Editor's note: The "First Episode" series to help you watch the drama is here. Is the recently aired drama worth getting into? Good-looking and weird, let’s play together on the weekends.
Maybe some dramas will get better gradually, and some dramas may start high but then slow down, so this article only represents the author's opinion on the first few episodes and is for reference only. If there is any subsequent slap in the face, we will inform you at any time.
"The Murder Deep"
Platform: iQiyi
First broadcast time: December 8, 2023
"Depth of the Murder" poster
I was wondering why it looked so familiar. After checking it out, I found out that it was written by the same director as "Legend of Disappearance". It has a familiar rhythm of being boring and making do at other times.
The advantages are very clear. It is a unit-type criminal investigation drama with two male protagonists. The cases are topical and stimulating, and there are also long-term cases as foreshadowing. In order to kill time, you can turn on the play.
The shortcomings are more obvious. As a criminal investigation drama, the rhythm is not good. To solve a case in several episodes, it is nothing more than a few steps of investigation, finding clues, witnesses, and following logic. However, this drama can actually make every step without surprises and rhythm. If it were not for deliberately looking back, it would not be possible at all. I remember how the case was solved.
I know that the creator does not want to repeat the same old methods of using BGM, pauses, confessions, etc. to set rhythm points, but no matter what, these steps need to be carried out in the minds of the audience, rather than just plainly fooling around, to highlight the creator and the protagonist. IQ.
Stills of "The Murder Depth"
Let’s talk about the case itself. Putting aside the question of whether the actors are well-known, let’s take the first case as an example. After reading the whole story, the sinking feeling is obvious, just like a short story on Kuaishou.
A teenage girl was raped and her father refused to call the police. The girl ran away from home in anger and gave birth to a child to take revenge on her father. ah? How did it happen? Where did the money come from? If the father doesn’t call the police, can’t the girl herself call the police? The child seemed to have fallen from the sky.
The daughter came back with the child, but why did the father still beat and scold her at every turn? One second there was a slap mark on the girl's face, and the next second the neighbor's aunt said her father treated her as a treasure and beat her for her own good. Writers and directors, take a look for yourselves, is this reasonable? Whose daughter is so treasured? Do you think domestic violence is love?
In the end, the case was solved. The girl was mentally distorted by her previous relationship and thought her father was cowardly, so she executed the person who bullied her child. The police actually did not mention the rape case she suffered and her cowardly father who did not call the police, and instead yelled at the victim for not calling the police. Understand father's love. What love? Love that saves one’s own face? I don’t quite understand how the creator views a society ruled by law and the spirit of law.
Just because the scale is large and the case can be solved doesn't mean it's a good criminal investigation drama. Don't look down on the plot and the audience's IQ. First, make the plot reasonable and let the case have basic logic, and then talk about the so-called high-level sense.
"Love in the Red Dust"
Platform: Tencent Video
First broadcast time: December 7, 2023
"Love in the Red Dust" Poster
Help...someone help me...I kept thinking about this while watching this drama...It is actually the same director as "News Queen"...
The basic setting of the plot is somewhat similar to "You Are My City Fortress". It tells the love story between Song Xingchen, who entered a belated rebellious period when he turned 30, and Su Qingche, the captain of the rescue team. In fact, as a romantic drama, it is common for the settings to be similar, mainly to see how to make the male and female protagonists collide and create sparks.
Stills from "Love in the Red Dust"
The heroine Song Xingchen played by Nazha resigned from the hospital at the beginning, but no matter her condition or makeup, it was impossible to tell that Nazha was a doctor, and two junior doctors were specially arranged to say bad things about her... This plot and character state , I’m afraid it would be more reasonable to place it in an advertising agency.
Just quit, change your clothes in a few minutes and go have a drink with your best friend, just drink, decide to invest 150,000 in a women's products business in just a few words, without any market research? Don’t you want to talk about the supply of goods? It's just so relaxed and casual.
Even if the character background is not the focus of the romance drama, the meeting between the male and female protagonists is cliché enough. Song Xingchen went on a blind date to perfunctory her parents, so she thought of several tricks. In summary, she dressed coquettishly and spoke sharply. She believed that this would not be liked by men. It’s hard to comment on the rush to objectify oneself. Later, in order to forcefully create a conflict, Song Xingchen mistakenly thought that the blind date had a girlfriend, and refused to listen to the explanation no matter what.
Thinking of the stories outside the drama, it seems that all the excitement is used outside of the drama.
"chemistry class"
Platform: Apple TV+
First broadcast time: October 13, 2023
"Chemistry Class" Poster
This year, it was nominated for the 2023 Critics' Choice Award. It is an Apple-produced series with female protagonists and themes. It has a total of 8 episodes. It was completed not long ago. There has been a lot of hot discussion on social media recently.
In domestic terms, this drama is an IP drama adapted from the recently published novel by writer, science editor and advertising copywriter Bonnie Garmus. The plot tells that in the early 1960s, Elizabeth Zoot was a chemical scientist. She was arrogant, withdrawn, disgusted with perfume and nail polish, and voluntarily cut off contact with her family. She loved chemistry and cooking, was unmarried and infertile, and planned to go with chemistry. For the rest of my life.
Objectively speaking, this drama is undoubtedly a breakthrough in the current era. The first three episodes reveal everywhere the unfair treatment Zot suffered as a female scientist, but she is far smarter than the men in the same laboratory. Scientists, even so, she still has to endure helping male colleagues pour coffee, organize equipment, and be verbally humiliated by leaders. No one believes that a woman can become a scientist.
But the plot is not limited to simple routines such as the heroine's counterattack. As soon as Zoot found a soul mate, she was hit hard by the death of her lover. Then, she became pregnant, but she never wanted to be a mother. This pregnancy plot may seem cliché, but the purpose is to highlight a woman's resilience and self-breakthrough. She learns to be a mother through collapse and does things she once disliked and was not good at. Although she could not continue to be a scientist, she did not dwell on it and accepted a job as a cooking show host. She used her knowledge of chemistry to cook and eventually returned to the field of science that she loved.
Stills from "Chemistry Class"
Elements such as gender equality and racial issues are stuffed into the play. But looking back, although Zoot is discriminated against and ignored in the male world, compared with other women, she still has the IQ and ability of the top of the pyramid, and The case against the sapiosexual male companion was raised eyebrows. Do only such elite women deserve to be treated equally? Of course, it may be harsh to make such a request in an era when male dominance still prevails, but Chizuru Ueno once said that feminism is not an idea that makes the weak become strong, but that the weak can be respected as weak. thought of. Compared with Zoot, the women who participated in the beauty pageant with her in the office were equally worthy of being seen and should not suffer Zoot's eyes and contempt.
But overall, this drama is still worth watching. After all, such elite women still have such strong energy and resilience when they are not treated fairly. This is the power of women.
