[TVB2012] No Good Either Way 《衝呀！瘦薪兵團》 Review

 

 

Genre: Modern, comedy
# of Episodes: 21
Producer: Amy Wong
Casts:
- Ruco Chan as Mo Nga Lik (Alex)
- Kristal Tin as Ling Ning Ching (Ling)
- Louis Yuen as Man Ka Wah (Man Siu Siu / Steve)
- Natalie Tong as Mo Kin Yi (Kin)
- Gill Mohindepaul Singh (Q Bobo) as Interpal Singh (Sing Siu Lung)
- Jason Chan as Yiu Yi Long (Aaron)
- Florence Kwok as Che Wing Han (Violet)
- Stephen Au as Ko Wai Ting (Mr. Ko / Sam)
- Matt Yeung as Ho Jing Jik (Jacky)
- Leanne Li as Shum Hei Man (Flora)

What's It About? A group of working class people experienced through thick and thin as they had to cope with their unreasonable superiors while trying to survive in today world of work.

- Spoilers Alert -

No Good Either Way is much better than I expected. It is one of the funniest series I've watched in such a long time. If you're looking for a decent comedy, this is it. Even though there was nothing special about the storyline and it may not be exceptionally good, I think it was nicely scripted. The witty script-writing is what made this series so enjoyable to watch. It brought out the comedic skills of many artistes, especially Florence Kwok and surprisingly Kaki Leung. The casts also had so much chemistry together. NGEW is such an eye opener because I never thought that there were so many Indians who could speak Cantonese so fluently, even more fluently than a lot of TVB actresses O_o

The story mostly took place at a company called Goaltech. Unlike any other institutions described in the beginning, the boss of Goaltech Mr. Ko is super nice, and I mean SUPER nice to the point that it's kinda unrealistic. However, most of the time he couldn't go to work because his wife was in a coma. Although he was nice, at home, he was bullied all the time by his father-in-law, who kept calling him "idiot", and at work, Goaltech's general manager Violet used this chance trying to take control of everything. This left Alex and Steve in great distress since Violet always picked on them.

The ranking in Goaltech looks something like this:
(Mr. Ko would look less fierce though...)

Ruco Chan as Alex Mo
Alex is the chief product designer for Goaltech. Although he was smart and creative, Alex behaved pretty much like a kid. He would sneak out to play during working hours. He would procrastinate and pull an all-nighter right before the due date. He would pretend to be working hard when someone checked on him. He would be eager to prove to everyone that he was a capable person. He would complain to his big daddy aka Mr. Ko how he felt mistreated at work... There were also times when he became unreasonable, like how he refused help from A3 (A4 excluding Aaron) with the ES project and even mistreated them himself. All in all, Alex wasn't a perfect person. He was capable, but he was also unreasonable at times. He even scolded Ling and Kin for no obvious reason sometimes.

Although I wouldn't say Ruco's performance was flawless, I think he was pretty good in his role. Alex can be difficult but he also had his reasons, and at times, Ruco did convince me to side with his Alex. The way he said his lines was so convincing that even when he was wrong, he made it seemed like he was right. Ruco has this confident look himself, his diction was clear and his intonation was just right, which helped make his portrayal of Alex more believable. Ruco was ok with comedy and was quite good in those light-hearted moments, but he seemed rather weak in the emotional scenes. Maybe it was his confident look that made him a little awkward when he was acting emotional.

Kristal Tin as Ling
Alex's wife Ling on the other hand was a much more simple-minded person. To her, every complicated problem would have a simple solution. However, most of the time things didn't work out the way she wanted. And everything just got worse when she became Alex's superior. Her principles were different from his, which eventually led to their quarrel. Kristal was really natural in her role. Her Ling may seem easygoing but she was not without temper, but whilst she had temper, she still reserved her gentleness. I really like the subtlety in her performance. Kristal also excelled in those emotional scenes, especially when she sat alone and cried quietly. Ruco and Kristal made a sweet couple. Their intimate scenes were not gross at all but rather believable. However, I'm sorry to say that even though they had the majority of the screen time, their storyline was rather bland and uninteresting comparing to others. They had the more serious parts of the story which didn't manage to make them shine. Their characters also weren't as special as the supporting characters so they failed to leave a deep impression on the audience.

Louis Yuen as Steve and Q Bobo as Interpal
They were best buds and their chemistry was amazing. These two were born with comedic talents because they were funny even when they tried to be serious, especially Q Bobo, he's funny by default. Steve was the assistant manager of the marketing department of Goaltech. He was a rather unlucky guy who always got into troubles at work. Feeling that he had no future at Goaltech, Steve and Interpal decided to run various small business on their own for extra income. However, with no experience in business, he was soon back at square one. And to make things worse, Steve also had to take care of his sister and her son because her husband was being a jerk. All in all, a rather unlucky character that you'll feel bad for BUT at the same time, I'm glad that he didn't end up with Dr. Shum (Leanne Li) at the end because it would definitely irk me if that happened!! Not every single main character has to be paired with someone!!

Q Bobo was amazing because like I said, he's funny. Although there isn't much to talk about his character, I laughed so hard at this one scene where he said "What kind of world is this? One job requires you to know Chinese while another job requires you to not know Chinese!!" And when he had to listen to Kin's boss flirting with this rich lady in the car and must pretend that he didn't understand them, oh boy... that face and that expression he had really cracked me up!!

Special mention to Ho Yuen Tung (何遠東), the actor who played Mr. Diu (Steve's tenant). I don't remember seeing him anywhere else but his short appearance here was hilarious. I especially love the part where Steve and Interpal pretended to be gay so Mr. Diu can "back off"!! (Everything he did was so misleading... lol) Great interaction with both Louis and Bobo!! I missed him already!!

Natalie Tong as Kin, Jason Chan as Aaron, Matt Yeung as Jacky
Love Kin and Jacky but hate Aaron to the core!! Kin is Alex's sister. She worked at an insurance company at first but her boss treated her like crap so she quit. Later she worked as a property agent under Jacky, who eventually had a crush on her. Kin, however, only liked Jacky as a friend because she was in love with Alex's subordinate Aaron (Why, Kin? WHY??) Both Natalie and Matt did a good job here. They were natural in their roles and quite a pleasant to watch, especially Matt. I love the part where he confessed to Kin: "Here's my health record and here's my financial status. I'm healthy and I can support you. Will you go out with me?" (or something along those lines). Quite cute!!

On the other hand, Aaron is the true bastard of the series. Everything he does and says just ticks me off so much. I don't understand how Kin can deal with him. If I were her, I would dump him from the very beginning. This guy was born to be hated!! He was lazy, arrogant, jealous, manipulative, and a despicable liar who just loved to show off, definitely not a guy you can rely on. He was just fake in general. Jailing him for only a year wasn't enough for all the stupid things he did. And I don't like how they hinted Kin and him might get back together at the end. Aaron was bad and Jason's acting just made it worse. He tried too hard to act arrogant and always put up a sulky face which just made him even faker. I don't know what TVB was thinking when they decided to cast him as the lead in his upcoming series with Linda Chung. I rather watch Matt than Jason.

Florence Kwok as Violet
One word: hilarious!! Her character Violet wasn't meant to be likeable at all but I just couldn't stop loving Florence in the role. There was never a dull moment whenever she's onscreen. Violet is the de facto ruler of Goaltech. When Mr. Ko was absent, she acted as if she was Mrs. Ko and bossed everyone around. She even purposedly got closed to Mr. Ko and tried to seduce him, hence creating tons of funny moments. I love how there's always some barking noise in the background whenever she's onscreen lol :D Florence did her part very well, her performance was flawless. Such an underrated actress!! I especially love her interaction with her cousin played by Kaki Leung. They tried to be mischievous, but always turned out silly in the end. One of the funniest parts of this series was in the last episode when everyone ended up hiding inside Violet's apartment and got recorded by Kaki. She then later eagerly told Violet how she busted everyone and even asked Violet to thank her. Genius!! Their expressions at that moment were priceless!!

Stephen Au as Mr. Ko
Stephen was excellent in his role as the kind boss of Goaltech. Mr. Ko is probably the nicest boss you'll ever know. He was caring, thoughtful, humble... a saint in general. You can see a big daddy figure in Mr. Ko. Because he was all nice and such, people often exploited his kindness and tried to mess up his Goaltech. I like watching his interaction with his father-in-law the most. Although he was a big boss himself, he often got whacked on the head and acted much like a servant when being around his wife's family. Poor guy!! I felt sorry for him.

For some reasons, the reactions towards this series are quite contradicting. Some enjoyed it (like me!!), some don't like it, and some don't even bother to try it. Why though? I admit that it didn't interest me at first. After watching the first episode, I wanted to drop it as well. (But luckily I didn't!!) And from the second episode onwards, I just couldn't stop watching. The first few episodes were great with Florence and Q Bobo stealing the limelight. It did drag in the middle and got rather annoying with Ruco and Jason's characters, but again, Florence's reappearance saved it. (Yah, Florence is technically the star of the series!!) Personally, I think that this series would work better as a sitcom. Nevertheless, this is a decent comedy and one of the better series that aired this year.

My Rating: 7.6/10

Worth watching? Yes, highly recommended.

**Credit: The pictures are taken from tvb.com and just for illustration purpose**

[TVB2012] Gloves Come Off 《拳王》 Review

 

Genre: Modern, drama, action
# of Episodes: 25
Producer: Marco Law
Casts:
- Kevin Cheng as Tong Sap Yat
- Raymond Wong as Pat Ka Sing (Buddy)
- Selena Li as Chai Pak Fai (Donna / Don)
- Natalie Tong as Yam Ho Kau (Bo Bo)
- Nancy Wu as Ting Yan Chi (Ah Ting)
- Kenny Wong as Ko Wai Ting
- Power Chan as Chu Sai Cheung
- Florence Kwok as Chong Po Lam (Polly)
- Katy Kung as Chong Po Kei (Vicky)
- Edwin Siu as Leung Yan Wah (Edward)

What's It About? A very frustrating story about the lives of two Boxing Champions, who take turns making stupid decisions for living. This series turns out to be nothing but a disappointment.

- Spoilers Alert -

First of all, the title is all wrong. The Chinese title literally means "Boxing King" or "Boxing Champion" but of the two main leads, one is already a champion to begin with, and the other one MIRACULOUSLY earned that title after winning ONE match half way through the series. If they chose to keep that title, they should have at least made the story more like it, something like Kevin's character helping Raymond's character work through all the hardship and FINALLY he becomes a boxing champion. For the series we see right now, a more fitting title should be something like "How to Ruin Your Life as a Boxing Champion" Now that's what the story is about!!

Nowadays, everything is about packaging. If in Beyond the Realm of Conscience the poor script-writing was masked by those fancy costumes and ginormous wigs, in Gloves Come Off, the cliche messed-up plot about love/hate/betrayal/revenge is wrapped up and sold as a boxing drama. I'm sure everyone can tell that roughly 5% of this series is about boxing, the rest is just more or less crap to me. This is one of those series where the artistes' efforts all go to waste because the scriptwriters were all messed-up in the head. I can totally imagine them talking among themselves "Hey, I thought of this AMAZINGLY DRAMATIC plot that I'm sure all the see-lai will love. How should I make it so the ratings can go even higher, you know, beating the records of HOG and MR?" "Oh, I know. Let's add some boxing scenes so the younger guys will like it and have those half-naked muscular actors acted out so the younger gals will love it as well!!" "Well, yes, that's a GREAT idea!! Let's make a boxing series out of that to draw the younger audience as well and the ratings will be skyrocketed. YAY!!" Aww man... I feel cheated by TVB!!

Ok, that's enough of ranting for now. What's so bad about GCO? Well, a lot... but not all. I do admit that not everything in GCO is bad. For example, the father-and-son plot of Kevin and the little boy Tong Kat (Kat Jai) is one of the best parts of the series. They do act like real father and son. Their story is rather touching as well and I thought it was quite cute how Kat Jai kept opposing his father and hiding his stuff just because Sap Yat wouldn't admit that he still loves boxing. The most memorable time got to be when Sap Yat hit Kat Jai because he was rude to his grandpa. He got mad when someone badmouths his father and would defend him all the way. He wants Sap Yat to be happy so he kept urging him to box again. What a cute little kid Sap Yat has!! It's also really funny how he always talks like an old man haha... I kinda miss him when he went to Canada. Well, it's actually unbelievable that Sap Yat would let him go to Canada with his grandpa in the first place. I thought Kevin did well portraying the role of a father. When he hit Kat Jai, I kinda saw tears lingering in his eyes. Very good performance, I can feel his pain. Thumbs up to the little boy as well, very natural acting!!

 

Buddy's change in character
This is one of the highlights of the drama and I think it's fair to say that Raymond's character Buddy is the driving force of the whole series. Buddy was nothing nice to begin with and he was rather annoying. He's badmouthed, irresponsible, lazy, hot-headed, arrogant, troublesome... but at least he still has conscience. I heard a lot of people said Raymond was OTT as the goofy Buddy but I thought he was fine. His character required him to act like that. Though you can just say you don't like his character in general. Anyways, when he started to learn boxing with Sap Yat, the two became good friends and Buddy also found his goal, which is to become a boxing champion. But once he earned that title, his desires just grew bigger. He wanted to be rich and famous as well and that had led him to the wrong path. That's some character dynamic right there!! However, it's kinda sad to see his friendship with Sap Yat broke up. And when Sap Yat decided to fight him, I thought Sap Yat would have the upper hand since he trained days and nights while Buddy was slacking off. It turned out I was wrong, Sap Yat kept getting hit by Buddy. But what I didn't like is how Sap Yat just needed to hit Buddy ONCE and he WON. That didn't seem right to me (ok, I'm not a boxing expert but still, make it more exciting at least!!). And did that hit cause Buddy to have brain damage or something because he turned all nice right after? That fast? Come on, it was only ONE hit? The part where he kneeled down and apologized to Sap Yat didn't have any effect on me at all because it wasn't even convincing. I was glad that he's good again but they should have at least made it more believable!!

Buddy, Bo Bo, (and Vicky)
Raymond and Natalie were quite cute as a couple. I love the part where Buddy and Bo Bo went to Super Junior's concert and danced to their song "Sorry Sorry". That was hilarious!! I also love the part where Buddy proposed to her on the street. That wig he wore was just... O_o Just like Buddy, Bo Bo was also immature. She was pregnant but she still got herself drunk and even slapped Buddy's mom by accident (that was a funny scene though!!). Even after they got married, she just knew how to play and didn't help the family out. However, Bo Bo gradually changed for the better. She grew more mature and even became the main support of the whole family. Bo Bo was actually my favorite character in GCO. Her character development was believable and Bo Bo was the type of character that makes you root for her till the end.

Sadly, her marriage with Buddy was ruined by the retarded Vicky who just happened to escape from a mental hospital. I don't even know why they added her to the story because she just made the series more frustrating to watch. If in Sergeant Tabloid Elaine Yiu's Ko Yee Kiu traveled through time to target Niki Chow's Tsui Sum because of jealously, in GCO Katy Kung must be trying to take revenge on Raymond for what Tung Bun Sin did to her in their previous life; and this time, it was her who seduced him. Vicky was such a wicked character with a messed-up head who even went as far as seducing her sister's husband, and Buddy was probably the dumbest guy ever!! I got so mad when he cheated on Bo Bo. And I really wanted to slap that Vicky when she came to Bo Bo saying she was pregnant with Buddy's baby. That being said, Katy was successful in portraying such b*tchy character. She has potential in acting but I'm afraid that she'll get typecasted from now on. Natalie's acting hasn't exactly improved but her portrayal of Bo Bo has won my heart. I appreciated that Bo Bo didn't abandon Buddy's parents and even helped them with the tofu business despite Buddy's wrong doings. And just when Buddy finished learning his lesson, they had to kill off Bo Bo. This is seriously the WORST part of all!! How dare they kill off my favorite character just like that?! I'm still so mad at how this series had turned out!! And I still couldn't believe Bo Bo just died like that. I almost cried at the part where Buddy watched the video Bo Bo made for her older self. Raymond's acting was good too. He showed his inner emotions well. BUT I'M STILL SO MAD AT HOW THIS SERIES HAD TURNED OUT!! ARGHHHH... and that Vicky didn't even get the punishment she deserved!!

Sap Yat, Don and Edward's love triangle
This is also another part that dragged this series down because I seriously don't understand their romance. Sap Yat loves Don but doesn't dare to tell her because he doesn't think he matches her. Don loves both Edward and Sap Yat but she seems to love Sap Yat more. Edward loves Don but knows that Don loves Sap Yat. And finally Sap Yat chooses to sacrifice and pushes Don to marry Edward. And of course Edward marries Don knowing that she loves Sap Yat!! O how unromantic!! These people seriously have no life!! The night before Don and Edward's wedding, Don ran out to find Sap Yat. Ok that's understandable given that Don loved him too. Let her be the only foolish one then, but NO, Sap Yat just had to come out at that moment and even kissed her and then...... still shipped her back to Edward!! What was the point of that then, seriously?? If he chose to step out of the relationship, he shouldn't meet her and let her forget about him. But no, he just had to remind her how 'in love' they were and in the end still had no guts to run off with her. Sap Yat, you're hopeless!!

Then came the tragedy, which pretty much served as an easy way out for this love triangle. During this time however, I appreciated that Don didn't give up on Edward and still took care of him even if he treated her badly. But then I just realized that according to TVB policy, Edward must die in this case so our hero and heroine can end up together. And yes, he died. So now Sap Yat and Don can be together. NOT SO FAST!! TVB decided to give us one more round of torture: Don came down with Alzheimer!! Seriously? For real? I thought I heard it wrong. I even went online to check at what age you can get Alzheimer. And yes it's possible to get it in your 30's but that's extremely RARE even for early onset (or does anyone want to tell me that Selena's character was supposed to be in her 50's or something). Otherwise, that's just too much of a miracle for me to take!! I'm satisfied with their ending though. That meeting in the church was bittersweet. I know a lot of people root for these two to be together but as for me, after watching all this mess, I didn't care what would happen anymore!! I must say Kevin's acting in this series has clearly improved. His reaction in that final scene was great. As for Selena, she's too pretty to be sick!! And I think I mentioned this somewhere before but I still don't like the way she talked. It was so hard to listen to because she kept mixing English in her lines. Acting wise, I still don't see anything different from her. She's just like the Selena I saw in Wish and Switch, nothing special. Edwin Siu deserves the praise here though. His breakdown scene was well done. TVB, it's time for Edwin to lead a series!!

Nancy Wu as a deaf-mute female boxer
Nancy again didn't disappoint me. She was really good playing a deaf and mute character. When she visited her dying mom in the hospital, she cried and cried but she had to hold back her voice. It's hard to cry without making any sound and she was effective in that scene. I also can feel her frustration when she couldn't voice out her feelings, especially in those critical situations like when Sai Cheung kept bothering her. Unfortunately, her character Ting Yan Chi didn't manage to shine with little screen time and her storyline wasn't as exciting comparing to others. Or should I just say, Nancy's character served pretty much no purpose at all in GCO!! Well that's true, though I guess I could spare her some credit for being the reason Sai Cheung gave in to the police. That's it, no more!! (But why can't Nancy be paired with someone from her generation??)

Sai Cheung's change in character...
Definitely not a good change and comparing to Buddy's, this is way more painful to watch. He was already annoying at first and after the change, he became even more annoying. Sai Cheung is just as messed-up as Vicky. And everytime I saw him or Vicky onscreen, I just wanted to throw my laptop out of the window!! The stuff he did sometimes just creeped me out, like the time when he put Ah Ting under camera surveillance. Such a creeper!! Throughout the whole series, every time he's onscreen, I kept asking the same question "What's this guy even thinking?" because none of the things he did made sense to me. How did he even get mad at Sap Yat and others in the first place? Because he's jealous that Sap Yat was better than him in everything?? His reasonings didn't sound legit to me. I just don't get him in general. It was just over one night and he's completely different. He was just stubborn at first but he turned quite nasty after. I'm really disgusted by how he betrayed Ko Wai Ting!! Power's acting was good though. He portrayed such character with a messed-up mind so convincingly that I technically hated him from head to toe. There's one thing I've been wondering though: Sai Cheung didn't know how to fight?! I thought he learned boxing together with Sap Yat and Ko Wai Ting??

Kevin Cheng as Tong Sap Yat
When I was typing this, I realized I have a lot more to say about Kevin's acting so I saved one whole paragraph for him. During the airing of this series, there was a lot of criticism about Kevin's acting, which I think was mainly due to his scandals with some other actors. They said his acting was 'plastic' and his boxing scenes were like swatting flies. I'm no boxing expert so I can't comment on that. Comparing to Raymond, his boxing scenes were minimal anyways, and like I said before, only 5% of this series was about boxing so I wouldn't even care if his boxing was authentic or not. Acting wise, I do think Kevin showed improvements here comparing to his last series, namely Ghetto Justice. His emotions were more believable and real here. The way he had his tears lingering in his eyes was just excellent, especially in the last scene where he met Selena again. However, apart from those emotional scenes, Kevin was still Kevin, nothing special, and his body language was still as bad as ever!! I also couldn't really get on with his character Sap Yat. He seemed too good and too forgiving to be true. Can I easily forgive someone who helped put myself in jail? NO!! Sap Yat, you don't do that! You have to hate him! Keep hating him! Do what Buddy and Sai Cheung did! Hate him! Hate him! Don't talk to him! And HATE HIM!! (sorry... I got carried away :P) Nevertheless, this is some good acting from Kevin even if his character may not be the best one to watch for. Oh yes, one more thing, the theme song was wasted on Kevin. The song itself was ok I guess (I don't like the English part though) but it definitely doesn't go well with Kevin's voice. He sounded weak. Sometimes I can only hear the music and not his singing.

My Rating: 6.3/10

Worth watching? Messed-up plots + some good acting, you decide. For me, it's a no. However, if you do want to start it, don't let the beginning fool you and more importantly, don't grow to love it or else you will be very frustrated later on.

**Credit: The pictures are taken from tvb.com and just for illustration purpose**