錦繡緣·華麗冒險 Cruel Romance

錦繡緣·華麗冒險 or Cruel Romance had the very appealing storyline of a mobster calling in love with an innocent, hard-working girl. I was ecstatic to watch it when I first heard of it. I actually waited quite awhile for it to release which is why I might have been so dissapointed. At first glance, the cast is perfect, the actors fit their role descriptions so well. Chen Qiao En and Huang Xiao Ming look soooo good together. And then you watch it.

The acting itself was very good as the cast are full of amazing actors but some of the scenes, especially at the beginning are sooo overdone and rather cliche. How they meet and their first encounters were so cheesy it was hard to watch, I guess what kept me watching was the awesome chemistry between the two stars (again, genius casting I must say). The drama totally took advantage of the fact Huang Xiao Ming was the star and many frames are just of him giving that intense sexy look, cool fighting moves, or stripping to show his well built body. Don't get me wrong, I appreciate his beauty very much but the way it was filmed was just so cringing and obvious that they were trying to hype up view ratings using Huang Xiao Ming.

Chen Qiao En's role, Rong Jin Xiu was likeable for the most part. The only thing that was draggy about her character at first was how she could never see how much effort, Zuo Zhen (Huang Xiao Ming's role) was putting in to protect her and impress her. HOWEVER I don't completely blame her. The men in this drama were quite misogynistic. I guess it's kind of sexy when a man becomes possesive of someone but from another point of view, it's unsettling. The mafia that Zuo Zhen holds a high position in is FULL of men. I get that it has to do with the time period but I think they could have put some effort into making the women in the drama look less useless. Yes Rong Jin Xiu did rebel quite a bit in the beginning and she tried to dodge Zuo Zhen's controlling tendencies, but in the end, she was still kind of weak. There may have been like one or two female characters in there that were truly strong? The first one I can think of is a Japanese girl that has a very tiny role but fights like a boss towards the end of the drama. Jin Xiu's sister, Yi Min Zhu had quite a sharp tongue where at times I wish I was as eloquent as her, but in the end she was controlled by the Japanese with drugs and was saved at the expense of her husband's life.