[Current Taiwanese Drama 2016] Better Man/ 我的極品男友

[blukat]

Corporate sponsorship...boy, when people want product placement, do they get it. My problem with this story is that one particular "product placement" seems to have retarded the growth of the characters and made them act and look like gullible ninnies. This show may not have gone the infantile way it has been if it hadn't been for the "Winnie the Pooh" brand and the 2 sisters taking their boyfriends to the store/museum after hanging out at the Yang household baking cookies with Momma Yang. Yi An did explain to Zhen Hao that after her mom died, they did not have a lot of time with their father due to the fact was he was the sole parent and breadwinner. The girls were old enough to be "latchkey kids" and that's what they turned out to be. He bought them "Winnie the Pooh" bears, with the caveat, that they could tell all their troubles to their bears. (lame excuse for parenting).

The "Subway" sandwich chain must be trying to make inroads in Asia as a "fast food" because I am seeing it here and in many Korean shows as well. I don't know about that Rose tea, but I am sure that's another thing gets tossed around. I just saw it in several episodes. 

I am sure these product placements, especially with the placement of Winnie the Pooh into almost every scene where the 2 sisters are talking in the bedroom at the end of the day has a LOT to do with the girls acting a little TOO girlish, and not acting their age AT ALL. This is where the producers SHOULD have looked for PROPER sponsorship to make the story believe-able. I was watching the show and have seen SO many product placements, that it's almost a non-stop running ad. It would have been better to have a romantic show without all the bears, puzzles, ice cream, sandwiches, etc. shown. This is tiresome, and I am seeing it in a lot more drama's lately, not just here. But here, it has, I believe, affected the storyline, and characters. 

What do you all think about this?

[40somethingahjumma]

My approach to the ZW and YX relationship is purely pragmatic. I don't really get the Lolita vibe but I'm concerned largely with the practical outworkings of that relationship. There are serious ramifications when two people with such a large age gap come together in holy matrimony. The fact that she's 22 isn't my biggest concern but that she's 22 going on 12 half the time. Another thing that also raises red flags for me is that ZW is doing his darndest to accommodate the in-laws. The man has bent over backwards to make that family happy. Sure, that's amazing on his part and maybe more guys should take a leaf out of his book but he's making it too easy for her and I don't want things to be easy for YX. This is where I think the Koreans get it right... make 'em suffer... put them through fire and let them earn the right to enjoy the endgame (whatever that might be). I'm perpetually uncomfortable with the thought that YX gets by (or worse still gets away with stuff) because of her aegyo and naivete. Methinks Dad Yang let her off too easily. The fact that she's got her dad wrapped around her little finger is red rag to a bull.

This is not to say that she hasn't any good qualities but I feel the show is skirting some fundamental issues that happen when two people from such disparate backgrounds with different interests come together. When men get to around that age, they also become rather set in their ways especially if they've been bachelors for so long. ZW is absurdly good-natured to point where he's not doing her any favours and it feels to me that he's doing all the heavy lifting in that relationship. I think I would've enjoyed that relationship a lot more if they had been combative like an Emma Woodhouse and a George Knightley where they thrash out their differences and he challenges her to be better when no one else dares to.

Yeah, so cradle snatch all you want, YZK... but one day you're going to have to take the pacifier out of that mouth.

The saddest part about the ZK-YZ shemozzle is that an attractive, intelligent woman like YZ seems to have given up on ever finding genuine love so that she's willing to bask in a faux romance. For goodness sake, she may as well have terminal cancer at the rate she's going. A doomed woman faced with a fate worse than death enjoying a last hurrah before shuffling off this mortal coil. Well, someone needs to accidentally drop bricks on ZK.

Still it probably won't take much for him to wake up to things if she takes off and leaves the company. She won't need a truck of doom to run her down or even to go very far before he "realises" that she's the one. He was already a blithering mess when she didn't want to be friends with him that other time. The problem now is that she's helping to perpetuate the myth that they're just friends with the odd alcohol induced benefits. He's far too complacent than is healthy and what he really needs is to be bottom kicked out of his comfort zone.

@blukat

I haven't given product placement a lot of thought quite frankly although after reading your thoughts the Pooh bear stuff made a lot more sense. I admit to cringing at the time. So apparently there was method to the madness.

[merinomedia]

@blukat I would love to say that I agree with you but I just can't. Money is a serious issue for many, if not most, TV productions. Yes, you can see it. Yes, it's so obvious sometimes you kinda wonder who thought this was a good idea. Coffee shops, anyone? Spontaneous camping trips? Characters using only one makeup line's products? (Totally ignoring cell phones) If we're going to criticize the product placement, go big or go home. I take it as just one more thing to love and to find entertaining in a drama. Catching all of them has become something of a past time for me (and why non-Korean dramas can sometimes bug me because they list all their corporate sponsors at the end and the others don't... and why I need to learn Hangul so I can know who all the corporate sponsors are) and a fun addition to how I watch a drama. I'm not proud of how desperately I want every men's bracelet I've ever seen in a drama because of that damn sponsorship. It's how the drama gets made and I fall for it hook-line-and-sinker every single time. 

I actually appreciated the detour to the Winnie the Pooh museum/store, since it explained the BS that was why they had Winnie the Pooh richard simmons all over their bedroom as grown adults (says the 26 year old woman with Winnie the Pooh shower curtains). At least they tried. Yes, it was a stretch, but it was better than nothing. I'm surprised Disney even went with that route. It seems really off-brand for them. That PP needed to be explained away and at least they did it. Now if someone could explain the giant juice bottle in the company break room I'd be beyond pleased. That one makes no sense and I need someone to explain that one. 

[blukat]

1 hour ago, merinomedia said:

@blukat I would love to say that I agree with you but I just can't. Money is a serious issue for many, if not most, TV productions. Yes, you can see it. Yes, it's so obvious sometimes you kinda wonder who thought this was a good idea. Coffee shops, anyone? Spontaneous camping trips? Characters using only one makeup line's products? (Totally ignoring cell phones) If we're going to criticize the product placement, go big or go home. I take it as just one more thing to love and to find entertaining in a drama. Catching all of them has become something of a past time for me (and why non-Korean dramas can sometimes bug me because they list all their corporate sponsors at the end and the others don't... and why I need to learn Hangul so I can know who all the corporate sponsors are) and a fun addition to how I watch a drama. I'm not proud of how desperately I want every men's bracelet I've ever seen in a drama because of that damn sponsorship. It's how the drama gets made and I fall for it hook-line-and-sinker every single time. 

I actually appreciated the detour to the Winnie the Pooh museum/store, since it explained the BS that was why they had Winnie the Pooh richard simmons all over their bedroom as grown adults (says the 26 year old woman with Winnie the Pooh shower curtains). At least they tried. Yes, it was a stretch, but it was better than nothing. I'm surprised Disney even went with that route. It seems really off-brand for them. That PP needed to be explained away and at least they did it. Now if someone could explain the giant juice bottle in the company break room I'd be beyond pleased. That one makes no sense and I need someone to explain that one. 

Hi @merinomedia, however, looking at your response, I think you DO agree with me that product placement HAS affected what gets written and shown within the scene featuring product placement. Anything showing "Winnie the Pooh" does not want a lot of "sexy time". So, they made the 2 sisters into girls with adult bodies. So, it has affected at HOW we look at products beyond just "product placement". The sponsors may have affected how the characters were portrayed. Right now, I  am watching the Chinese fantasy "Ice Fantasy" with the Chinese Elves ala LOTR. (people that have worked on LOTR are working on that one.) The characters, no matter how silly they might seem, are "believeable" within THIS context.  The context of "Better Men" is a melodrama/light romance with a push towards family values. I understand that. But when you take these sponsors and have them possibly pushing additional values, then the context becomes additionally vapid towards us. If I wanted to watch, say, a Christian show like the Duggars, I would understand these values within the context of how the people are portrayed. We do not have that "additional" piece of information telling us that, so in a way, who is being jerked around? Of course, it's the viewer. They have to figure all these things out for themselves. This thing was relatively easy to figure out just by the sheer volume of products being placed. 

By the way, that drink that was in the cafeteria area in their workspace was a Rose or Rosehip flavored drink. I don't know if it's carbonated, but it's a health drink, and I've seen them downing that here and there throughout the series. I don't read any of the Chinese languages (Cantonese or Mandarin) so I can't tell you what it exactly is, who makes it, etc. I love drinking Rosehip tea, especially during the Winter for extra Vitamin C. 

Don't beat yourself up about your Winnie the Pooh Shower curtains, I am sure most of us have had some childhood thing in adulthood. Look at how many women still love "Hello Kitty". My rant is on those that are making money off of their products and possibly ruining a script by "having to accomodate" the Sponsor's feelings or dictates. In this case, too many cooks spoiled this broth. Look at how many of us are fed up with how these women are portrayed, and what type of role model does that send to younger folks watching it? I didn't know that I signed up to watch "My 3 Sons"...which I remember watching as a young girl many moons ago. 

[merinomedia]

@blukat See, I know and expect that there will be PP and that it's going to affect the story in some way. It has to. They are paying good money to have their products featured in a meaningful way. I'm just past the point where I find it an annoying factor to a drama, but a facet of how richard simmons gets done. Have you watched King of Dramas? It's so meta it's kinda crazy (besides being an absolutely amazing drama), but it totally points this out all the time, and PP is actually part of the major conflict in the first episode. Dramas like Ice Fantasy and other historical/fantasy dramas are actually less likely to be produced BECAUSE it can't get as many sponsorships as something airing currently. You're comparing apples and chicken feet. Yes, they are both food, but I'm not gonna say they're in the same category.

They had a sponsorship from Disney for their Winnie the Pooh line. Okay, that seems kinda dumb, but there must have been something in the story that made them take it from what the writers wrote in the beginning. Crap, they gave us a bunch more money and now telling us we need to include their exhibit. Okay, this character is like a child anyway, let's go with it. Although tbh even I would have gone to that exhibit/store if I lived in Taipei and knew it existed. Hell, I would have dragged my boyfriend there kicking and screaming (if I had one, but I don't believe in that nonsense so nope). It's not really beneficial to criticize something because it is childish. I think it more has to do with how it was set up that made it super awkward. If they had done some of that annoying exposition "There's this Winnie the Pooh exhibit/store that just opened up and I really wanna go and will you go with me? Please please please? Insert story here about how it was meaningful to me growing up and I want to share that with you." Hell, that probably would have made YX seem more grown up because she's relating it to how it has developed into what she is today. It was great when YA did it, so I don't see why they couldn't have had YX do it and made it more meaningful to that relationship over YA/ZH. Honestly I think it's more of an issue of how they framed it than it existing at all.

PP is a necessary thing. Either only watch historical/fantasy dramas or expect them to be a part of the story and embrace it. The reason why I find the GIANT BOTTLE OF ROSEHIP TEA sponsorship to be so ridiculous is because it's an actual advertisement in their break room. Like what corporate break room has a giant poster of a health drink covering all of a break room wall? They totally lost me on that one and I laugh every time. It's funny cause they're not even trying to have it make sense. Go ahead and drink the drink all the time. I support this. Money. But a poster advertisement bigger than I am covering an entire wall of the break room? Nonsense.

I mean, we could go completely off topic and bring up the absolutely  ridiculous spontaneous camping trip in a park in Oh My Venus, but again, that's not helpful. It's a part of how this stuff gets made, and it actually has a very long history in television production. Really old variety shows (I'm talking the 50s and 60s Ed Sullivan and the like) had entire segments that were dedicated to a particular brand that is being advertised and they would have a whole story around some quickbread mix or cigarettes. We moved away from that model with having actual advertisement segment breaks during programming, but productions have gotten more and more expensive and so we've needed to bring them back into the show itself in a big way. This isn't new in any way, it's just new to our memory.

[blukat]

3 hours ago, merinomedia said:

@blukat They had a sponsorship from Disney for their Winnie the Pooh line. Okay, that seems kinda dumb, but there must have been something in the story that made them take it from what the writers wrote in the beginning. Crap, they gave us a bunch more money and now telling us we need to include their exhibit. Okay, this character is like a child anyway, let's go with it.....It's not really beneficial to criticize something because it is childish. 

I am NOT arguing about product placement. What I am saying, is when producers have a vision in their mind of what story they might want to produce and it gets pared down more and more by the money, it has an effect on how the story gets told. Your comment above, is "Okay, this character is like a child anyway, let's go with it"... What *I* am saying is the way the actress might ORIGINALLY have been written is NOT like that, and the money that was given had such strings attached as to change the characters, which in turn, changed the plot line they could come up with, the storylines, etc. It wasn't written FIRST like that, it was CHANGED to reflect the money that was given to the producers. In that regards, then, what am I watching? What was I originally supposed to watch? (we'll never know..) Time was wasted on what I had HOPED for was a good drama with a bit of an adult content, and NOT so much fluff, Edward Bernays must be laughing at this now. He can watch the rest of this show, because the rest of it is just an exercise for watching adult women make grown fools out of themselves. Just my opinion. This was the reason I stopped watching television over 15 years ago....maybe time to get bookin' again.

[merinomedia]

58 minutes ago, blukat said:

I am NOT arguing about product placement. What I am saying, is when producers have a vision in their mind of what story they might want to produce and it gets pared down more and more by the money, it has an effect on how the story gets told. Your comment above, is "Okay, this character is like a child anyway, let's go with it"... What *I* am saying is the way the actress might ORIGINALLY have been written is NOT like that, and the money that was given had such strings attached as to change the characters, which in turn, changed the plot line they could come up with, the storylines, etc. It wasn't written FIRST like that, it was CHANGED to reflect the money that was given to the producers. In that regards, then, what am I watching? What was I originally supposed to watch? (we'll never know..) Time was wasted on what I had HOPED for was a good drama with a bit of an adult content, and NOT so much fluff, Edward Bernays must be laughing at this now. He can watch the rest of this show, because the rest of it is just an exercise for watching adult women make grown fools out of themselves. Just my opinion. This was the reason I stopped watching television over 15 years ago....maybe time to get bookin' again.

It may just be me, but I don't see much value in wondering what the "original writing" could have been. Because it could have been total crap and definitely needed lots of hand holding to get it to where it is now. Plus, keep in mind that we're watching a daily. Production is already rushed, but this puts them at an even more ridiculous pace I'm sure. I even went back to the first few episodes to see if maybe she wasn't always this annoying and possibly something that was warped by PP, but she was just as cloyingly sweet and innocent then as she is now. And if that character was radically changed from the onset to justify why she has stuffed animals in her room than we should probably inform quite a few significantly more mature adults in our company that only annoyingly innocent people are allowed to have stuffed animals. Was the trip to the Winnie The Pooh shop handled well? No. But apparently Winnie the Pooh is crazy popular there, so I guess that makes me actually less surprised that they went the PP route. I think I've seen it or something similar in another Taiwanese drama so that's probably why it didn't phase me quite as much. But to say that a character was completely altered to justify a PP is going a little far. They just want their screen time. How they do that is up to the writer. I know the writers are not fans (at least, that's what I've gleamed from the Writers Guild of America and King of Dramas), but to say that it's completely altered a character's personalty is making some leaps.

Taiwanese shows have a tendency to overdo the characters already (and I know people that don't like Taiwanese dramas for this reason specifically), so I wouldn't say that her character was formed as a ridiculously innocent character to justify some stuffed animals. Did you watch Refresh Man? If you want to see some horribly two dimensional characters with no growth (and some criminally offensive use of blackface that was taken down by Viki) check that out. This isn't new to Taiwanese dramas by any stretch of the imagination. Plus, it seemed to me that YA was more involved with the Pooh stuff in their room than YX, but that could just be that I wasn't paying as much critical attention to her because she was annoying. It doesn't really go with the brand for their products to be associated with such an innocent character, and I doubt it's going to help their sales. If I was Disney I'd actually be pissed that my products were being highlighted by a character that is so clearly not growing up. Cause people like that probably aren't running around making a lot of money. They likely want more of an association with YA, which would explain why she did the exposition on why they loved Pooh so much. But again, that's assuming that Disney's got their hands all up in and around the production. I make jokes all the time about how Disney is the mafia, but I doubt it's going that far. Like unless there are exec producer credits from people known to be Disney I'd say that's a reach.

[riritus]

Hi everyone, i´m new on this and english isn´t my first language, but, someone saw the last ep. (53)? if you don´t you must. i saw it raw and i can´t wait until monday for the subs. 

[merinomedia]

@riritus WELCOME WELCOME!! I too have caved to the watching raw (I think a lot of us have) cause it's just that good! Many exciting things afoot... 

I'm mostly pleased because I got what I wanted with the YZ/ZK relationship. Everything else I have not really known for sure what to expect, but I did with them and I'm so happy it's happening I could die.

[riritus]

Thank you for the welcome. i´m such a fangirl with YZ/ZK couple the ep 52 their scenes made me so sad because i knew what was comming. But the second half of the ep. 53 i was jumping in one leg . All our suspicions about this couple is confirmed i´m so pleaced. And for the others couple well first YA/ZH you can fell the tension but they are very warm too. And the last but not less is YX/ZW, well this couple is very tricky, when you migh think: ohh finaly she is growing up, she mess up, but at less you can see she is trying. I must say that they are very good because although i saw most of the serie raw and then later with subs i could understan mostly everything.

 

[blukat]

Yesterday, I received notice for folks watching this story, that there has been a definite decision made to end the show at 60 episodes. Seeing that Episode 53 is already up at the other places for watching "raw", they better step it up a notch if they are going to finish this. Maybe the Olympics has something to do with shaving 10 episodes off of it. Who knows? It was supposed to have been 70 at first count. 

Bad reviews in Asia?

[Marie K]

I honestly don't understand why ppl dislike , in some cases hate, YX. There are a lot of immature 22 year olds in the world, some worse then YX (heck I worked with a 21y/o who was more annoying then YX on any giving day) Everyone has at least notice that she is changing and she knows her flaws (she told YZ she know she is lacking cooking skills but she could learn). I hate double standards because ZK is immature himself and no one express dislike or hate towards him. He travels with a backpack just like YX did but you only saw ppl complaining about her wearing hers. As for her faking her drowning, the world is filled with females going to the extreme to get attention from some guy.  Give the girl some credit, she didn't rush into her engagement in fact she was somewhat pressure by ZW grandma. Everyone is also wandering why ZW is dating someone like YX , per the description of him in the summary he was a workaholic who has little experience with women ( and fun) that only wanted to expand his cafe. YX represent everything he missed out on in his own life and he want to hold on to that and she wants nothing from him but him and to make him happy ( which nowadays someone always want something from someone else) . YX could do the most normal thing in an episode and everyone will say they are tried of her and dislike her. I really don't understand. But her sister could do the most boring things with ZH and everyone swoon. 

[40somethingahjumma]

I'm not sure what I think about recent developments re: YZ and ZK. There's a part of me that should feel vindicated for having predicted the outcome of the drunken revels a while back but it feels a tad hollow with more contrivances to make the entire scenario unnecessarily protracted. While I think that YZ is quite capable of raising the child on her own, I think it's quite wrong on every level not to tell ZK that he's the father out of some misguided sense of nobility. The fact is he should take responsibility because it does take two to tango (even if it was alcohol induced). It's short-term thinking and not really worthy of a character like YZ. So it's okay to let him off the hook now so that he can feel really good about himself later on when he finds out that he had a son which he didn't know existed which he had no part in raising.  I'm sure he'd feel really responsible then.

Obviously the show won't go that far and it's such an egregious attempt to complicate and delay the inevitable. Still I expected better from this show than to walk this well-worn path.

I can't help feeling that the show is trying a little too hard to sledgehammer us with ZK and YX's immaturity. I've completely given up on YX. She's more like a McGuffin now than a real person. They could have done so much more with the character but they chose to play up her weaknesses rather than draw on her better qualities. 

@blukat -- Where did you see that the show has been cut from 60 to 70 episodes? Ratings for the show doesn't seem all that bad. It's been steadily increasing from the beginning although the entry in Wikipedia hasn't been updated recently.

[blukat]

2 hours ago, 40somethingahjumma said:

@blukat-- Where did you see that the show has been cut from 60 to 70 episodes? Ratings for the show doesn't seem all that bad. It's been steadily increasing from the beginning although the entry in Wikipedia hasn't been updated recently.

It came up the other day. (last Friday, I believe?) Someone who moderates the show put up a notice here on Viki, and in the "inbox" I saw that he said the show was being cut from 70 to 60 shows. (He said it was "affirmed".) The 70 shows were always "TBC" meaning that is what they were working with, but were not "confirmed". The producers of the Korean Show "Beautiful Mind" just cut their show down before it ended, just recently. 

Some of the actors in this show are being featured in other shows, now, so maybe it was time. That and the Olympics. I have seen "Grandma Yang" as the "Saint Mermaid" in "Ice Fantasy" (boy, what a difference a wig makes!)  I think someone else mentioned that the oldest brother (ZW) is being featured in another Taiwanese show. So, maybe 70 was pushing it for the cast. I don't know if we'll get the storylines wrapped up in time, they might have to do "Better Man #2" and continue on with another storyline. I wonder if all the weddings will happen before Episode 60?

[merinomedia]

3 hours ago, blukat said:

I wonder if all the weddings will happen before Episode 60?

I'm so convinced we have a triple wedding on our hands it's dumb. Cause there's no way that baby is coming without a marriage. It's the heir to the company! And YA/ZH will just because they're dead fish and will go along with this hair-brained idea.

This is not to say that I wouldn't COMPLETELY LOVE a Better Man 2 that continued their story and pushed 2 and 3's marriages till a little later. I'm so crack addicted to this thing it's stupid. But I LOOOVE post relationship/marriage things and they are basically never done, so there is that. Also because Jolin Chien hasn't confirmed anything yet and I want all of him in all the things. All. Of. Him.

Kinda side note: Anyone know what's replacing Better Man? Since the announcement of the episode amount was so late I was expecting that maybe they needed to push up production of the next thing for some reason (although why they would ever want to be early over late boggles me... I'm grasping at straws). But there's been absolutely no advertisement of a new drama from SETTV, so I'm kinda confused. I knew about Better Man months before it even aired, but with whatever comes next I've got nothing. Also don't see the Olympics as being a reason for the episode cut. We're already in the Olympics and they are going to be done when the final episode airs. If anything they would want it after the Olympics to keep airing for a greater likelihood of people watching it. Unless they're looking for a ratings bump from the Olympics on their finale. IDK. I'm stretching and using lots of fan excuse bingo squares to try and explain this 60 episode nonsense. It clearly needs more episodes. Besides, I was totally expecting at least one get together, break up, and then get back together again and that didn't happen yet so there need to be more episodes.

[thunderman1]

I marathoned 1-10 last night.. The struggle was real this morning. This drama was slow to begin with but I am liking how it is carried out thus far.

One thing I don't see happening is the little sister with the older brother... she's like a little 13 year old stuck inside a 22 year old body. lol Currently, the second sister is too weak and needs to step up her game. The unrelated older sister is perfect for the CEO. She's fiesty and can handle him.

[blukat]

2 hours ago, thunderman1 said:

I marathoned 1-10 last night.. The struggle was real this morning. This drama was slow to begin with but I am liking how it is carried out thus far.

One thing I don't see happening is the little sister with the older brother... she's like a little 13 year old stuck inside a 22 year old body. lol Currently, the second sister is too weak and needs to step up her game. The unrelated older sister is perfect for the CEO. She's fiesty and can handle him.

You can read through all of the pages here, and essentially, we are all saying the same thing (that we agree with you about the youngest sister. As well, how the older sister behaves until she starts dating the second brother. It's a work in progress, the progress happened earlier to some of our cast members vs. others..You'll have to suffer through the llittle sister, though, sorry to say.She's a lost cause. (not the actress, just the way she's written.)

[blukat]

Attention! Episode 55 conversation, so if you haven't watched this far, possible EPISODE SPOILERS!!

 

Went ahead to Episode 55 (watched it "Raw") and a lot of talking in this show, so I don' t exactly know specifically what is going on. However, we know that our little bride has lost Grandma Yang's engagement ring that was a family heirloom (almost immediately as well.) She might not be used to wearing jewelry, and how to "keep things on her". She's a ditz whatever the case. In the "coming events" (preview of episode 56 yet to come) we see what LOOKS LIKE a "wedding call-off". It seems that a very concerned soon to be husband is not happy about his bride lying to him about important things. She was shown crying her eyes out. Wow..maybe NO WEDDINGS will happen to this group! (at least now.) I have a feeling that they might parlay for a "Better Man #2" at this rate. There's NO TIME LEFT to develop anything else!!

[40somethingahjumma]

I wrote a long rant which got swallowed up in the Soompi black hole. Which may be for the best.

Maybe it's just me... I don't see the point of all the lying. It's the tyranny of short-term thinking and plain silly. There's no point whatsoever. It's like a bad murder mystery where everyone lies because they think they're protecting someone and making things worse. It boggles the mind.

Ironically there's also something inherently selfish in noble idiocy. YZ isn't really thinking about ZK... At the end of the day, using the excuse of being pregnant, she's afraid that he'll tire of her. All this talk about not wanting to tie him to a "loveless marriage" is a smokescreen for her own fears. Apparently that's a valid excuse for not telling the father of the baby what's really going on. It's Noble Idiocy 101: Oh I'm protecting him = I'm not giving him a choice = It's okay to lie about the most important, most disruptive thing that's just happened to us.

I'm happy for the ZW-YX wedding to get canned for a bit. Things were going a bit too swimmingly but it won't stop me from grumbling about the stupid lost ring device. And if YX decides to go to France with her artist friend to find herself, all the better.

Seems like ZH is also ready to pop the question. He was just waiting for Uncle Wu to return but with the matter of the training centre not resolved, he won't be thinking about marriage just yet.

Good to see the writer being true to form here... laying out all the road blocks before leading the couples down what might be the home straight.

 

[40somethingahjumma]

If anyone... anyone still has any lingering doubts regarding the difference between ZK and YX, I suggest you look no further than the latest episode. I think it was just a few days ago when someone wondered out loud why the two most immature people in this show were treated differently by the viewers. Why YX was the object of "hate" and scorn whilst ZK wasn't. Well, it's obvious to me at least that while ZK has these head scratching moments of cluelessness particularly about relationships, he has a head that is screwed on properly for the most part. Of course you'd expect that from someone who runs a multi-gazillion dollar family business. Whatever shortcomings there are to his character, he makes up for it by using the organ between his ears. As for YX, I'm not even sure if there's anything between those ears. If there is, it's lying dormant.

Lest anyone thinks that this is an invective against the actress. No. It's not about the actress for me. It's the writing. It's the loss of potential. She could've been interesting. There was so much they could have done with her arc but no, they played up her silliness to the max. Yeah, she's lived a sheltered life but lots of girls live sheltered lives without turning into oversized babies.

Is there something in the water at the apartment block that causes women to be infected by a martyr complex? I had to ask. All that bravado and suffering for love's sake. Unnecessary suffering. ... "I was only thinking of you, my love. I was only trying to protect you." Meh.

I'm not happy about the implied parallels with YZ's own upbringing. The baby is not an orphan.

Call me cynical but if she's willing to take a chance on the baby and not on the baby's father... well then, how's he any different from a sperm donor? There are no certainties where these kinds of things are concerned.

Kudos to ZK for taking action now that he's collected his wits. "I won't ever treat you as an assistant, much less treat you as a friend. From now on, I will treat you as a woman. My woman, the woman of YZK. Special assistant Yao can leave (the job), but I will definitely never let YZ leave my side."

Was he cool or what? His cockiness has matured into a quiet confidence. Sob... our boy is all grown up. 

Jolin was super cool too.