Y A S S S we won!!!

I was working out in the morning while I read all the comments in the previous post about how it’s a happy ending, and I couldn’t wait to watch it at night! I’m actually so surprised that they made it into a happy ending and glad they did, but I wish they made it longer. It ended pretty abruptly, which I really didn’t like – I guess that’s the downside of having two endings because then neither of them are done elaborately.

I did a post about some ending spoilers which didn’t happen (luckily). I’m wondering if this was actually the alternative ending or if someone on Weibo was just trolling. I guess we’ll never know 😥 if it was the alternative ending though I kind of feel bad for the actors that got casted but never got to be in the drama.

***WARNING – SCREENCAP HEAVY BECAUSE IT’S THE FINALE***

The episode starts out with Shi Tou trying to protect Chun Hua. Song Ben threatened Shi Tou, that if he is reluctant to help out with the human testing labs, that he’ll throw Chun Hua in them first, to test the poisonous deadly gas. That being said, Shi Tou agreed to visit the human testing labs with Song Ben.

Coincidentally Bai Lang conveniently picks the same time to go snoop around the human testing labs. He sees what they’re doing to the Chinese, and the amount of people that have been held captive.

He coincidentally sees Shi Tou being held captive and overhears that Song Ben is going to throw him in the gas chambers because of his reluctance to help. Bai Lang, despite all that Shi Tou has done, decides to rescue Shi Tou. Understandably, Shi Tou feels guilty about this and throws a hissy fit to Bai Lang in why he saved him.

Shi Tou goes back to the Bai family mansion to save Chun Hua and uh no duh Song Ben is already there because it’s pretty obvious what Shi Tou cares the most about. I mean… he could’ve used more planning. Did he really think that there would be no one guard her?

Meanwhile Bai Lang meets up with his gang and tells them all about the human testing labs. They set three goals:

1) Rescue the captives

2) Bomb the lab

3) Kill Song Ben

They decide that the person that will go into the human testing lab one more time will be picked by a draw.

AH yaaas and our OTP has some cute scenes. Honestly what they’re saying is nothing of substance, just that she’s very worried about him, and that he’s grateful for her, blahblahblah. Their interaction is really cute though, but I’ve become numb to it.

Wait no, I take it back. His reaction to waking up and seeing her was the cutest. And kissing her on the cheek.

D’awwww. Bai Lang asks her to teach him how to do a magic trick where you can switch two identical items. Jiang Xin teaches him how to use slight of hand, thinking that it was just impress a little kid.

Jiang Xin realizes that the slight of hand trick was for Bai Lang to win the draw to be the person to enter the human testing labs to save all the captured citizens and to bomb the lab down.

Jiang Xin goes on a walk with Bai Lang and reveals that she already knows about his plans – and that she fully supports him. She says something corny like “The wolf always protects his pack” and I’m like “Yo can we please stop with the corny wolf analogies now? It’s getting so corny here that it’s pretty much raining cobs”.

Shi Tou goes to Bai Lang to beg him to work with him to take down Song Ben and save Chun Hua.

Jie Wen/Sheng Shao confronts Bai Lang about how he knew that Bai Lang used the slight of hand trick to get the piece of paper – Bai Lang admits to it, but threatens Jie Wen to stay back. He says, “I will not hesitate to hurt you so you have months of bedrest – I cannot afford to lose my only family member”. At this point, they’ve pretty much reconciled and Jie Wen has resolved all his issues with Bai Lang.

LOL does Bai Lang look like such a child or what?! It’s so adorable. Bai Lang has always had a babyface – so he definitely looks young, but now it’s accentuated by the plaid pyjamas. Plus, they don’t have much of a height difference – Hawick being 5’8 and Tiffany being 5’6 so it makes him look even smaller than he is. I’ve noticed throughout the drama how the thief got to wear these pretty high heels, while Tiffany Tang had to wear flats.

I think Tiffany Tang looks the prettiest in this scene. Her face looks like it’s been photoshopped and filtered – her perfectly heartshaped face and her sharp nose are so nice. In this scene she says tells Bai Lang that she wants to have his child, which makes me do a doubletake – were they using birth control until now? I’m sure since they’ve slept in the same bed and been a couple for so long that they must have consummated their marriage right?

I went as far as googling this and finding some answers on Wiki – apparently birth control was introduced in 1930’s and was not popular until the 60’s and 70’s. Hm.

Anyways Bai Lang says no, because he doesn’t want to leave her with a child in this state – especially that he might die. He doesn’t want to see her becoming a single mother.

In the middle of the night, Jiang Xin wakes up to talk to her deceased family (ancestors? but they’re not old enough to be that right?). She prays that they’ll keep him safe, and make sure that he comes back. The producers do this super corny thing where Bai Lang overhears everything that she says – about how she can’t pretend to be strong anymore, and how scared she is, bleh. The corny game is strong.

I mean I know this scene was supposed to tug at my heartstrings but I was like “HOW ARE YOU ‘OVERHEARING’ THIS, YOU’RE RIGHT IN THE DOORWAY”. He isn’t even peeking into the room – he is in full view. If Jiang Xin would use her apparently nonexistent peripheral vision, he’s just right in the doorway.

Anyways – they have one last scene that doesn’t add to the plot where they interact and act very sad. I didn’t realize how repetitive and pointless these scenes were until I began recapping. I mean they don’t say anything of substance, and they just act sad until he leaves. I guess the cynic inside me is just too strong. I did really like the song that they played in this scene though – I’ve tried Shazam, YouTube and Google, and I can’t find it.

Anyways. FINALLY. Sh*t goes down. Bai Lang goes in with dynamite strapped around him (so people can’t shoot him and people are afraid to go near him). He first releases all the captives. Seeing the captives really made me sad though – I’m reminded of history of what had happened. I’ve seen worse pictures of what happened during the war and hearing people cry out, even during a drama, just made it more real of what happened back in the early 20th century.

Bai Lang is handed over to Song Ben by Shi Tou in exchange for Chun Hua. Once Chun Hua was safely by Shi Tou’s side, Shi Tou reveals that he has dynamite strapped over his body. Bai Lang tries to convince him to not commit suicide, but Shi Tou revealed that he already swallowed many bullets beforehand, and planned to take the Japanese down with him.

Good, good! I’m glad you’re redeeming yourself Shi Tou. Now, just make sure that you can decimate the bomb before-

you die. Well… sh*t. Song Ben appears to have shot Shi Tou in the head during their struggle, but somehow there is questionably no wound on Shi Tou. And they really like the blood on the edge of the mouth thing don’t they? And they’re particular about it too – it’s always only the right side.

Before he dies, Chun Hua is directed to take one of the grenades to decimate them to blow up the human testing lab, as well as to kill Song Ben at the same time. I would like to add that is a big diamond on her hand. I mean, that’s like 1.5 carats. Isn’t that a lot of money back then? I hope they can recover that after the explosion.

Bai Lang sees Chun Hua pulling the pin on the grenade, and I really don’t know what the hell he was thinking but he starts running towards her? Like… she already pulled it. Shouldn’t you be running away?

Well a series of explosions ensued and Bai Lang was swallowed by the sea of fire, and Jie Wen was held back while he yelled out “Big brother” – which was the first time he acknowledged that Bai Lang was his brother. It was a sweet and sad moment.

Jie Wen goes to the temple where Jiang Xin is praying for Bai Lang’s safety to tell her that he’s dead. I pinpoint that this is exactly where the alternative endings kick in – so Bai Lang is dead, then they just continue on with the story where she has a kid (because there are no actual scenes of them together as a family) and maybe the ‘spoiler’ scene that I found on Weibo. Or, they show this ending:

Bai Lang enters the temple at this suspiciously convenient moment where he says “Who said I died?”.

Aight ok – logically how did you survive? Literally you were swallowed by a sea of fire that you ran into? And even if you did survive that, how did you come out with no burn marks (not even a scratch or a bit of soot or ashes?!).

And since Bai Lang survived, we can just safely conclude that his men and his brother are the worst search and rescue team on Earth. Obviously none of them stayed even long enough to look for Bai Lang whether if he was alive, or even stayed long enough to collect his corpse.

It ends with a uber awkward scene where they walk out into Shanghai without smiling, trying to be all epic and that jazz. Jiang Xin and Bai Lang are closer and walking in front of Jie Wen, which makes him look like an awkward third wheel. Why couldn’t they have had a smiling scene where they’re all embracing and happy?!

Now I don’t know if you guys noticed or what the purpose of this was, but they literally walk into a painting/green screen. It looks so obvious that it’s not a real shot of the street because the people on the streets aren’t even moving. Did they do this on purpose? Or did they just expect us not to notice because it was very noticeable.

ANYWAYS they end off with a very wholesome and cute scene of them dancing together with flashbacks on how they fell in love. Bai Lang’s squinty smile is the cutest.

The Lady and the Liar ends with Bai Lang looking to the distance, and seeing Jiang Xin and his son daughter play.

Yup. That’s it. It’s pretty obvious which scenes would be cut and which would be included if we had the alternative ending. They didn’t talk during the entire dancing scene, and you couldn’t even see the face of the Jiang Xin in the last shot so it was really easy to dub whatever they’re saying. They just had to cut out the scene where Bai Lang enters the the temple, and they could make the last dancing scene like how Jack and Rose danced in the Titanic even though Jack was dead.

Anyways – despite all the turmoil and emotional rollercoaster that this drama put us through – it wasn’t bad. Even though it was a happy ending, it was still a dud for me because it ended so abruptly – I just wanted more – like a family scene or something. I felt like Hawick was the main factor that all of us persevered with it, because with a lesser male lead, I might have dropped the drama after the 18th episode. The storyline could have been less complicated for sure too – I don’t know why producers always make a way to add dumb obstacles into the plot.

But reading the comments from yesterday, I think all of us are just relieved that this didn’t end like Lan Ling Wang and we can finally sleep at night. On to the next one!!! Let’s see if Cruel Fate is any better ;). I don’t want to watch the new drama after this – 转身说爱你 (Fall in Love with You Again) because I watch the trailers and it looks so complicated and sad. And I shallowly don’t want to watch it because the female lead and male lead are both not very attractive to me LOL so I will stick with Love Weaves Through a Millennium until a better daily drama comes out.