I started watching The Time Traveller's Wife last night. I loved the book and read it so many times i dogeared the copy I had.I hated the movie that came out some years back. Eric Bana and that Adams chick just didn't capture the characters for me.
Theo James though... oh gosh, he is Henry. He's absolutely Henry. Rose Leslie is a good actress, and she's doing a good job, I am not sure I like her as Claire. I'm not sure why, but she's just not fitting the picture I made in my head about this woman with guts and long love. I can't fault her acting though, she's doing a great job. But it's Theo doing it for me.
I honestly am yet to not like him in anything. I can't tell if I think he's pretty, or if he's a good actor or a bad actor. I just like watching him... he makes me believe every character I've seen him play. And say what, for me, he has definitely captured Henry's humor, his fear, his kindness, his ruthlessness, his wily cunningness, all of it... I particularly loved the scene with him and Rose Leslie in The Stacks where Henry introduces Claire to his mother.
Gosh... he totally sold me.
I read a half and half kind of review from a big outlet a couple of weeks ago, and was very surprised someone attempted this story again, and was totally prepared for another wan attempt, but no... I am really liking this.
This is definitely doing some justice to Niffenegger's beautiful love story.
I discovered Chinese dramas in the wake of the news about ‘The Most Googled Show On Earth’, and I admit, Yanxi Palace was my gateway ‘drug’.
Since then I’ve watched two other 60 episode series, neither of which prepared me for the gloriousness of Ever Night.
Arthur Chen is undoubtedly the star of this piece, and despite is stunning youth (18 years old), he turns in an insouciant, endearing, impressive performance.
He captured his character’s braggadocio and swagger perfectly, and his fight sequences, from the first to the last, are incredibly well choreographed and edited incredibly well. Everyone admits he is a scamp, but he revels in it. (Doesn’t hurt that he’s adorable either.)
Irenie Song, who plays my darling Sang Sang, a tiny little girl with a BIG HEART and a sharp tongue also turns in an adorable and heart warming performance.
The chemistry between Chen and Song on screen goes from brother/sister to cameraderie to romantic, and they both do an incredible job with their characters.
The narrative, simple and uncomplicated, but with enough ups and downs and thrills, is a story well told. I thoroughly enjoyed the set up, and the long arc of development Ning Que (Chen) and Sang Sang that allowed me to invest in them...
Every time Ning Que gained in experience and advantage, I cheered a bit. When he and Sang Sang fought over The Bookworm Maniac, my heart hurt a bit too... because SANG SANG! And I knew pretty early on that Sang Sang was never going to be ‘the Little Maid’.
And mi dears... the lead up to the final battle, with its bit of a shocker (about who Ning Que really is), and the final, epic battle between Ning Que and Xia Hou, is like NOTHING I’ve seen on a TV screen.
Maybe I am old and corny now, and I don’t watch anywhere near the amount of anime I used to in my 20s, but the final battle sequence was one of, if not the best fights I’ve ever seen on film.
Beautifully acrobatic, with some moves I’ve had to watch on replay five or six times to fully catch just how badass Ning Que really is (he’s an original Badass, I said it, OG!), and its heart breaking, frightening end, it is worth watching this fight over and over... deeply rewarding it is.
After the relatively straight forward palace intrigue story lines of the last three dramas I watched, Ever Night’s story, fight sequences, special effects (industrial light and magic) and the unaffected performances of Chen and Song (and others like the actor playing Chen Pipi, and several others I just loved, like Yan Se, and Brother Chao) make this show just good, without qualification. This drama was thoroughly entertaining, from beginning to end. I liked the world created for it, and the magic in it, and I am FAN of Ning Que and Sang Sang. I ship ‘em!
I am pleased there will be another season, but heart broken Chen won’t be back as Ning Que. I’m looking forward to the continuation of the story, but I’m not sure I can buy anyone else as Ning Que. Chen possessed that role. His little side smirk and that thing he does with his mouth will forever be etched on the fabric of Ning Que for me.
A note here on the character Long Qing: Piss in his pocket! Arrogant, over praised, over pretty, twaddle head! Of course Ning Que will cut his ass eventually too, but his character arc in this season left me despising his ‘butter can’t melt in his mouth’ ass. And instead of learning, he just descended even deeper into the morass of his mediocrity. All that he did to make him myself powerful, in the end it will be his undoing. And let me also add: I think HE is the Child of Hades. Trying to malign my boy Ning Que? NO! It is Long Qing!! When S02 drops, bet me money that is what is revealed.
I watch on Viki, but for English speakers a warning: These subtitles are almost hilarious in how they interpret English. So if you watch, you will need to understand proper English yourself so you can extrapolate. It’s not terrible, but definitely not perfect.
*** rubs hands gleefully ***
Season 2 is just around the corner! I may rewatch all 60 episodes and do some short summaries for The Goddess Room, because this is definitely going HIGH on my list for Game of Thrones withdrawal fare.
Watch it. You won’t be sorry.
Scum's Wish
What a beautiful, messy bunch of fuckers. it's hard to like these people, but really hard to hate them. From beginning to end, as the tangled web of lies, jealousy, hate, deceit and perfidy they are all enmeshed in unravels, we get some of the most human characters of any anime i'v watched.
I rarely watch some of these stories more than once. Indeed my watchings of "Scum's Wish" are about two years apart and I am no less struck by this story's complexity on the second watching, as I was the first.
Seductive, Hana and Mugi's mutually destructive center holds court for the web of characters: All selfish, all cowards, all emotionally unreliable for each other.
While it is easy to fall into the trap of shipping who you want to ship, the story is true to life, in that happy endings for scum tend to be neither unlikely or overrated. For most folks, dissatisfaction and low self esteem ruin most good things.
Because everyone is scum... these are not nice people, but they love and are loved all the same.
The surprising emotional depths of this story, shock only as much as it was ever adapted. As anime goes, this is an adult story set in a high school, leaning on all Japan's narrative obsessions with school tropes you find in these stories. But it is unchildish, unrepentant in its portrayals and bittersweet (more bitter than sweet) start to finish.
Buckle up... this aintcha Mama's bishonen perfect romance heavy shojo. No friends, this is a voyeuristic & tragic look at how far cowardice can get you in relationships. Not for the faint of heart, cowards or anyone looking for shalala flavoured climaxes and saccharine perfect endings.
This is a study in anime angst like only the Japanese can produce with many, many, many thoughtful shades of grey, pink and yellow.
Where I come from we would say, "Pick sense from shit."
As Superhero shows go, this was so unusual, subversive, corny, clever and entertaining, that I didn’t mind even the slowest of moments... I enjoyed this way more than any recent time traveling show (featuring either regular-ish humans and well, supers.)
I thoroughly enjoyed not just the premise, but the execution. Special effects were not the point of the story. The mix of characters soooo eclectic, that I throughly enjoyed the way the story played itself out.
That said, the acting across the board is ok, with the stand out performance being Aidan Ghallegher’s performance of Number 5. He really brings forward this wizened and hardened nearly sixty-year old consciousness to a child’s body. And sells it!
I also enjoyed Robert Sheehan as Klaus... he was not just comic relief, but the most human of all the main characters. I thought Sheehan captured both the trauma and the joy of Klaus’s reprobate ways, and his joie d’vivre beautifully.
The only other performance that stood out for me, and not in a good way, was Emmy Raver-Lampman as Allison Hargreeves. It’s not that she is a bad actress, I just didn’t buy her belief in her character’s story. It felt like she was forcing, and her face didn’t convey her emotions well.
Everybody else was good to fine... enough that this was an enjoyable romp. I’m looking forward to Season 2.
