Story: It started out with the standard one case per 2 episodes formula but slowly evolved into something quite different. Bit by bit all of the puzzles fit towards literally the final 15 mins of the entire drama when it's all revealed. It'll keep you guessing but me...meh... knew who the big baddie was a while ago!...Thanks to my over 30 years of drama watching! But to those of you who are not a seasoned investigative drama viewer, you'll be guessing all the way to the finale. This is another great example of how having a story from a popular novel adapted into a drama can be a success. The storyline is the absolute strength of this drama. Add to it the witty and mature conversations between the characters, an international cast of actors and actresses, international locations, tri-lingual conversations (Mandarin, English & Cantonese) that depicts actual real-life manner of how multi-lingual ppl communicate (yay! no dubbing!) and quality production and you'll get a gem of a drama. This is something that does not come your way often. If you like mystery, thriller and romance - you'll definitely love this drama. If you do not usually go into the mystery and thriller genre (like me), you'll still find this drama a breath of fresh air and definitely worth your time. What it does is re-awaken my interest for more thriller, mystery and investigative dramas (which I kind of grown tired of since the late 1990s) and I am browsing around for the next fix!
Acting/Cast: Superb cast overall but I find that FBI guy who speaks in a thick South African English accent a bit annoying coz he's the only one not speaking in American English and yet goes around in the role of an American FBI agent (a mis-cast?). The lady playing Susan was great and I hope she'll hit it big in Hollywood in the future. The other actors in the US side are passable but not great. The Chinese cast are obviously the ones shining in this drama here.
Music: Most of its OSTs are instrumental and fits the sophisticated, modern and mystery feel of the drama. The ending OST however is hauntingly beautiful and its lyrics accurately depicts the emotion part of the drama (the relationship between the main couple).
Overall: It is not always you find a gem amongst all the dramas produced throughout the years and decades of Asian entertainment. Once in a while, you find one at a place you didn't think to find. I've always followed Chinese dramas but mostly for historical and wuxia series, seldom for their modern series as I think the quality of chinese modern series are beneath that of Japan and Korea but this drama here is an exception when it comes to modern chinese investigative series made by mainland Chinese (not HK which has an excellent track record for investigative modern dramas). I am surprised and impressed and read from a blogger earlier today how there are fans of this drama who wanted more than 24 episodes and are hoping for a Season 2. Well...I sure hope to see more of Bo Jin Yan if possible but apprehensive about Season 2s as they normally do not perform as well as their predecessors. As for those of you who are hesitating, don't...just watch it and I'm sure you'll not regret this decision!
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