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dangermousieI am halfway through episode 12 of The Outsiders.
This is, honestly, the most complex drama I’ve seen. If I didn’t know better, I would have sworn it was an adaptation (or a transplantation actually) of those mid-century French and German novels I used to read.
On a more shallow front, Dylan Kuo has displaced Mike He as the second hottest Taiwanese guy I’ve ever seen. And the jury is out on whether he is going to displace Vic Zhou, up till now the hottest spot holder ;) And I definitely now get why Barbie Hsu went out with Blue Lan. Whoa.
Also, if Bali is a dark mirror to Hanadan, I think this is a dark mirror to Mars.
TO is a classic tragedy, isn’t it? Best intentions lead to worst results. You are doomed through your kindness and compassion and love.
If you think about it, all the bad things that have happened, happened as a result of good impulses. Yu Yen saved Ah Hao from being killed which was a good act (but would eventually lead to her becoming a mob moll, and everything what happened followed). Ah Hao went racing to buy his beloved a piano (and thus got undying hatred of chief mobster and everything that happened followed). The boys joined the mob to protect their loved ones. All led to disasters, didn’t they?
And something tells me that this new altruism, Ah Hao deciding to help the mainland girl who escaped the slavers and recruiting his two friends to do the same, and deciding to find her cousin for her, to and shut down the trade, are all incredibly awesome things. But they are so going to lead to disaster.
You know, if episode 11 brought home that despite anything, despite the differences, Yu Yen is still the same Yu Yen she was in ep 1, only tougher, sadder, and somehow more defined, episode 12 establishes that despite being a mobster up to his ears, despite the toughness and alienation, Ah Hao is still the same impulsive generous romantic he was at the start, somewhere deep down below. He is completely indignant about girls being kidnapped to be forced into prostitution (he has no problem with running hos but they have to be willing), he unthinkingly, instinctively helps the girl on the run. He decides they are going to take this thing down, and he drags his friends in.
Oh boys. Oh boys.
You know, it’s interesting. While Danzi is by far the smartest of the three, the reason Ah Hao got Yu Yen’s attention, the reason he rose so high in the mob, is because he is a leader. Danzi is clever, but he doesn’t have the leadership skill or instinct, or the fire to get causes, enthusiasms etc. But I think this very quality is Ah Hao's doom. The very single-mindedness, the very way he throws himself with his whole heart earlier in pursuit of Yu Yen or racing or what not, that quality of passionate attachment and giving his all that makes him so irresistable, means that he can’t help but apply this dedication to the mob (or any activity he would have ended up doing). Danzi is detached and Ah Qi very laid back. I can see them leaving somehow (harder for Ah Qi than Danzi) but Ah Hao is in for life.
I am fascinated by his reaction to Mainland girl. In a way, he wants to help her not just because he is, at bottom, not a horrible person, but because her manner and her hair and her look remind him of Yu Yen, the way Yu Yen was before she was drawn into his world. To let her rot, to let her be captured is like letting the innocent Yu Yen ‘die’ again. He failed to safeguard the original, he is the one who dragged her down (and I am sure he feels immense guilt) so maybe this time…It’s an atonement, really.
I was in love with the scene where he buys a huge bouquet of flowers and starts making a reservation for a fancy dinner for himself and Yu Yen but then sees (unobserved) Yu Yen laughing with Danzi and drops the flowers and walks away. Because it isn’t jealousy, as I first thought. It’s the reverberation of knowledge that she doesn’t laugh the same way with him, that somehow on their way, in their struggle to survive, they lost that happiness that used to be theirs. He wrecked his whole life to make her happy, repeatedly, but that process dragged him down and her with him, and now simple happiness is out of the reach of both of them.
Pictures of episodes 11 and 12 behind cut:
Yu Yen in her tough new avatar. But the wistfulness is still there, just hidden:
Whoa, baby:
Mob business and other darkness:
Irony moment number 1. Ah Hao telling YY that she only wants to go soft on Ah Bao because she’s never been harmed by him (I’d really wish you knew, right about now, but then you’d self destruct and I don’t want it):
Girl stuff:
Hong Do is pointing out that unlike other mob bosses who change women like socks, Ah Hao loves her. That is true, but love isn’t enough for happiness it seems:
Danzi is out of jail and the friend!ot3 is back together!
Make it an OT5:
Yay. Bonding:
I love Danzi when he is blackmailing the bad guy:
Further Danzi hotness:
Seeing Yu Yen again:
Yu Yen is excited Danzi is out:
Irony Moment number 2, Ah Hao who never apologizes, apologizing to Danzi and thanking him for getting there in time to save Yu Yen. *weeps*
Danzi announces he is out of the mob and Ah Hao decides to help him out. EEE:
A family that drinks together?
Seeing Mainland Chinese girl and being reminded of Yu Yen:
This is my favorite sequence in the ep, flashback to the morning after Yu Yen’s rape.
(Yu Yen comes home and Ah Hao can sense something is wrong but can’t figure out what and is busy running out because Danzi got arrested):
And Yu Yen gets her hair cut, as if to replace herself (it kills me that she is so strong, to keep the rape from Ah Hao, and it kills me that Ah Hao can tell something vital has been irrevocably lost in Yu Yen and in their relationship and he doesn’t know what):
This scene made me cry again. They are in bed and he is asleep and she can’t and then, he rolls over, putting his arm around her in his sleep (awwww) and she freezes and then pushes it away.
And she learns to be tough (and once again, Ah Hao can feel something is majorly wrong and with years he will be used to it, but not yet):
Pictures for first half of ep 12 are here.
Still stunned by the fact that the girl reminded him of Yu Yen:
Coming home, still out of it. I really think he is faced with the loss in Yu Yen and he is freaking out (that is why the scene with the flowers and his freaking out about Danzi. He might not have thought of their loss of happiness before, but it’s been brought to his attention recently that YY is diminished):
A few purely shallow shots:
Doing business:
Buying flowers for Yu Yen and making dinner reservations:
Seeing Yu Yen laugh with Danzi and thus confronted with his failure to make her happy:
Walking to his old house:
Bumping into Chinese Mainland girl again:
And deciding to end Ah Bao’s trade in flesh:
This is, honestly, the most complex drama I’ve seen. If I didn’t know better, I would have sworn it was an adaptation (or a transplantation actually) of those mid-century French and German novels I used to read.
On a more shallow front, Dylan Kuo has displaced Mike He as the second hottest Taiwanese guy I’ve ever seen. And the jury is out on whether he is going to displace Vic Zhou, up till now the hottest spot holder ;) And I definitely now get why Barbie Hsu went out with Blue Lan. Whoa.
Also, if Bali is a dark mirror to Hanadan, I think this is a dark mirror to Mars.
TO is a classic tragedy, isn’t it? Best intentions lead to worst results. You are doomed through your kindness and compassion and love.
If you think about it, all the bad things that have happened, happened as a result of good impulses. Yu Yen saved Ah Hao from being killed which was a good act (but would eventually lead to her becoming a mob moll, and everything what happened followed). Ah Hao went racing to buy his beloved a piano (and thus got undying hatred of chief mobster and everything that happened followed). The boys joined the mob to protect their loved ones. All led to disasters, didn’t they?
And something tells me that this new altruism, Ah Hao deciding to help the mainland girl who escaped the slavers and recruiting his two friends to do the same, and deciding to find her cousin for her, to and shut down the trade, are all incredibly awesome things. But they are so going to lead to disaster.
You know, if episode 11 brought home that despite anything, despite the differences, Yu Yen is still the same Yu Yen she was in ep 1, only tougher, sadder, and somehow more defined, episode 12 establishes that despite being a mobster up to his ears, despite the toughness and alienation, Ah Hao is still the same impulsive generous romantic he was at the start, somewhere deep down below. He is completely indignant about girls being kidnapped to be forced into prostitution (he has no problem with running hos but they have to be willing), he unthinkingly, instinctively helps the girl on the run. He decides they are going to take this thing down, and he drags his friends in.
Oh boys. Oh boys.
You know, it’s interesting. While Danzi is by far the smartest of the three, the reason Ah Hao got Yu Yen’s attention, the reason he rose so high in the mob, is because he is a leader. Danzi is clever, but he doesn’t have the leadership skill or instinct, or the fire to get causes, enthusiasms etc. But I think this very quality is Ah Hao's doom. The very single-mindedness, the very way he throws himself with his whole heart earlier in pursuit of Yu Yen or racing or what not, that quality of passionate attachment and giving his all that makes him so irresistable, means that he can’t help but apply this dedication to the mob (or any activity he would have ended up doing). Danzi is detached and Ah Qi very laid back. I can see them leaving somehow (harder for Ah Qi than Danzi) but Ah Hao is in for life.
I am fascinated by his reaction to Mainland girl. In a way, he wants to help her not just because he is, at bottom, not a horrible person, but because her manner and her hair and her look remind him of Yu Yen, the way Yu Yen was before she was drawn into his world. To let her rot, to let her be captured is like letting the innocent Yu Yen ‘die’ again. He failed to safeguard the original, he is the one who dragged her down (and I am sure he feels immense guilt) so maybe this time…It’s an atonement, really.
I was in love with the scene where he buys a huge bouquet of flowers and starts making a reservation for a fancy dinner for himself and Yu Yen but then sees (unobserved) Yu Yen laughing with Danzi and drops the flowers and walks away. Because it isn’t jealousy, as I first thought. It’s the reverberation of knowledge that she doesn’t laugh the same way with him, that somehow on their way, in their struggle to survive, they lost that happiness that used to be theirs. He wrecked his whole life to make her happy, repeatedly, but that process dragged him down and her with him, and now simple happiness is out of the reach of both of them.
Pictures of episodes 11 and 12 behind cut:
Yu Yen in her tough new avatar. But the wistfulness is still there, just hidden:
Whoa, baby:
Mob business and other darkness:
Irony moment number 1. Ah Hao telling YY that she only wants to go soft on Ah Bao because she’s never been harmed by him (I’d really wish you knew, right about now, but then you’d self destruct and I don’t want it):
Girl stuff:
Hong Do is pointing out that unlike other mob bosses who change women like socks, Ah Hao loves her. That is true, but love isn’t enough for happiness it seems:
Danzi is out of jail and the friend!ot3 is back together!
Make it an OT5:
Yay. Bonding:
I love Danzi when he is blackmailing the bad guy:
Further Danzi hotness:
Seeing Yu Yen again:
Yu Yen is excited Danzi is out:
Irony Moment number 2, Ah Hao who never apologizes, apologizing to Danzi and thanking him for getting there in time to save Yu Yen. *weeps*
Danzi announces he is out of the mob and Ah Hao decides to help him out. EEE:
A family that drinks together?
Seeing Mainland Chinese girl and being reminded of Yu Yen:
This is my favorite sequence in the ep, flashback to the morning after Yu Yen’s rape.
(Yu Yen comes home and Ah Hao can sense something is wrong but can’t figure out what and is busy running out because Danzi got arrested):
And Yu Yen gets her hair cut, as if to replace herself (it kills me that she is so strong, to keep the rape from Ah Hao, and it kills me that Ah Hao can tell something vital has been irrevocably lost in Yu Yen and in their relationship and he doesn’t know what):
This scene made me cry again. They are in bed and he is asleep and she can’t and then, he rolls over, putting his arm around her in his sleep (awwww) and she freezes and then pushes it away.
And she learns to be tough (and once again, Ah Hao can feel something is majorly wrong and with years he will be used to it, but not yet):
Pictures for first half of ep 12 are here.
Still stunned by the fact that the girl reminded him of Yu Yen:
Coming home, still out of it. I really think he is faced with the loss in Yu Yen and he is freaking out (that is why the scene with the flowers and his freaking out about Danzi. He might not have thought of their loss of happiness before, but it’s been brought to his attention recently that YY is diminished):
A few purely shallow shots:
Doing business:
Buying flowers for Yu Yen and making dinner reservations:
Seeing Yu Yen laugh with Danzi and thus confronted with his failure to make her happy:
Walking to his old house:
Bumping into Chinese Mainland girl again:
And deciding to end Ah Bao’s trade in flesh:
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no subject
Date: 2007-06-28 08:04 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-06-28 08:10 pm (UTC)I really must watch TO II. If for nothing else then the fact that none of the core five die in it. But oh, this is so painful and brilliant and...wow.
Except after seeing a bit of 20, I get sorta weepy every time I see Ah Hao now.
I really find it such an anti-drama message, in a lot of ways. Love isn't enough, and neither is youth and hope. Sometimes the worlds are just too different. But it might have been worth it for the moments of happiness anyway. It's both affirming and sad.
Btw, I just realized that there so far has been no mouth-to-mouth kissing between Dylan and Ady (it's amazing but I didn't even feel the lack). The only other time I've seen something like this was in Tree of Heaven. Was she underage or something?
no subject
Date: 2007-06-29 02:11 am (UTC)I noticed that Dylan and Ady don't kiss at all either, which, to this day, still has me perplexed. I chalked it up to the nature of the story, i.e., Yu Yen being so traumatized by her rape that she can't physically connect with Ah Hao anymore, but then again, she was never that physical with Ah Hao in the beginning, you know?
no subject
Date: 2007-06-29 02:21 am (UTC)Actually, I know it's a random question, but I assume by the time she got raped, she and Ah Hao already made love, right? Because they've been living together for ages, and also, if that wasn't the case, there was no way she could have tolerated starting to make love with him, after such a first experience, without giving herself away. But maybe I am just an overinvested girl and just want her first experience with sex to be loving and not horrific, though). Of course, regardless, that scarred her for life. I know this is a horribly shallow comment, but Ah Bao deserves to be burned at the stake because it's the ultimate bad luck to be the girlfriend of someone as gorgeous as Ah Hao, who is also completely mad about you, and when you love him too, and still feel freaked out about intimacy and probably remember the rape of the evil guy every time the love of your life touches you. (I think since she kept it a secret, she never processed it properly).
I mean, I ended up crying when he comes home after she had her rape flashback nightmare, and he is so sweet and tender and asks her to stay and tells her he missed her and starts kissing her neck and it's gorgeous and wonderful and she loves him as much as he loves her, but she is frozen in misery, barely containing herself from bolting. (Btw, Dylan Kuo kissing Ady An's shoulders? All sorts of HOT). And he sees her flinch and his hands drop to his sides and Oh. OH. WOOBIES. Poor woobies. Whatever the death toll of this drama, I want Ah Bao (who did achieve perfect revenge on Ah Hao after all) to be among it.
Once again, unlikely to know, but have they even made love much after the rape? His reaction to her withdrawal seems to indicate it's a pretty common thing.
no subject
Date: 2007-06-29 11:14 am (UTC)Yeh, I assume they would have, living together,sharing the same bed..(and on a completely shallow note) if I was YY I would want to make love to someone as hot Ah Hao..(told you it was shallow:P:P)
no subject
Date: 2007-06-29 03:17 pm (UTC)I mean, I realize they must have certainly made love since her rape, it's just I am getting the feeling that there was more than one instance where she would flip and shut off so it was nowhere near as often or nice as it would otherwise have been.
on a completely shallow note) if I was YY I would want to make love to someone as hot Ah Hao..(told you it was shallow
LOL, shallow but totally right.
no subject
Date: 2007-06-28 09:29 pm (UTC)Mars' "Zero" is pretty cool too.
no subject
Date: 2007-06-28 09:30 pm (UTC)I admit I am addicted to drama soundtracks, especially kdrama and twdrama ones. I have 'Love Storm' soundtrack playing for days now, and I haven't even seen the drama!
no subject
Date: 2007-06-28 10:02 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-06-28 10:06 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-06-28 09:47 pm (UTC)and ahhh this drama looks sooo good
no subject
Date: 2007-06-28 10:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-06-29 11:10 am (UTC)...I think Danzi is just much more of a "Safer" option for YY...and yeh...the ending does leave that sort of a possibility...
no subject
Date: 2007-06-29 03:19 pm (UTC)Oh yeah, exactly. That is why he is my favorite of the three boys, actually, too. I can see why YY fell for him etc etc. But you are right, he might be irresistable but Danzi is safer.