Mischievous Kiss, really.  Two kids who were basically betrothed at birth meet again in high school and fall in love, then anything that could possibly keep them apart keeps them apart.  Like he's running away from his feelings the whole time because it was hard enough for him to just accept her as his best friend and family, so taking it to the next level was too much.  Then everything getting in the way in between, it was pretty unreal.  But most of the characters were so lovable that it was fine wading through all the frustrating "you like each other, why aren't you together yet?" if you just sat back and enjoyed the ride.  Mind you, for me that was difficult to do, but it made it easier.  It also had a trolling habit of making you think things were going to be much more extreme.  Like everything will be ruined next week, or they're going to finally get together, or he's going to be even more of a psychopath, etc.  None of it ever really happened, which was part good and part frustrating.

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: