At Dolphin's Bay - drowning in sugar

[dangermousie]

Even such a lover of overwrought, ridiculous melodrama as I am had to pause and boggle at the miracle that is twdrama At Dolphin's Bay.

Wow. Just wow. It is as if some demented maker took Winter Sonata, Stairway to Heaven, Autumn in My Heart and Stained Glass, threw them into a blender, and cranked the power up to 11. This makes Stairway to Weeping Beautifully, Winter Sonata of Amnesia, Stained Glass of Insanity and Autumn in My Heart Which Is Lusting for My Sister look downright understated and tame.

I confess I laughed like a hyena when the heroine's mother got hit by a truck out of nowhere, hours after begging her evil father in law to take in her and her child. I am probably going to hell.

I was even more amused by the fact that the formerly evil father in law (he seems to have reformed at some point) not only took the wrong child from the orphanage, he took the wrong gender child. That demonstrates the importance of paying attention to gender pronouns, as opposed to just twirling your mustache while tying someone to train tracks.

There were also happy nuns, childhood love, and a blind dolphin doll. Hero grew up to look freakily like Winter Sonata-era Bae Yong Joon, including the glasses, and heroine is Angela Zhang back when she bothered to act.

This is kdrama on crack. And a bit of LSD.

I am afraid I could only take one episode of this. I think I am going to try either Single Princesses and Blind Dates (I adore Jimmy Lin immensely) or continue with That Love Comes, otherwise known as "the drama where Joe Cheng gets to actually act again."

Comments

[ambergold.livejournal.com]

Jimmy Lin? *perks up ears and goes off to check out*

-back- ooooh it looks adorable!! I'm about to start Runaway and That Love Comes so won't start it quite yet but update me on how it is!

[dangermousie.livejournal.com]

Let me know if Runway improves after the awful first ep.

TLC = adorableness.

[ambergold.livejournal.com]

I liked the first ep, actually! but then, I had very low expectations after hearing mediocre reviews from everyone. But I was sold on Lee Na Young's character- there are few things I love better than a woman with a haunted past that's done well. And while it took me 2 tries to get past that horrible opening scene, I actually really liked the progression of it - I was able to sympathize with Rain's character as well because of his trauma with best friend/partner, and I love the paralleling of his character with Lee's - both people hiding out from authorities and haunted by past events. Granted, I don't think anyone bUT Rain could pull off his character - but he's so ridiculous that it works.