Current Fav OST Tracks from Hot Shot (籃球火)

Ending theme of the currently airing Taiwanese drama serial, 籃球火 (Hot Shot), 一半 sung by Jerry Yan 言承旭 himself, 1 of the male leads of the show too:



Me quite surprised Jerry Yan actually sounded not bad for the song! But then, this type of 'melt melt' song is my fav type, so, maybe I'm a bit biased. ;)

Anyway, complete version of the song not available yet, it's not in the OST album. I guess it'll be recorded in Jerry's own album in the near future.
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The other craze from the same show: Superman, by 倪子冈.

The dance seen in the clip is performed by the basketball team during their warmup sessions, then when they won their 1st championship title, they danced this in front of their opponents & fans, driving the opponents nuts!

This isn't the official MTV for the song, but I prefer this version from the 幕后花絮, cos it's the only complete version of the dance. Hence the screen shots don't look so 'cool'.

For a fuller impact of how the dance infuriated the opponents, view episode 6 of the drama, when the team danced after they just won.

黑糖群侠传 is Surprising Not Bad

Initially didn't really wanted to watch the not-so-good acting of the 棒棒堂男孩 & 黑girl (previously known as 黑涩会美眉).

But at that time, didn't find any other good shows to watch, & had thought the sypnosis quite interesting, so gave the 1st episode a try.

Now I'm on to episode 5, and frankly speaking, I find the show slightly more engaging that the 篮球火!

Oh, the youngsters' acting have only improved slightly, but fortunately, the plot isn't all that complicated. You can't go too far wrong with all the usual love triangles and 欢喜冤家 kind of couples in the popular 偶像剧 format.

What's interesting is how the drama incorporates the 古代武侠 elements into the present day situation. Imagine all the gongfu in 金庸's stories actually existing in the modern society. There're schools (hidden in bamboo forests of some 八卦阵) to teach potential students the different types of gongfu.

Chemistry is actually the art of making poisons. Physics is the skill of 暗器. And the students all dread the exam of Modern Gungfu History, where they have to memorise the various fights & gongfu styles used by 黄飞鸿 & 霍元甲!

Of course, in the spirit of traditional 武侠小说, there will be some secret gongfu manual the 邪教 is trying to lay their hands on, which is kept in the school's 藏经阁 (ie. the library). So the good guys will have to train their young proteges in some formidable gongfu to defeat the bad guys. What a totally predicatable but always popular plot!

To add a further mockery to the gongfu setting, all the key characters have names & certain characteristics that resemble some popular 武侠小说 character: eg. 令狐聪 is the 1st disciple & has the best kungfu，郭敬 is slow to learn but very upright，小聋女 has poor hearing cos she trained in 狮子吼!

All in all, an entertaining show for someone looking for light-hearted brainless relaxing hour of fun. Just my type of drama right now!

Better Shows to Watch than 楚留香传奇

Yes, have finally given up on 楚留香传奇.

Now that am watching 太王四神记 on Astro from 10:30pm, my whole night is nearly fully occupied in front of the tv, barely have time for the internet! And the 楚留香 is so wishy-washy on the story telling, I can't tahan all the draggy love talking anymore!

I need a better show to relax in my limited time!!!!!!!!!

Giving up on 美味关系 (Sweet Relationship)

Have given up trying to follow 美味关系 on 8TV.

I just cannot tahan the female lead 侯佩岑!!!!!! For some reason, she just doesn't seem at all like the sweet innocent girl the character is supposed to be, & it gets on my nerves to see her pretend to be one.

Too bad couldn't finish this Vic Chou show..........but when the drama focus around the female lead, even the best male actor would find it difficult to overcome such a great barrier.............

这里发现爱 Wish to See You Again Summary

Genre: romance drama. is meant to help promote Taiwan as a tourist destination.

Episodes: 16

Leads: 仔仔（周逾民），朱孝天，王传一，陈妍希.

More info at DramaWiki.

Motivation to watch: Thought will be interesting to see how this drama is supposed to help the Taiwanese tourism board promote Taiwan overseas. Besides, the lead is 仔仔, & I had a good impression of the female lead 陈妍希 from her 1st show Why Why Love.

Sypnosis: The 3 male leads were close friends from high school. 10 years since, 王传一 is helping out in his family's hotel business & 仔仔 became a popular novelist, who turned to driving a taxi to get inspiration for his new novel. Thus he met 朱孝天, whom they've lost contact after the latter migrated to the USA after graduation.

The show revolves around the friendship & love stories of the 3 men, with flashbacks to their high school days, detailing how 朱孝天 & 王传一 gained the friendship of recluse 仔仔.

陈妍希 is the subodinate of 王传一, & initially had a crush on the dashing PR manager. She later became the love interest of 仔仔, whom she mistaken to be a suicide attempt while the latter tried to get back his inspiration from her. 陈妍希 is also a family friend of dejected 朱孝天, who rejected the love of 陈妍希's sister, since he still couldn't forgive himself for failing to save his father's business.

Another subplot in 关颖, dream girl of 王传一, ex-fiance of 朱孝天.

My 2 fav parts of the show:




Extended trailer at : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBhMUOD9jm0

Loves: Got interested in Taiwan's 阿里山 after watching the show!!!!!!! The place was filmed so beautifully & seemed rather interesting. I had thought it was simply another nature reserve/mountain, but think the place is rather well developed as a tourist spot. Wanna go visit!!!!!

Oh, & they did a rather good showcase of the 101 building: the fireworks on New Year's Eve looks wonderful! Have never knew it possible to have fireworks of a building like that! And now I know, if visiting the building, must post a letter from the post office there, cos will have a unique 101 building postmark!!!!!

Hates: the slipshod ending. Can't stand how all the characters repent/made decision in the last few minutes of their stories, when they've spent >10 previous episodes rejecting the other party.

Finished watching 这里发现爱

Oh! the last 3 episodes were such a drag!!!!!!! Sooooooo predictable of taiwanese idol dramas to come up with some miserable twist to the story near the end, so that there'll be a happy end in the last episode.

And the last episode is so different from the rest of the show!!!!! They spent the 1st 15 episodes building up all the characters, only to have the main character repent in the last episode without any explanation of why he so suddenly 'gain enlightenment' & became the ideal good son & boyfriend. Did they have a different scriptwriter for the last episode or what???? Or maybe it was like the scenario in "On Air", where the last episode was filmed 1st before the prior episodes' script were written?????

Sigh!!! I guess can't expect too much. After all, I did have an enjoyable 13 episodes before the story developed downhill.

Especially around episodes 6~7, when the 2 leads started falling in love, it was soooooo sweet!!!! And so funny to see 仔仔's character get jealous in episodes 10~12! Really think 仔仔's acting has improved, watching the show mainly for him! ;) Pity he's so thin, would have been perfect if he looks a bit more healthy...........looking forward to see his next show!

陈妍希 was not bad, I thought. Even hubby noticed her across the room. She really reminded me of 大S. Wonder why she got so much bad press????????

这里发现爱 OST

Nearly every drama serial I loved has a good OST. Shows need good songs to bring the audience into the mood. And the story will help bring out the essence of the song.

So though I wasn't expecting much from the OST, since didn't really like the show's starting song by F4, I got to notice this song played whenever the female leads were having a sad time with their love life:

I believe in Love, by WOW 头号人物



The MTV for the song itself is actually rather boring. It was much more touching to hear the song when you're watching the drama's love story unfold..........really heart melting!!!!!! Kinda wish I can make my own mtv from the drama scenes to show you what I mean!!!!

Surprisingly, the rest of the OST used for the show are not bad, rather suitable for the drama. Don't think it's good enough to listen on its own, but as the soundtrack it did a very good job, I thought!

Vic Chou's 白 was not bad too.......well, at least I noticed the song when watching the show. Don't think much of the singing, but the tune & lyrics did the show justice, touching enough for me to actually find out about the song. So I guess it's a 'success'. ;)

这里发现爱 Episode 2

Started watching this show today.

Turns out to be not bad, funnier than I expected. 仔仔's character quite amusing, doing all sorts of weird interpretations of others' advice to him in his hunt for inspiration to write his novel. And 仔仔's acting really improved, now is less exaggerated & more believable when he acts like the crazed novelist. Only dislike is that he's gotten too thin!!! Not so nice!!!!!

王传一 is so cool in the show as a 花花公子! Much more good looking that 朱孝天, who looks fat in the show & has such a strange lopside hairdo. Looks like 王传一 got a more meaty role than 朱孝天, since the former appeared in the 1st episode already, while the latter only turned up from 2nd half of episode 2. Looking forward to see how 王传一 will chase the girl of his dreams......