THE CURSE OF ZHENG SHUANG

I’ve watched a lot of dramas in my life – and there are very few dramas that I actually dislike. I mean, yeah there are ones which I roll my eyes during some scenes and cringe, and complain but that’s what us drama-watchers do.

But this drama… Man. I was just waiting for the roller-coaster to drop the whole time and I was waiting to be really, really in to it, and the roller coaster ended up levelling off, and there was literally no climax at any point. I didn’t feel excited… I didn’t feel attached to any characters, I just really didn’t care. Especially that the ending’s been out for so long, I’ve just put off watching it and doing its recap.

SO AGAIN, due to my very indifferent and unattached feelings (to say the least) this recap will probably… be very brief, and full of angst and frustration with the lack of development with these characters.

Is it Zheng Shuang?! I have never felt so annoyed, other than with this, and Love Weaves Through A Millennium.

Jiang Yu, realizing that Cai Hong was so ‘brave’ to face her feelings, decides to come clean about his feelings towards her, and confesses his love towards her.

FINALLY Cai Hong wakes up after being a coma for literally half an episode (ok, fine, it’s a drama) and Shao Tian goes to tell Jiang Yu.

At this point, Shao Tian has accepted that Cai Hong likes Jiang Yu (even though Cai Hong has expressed it very terribly in the drama where I could not even tell), and was looking to set them up together.

Jiang Yu looks troubled after hearing the fact, and Fei Fei tells him to go find Cai Hong.

Fei Fei directly tells Jiang Yu that she’s giving him her blessing, and that if Cai Hong is what makes him happy, he should go for it.

I just love Fei Fei. If I could pick my favourite character from this drama (other than Jiang Yu of course) it has to be Fei Fei. I would definitely watch any drama that she’s in. She probably is the most well-liked second female lead ever since they always try to make the second female lead seem like such a bitch. She’s so understanding, not catty, not manipulative, and pretty. SIGH.

Well spoiler alert, this is really the last few times we see Fei Fei in the drama.

And suddenly the sweet moments come to a sudden halt, where their conversation is interrupted by Mama Jiang, pretty much piping in and saying “Uh how about no” because she can’t get over the fact that Cai Hong is Wu Hong Da’s daughter.

OK C’MON Mama Jiang, as much as I dislike Cai Hong, she saved your f*cking life and you pretty much owe her at this point.

Mama Jiang threatens Jiang Yu by telling him that she will take her own life if he decides to continue his relationship with Cai Hong.

Up next, we have this way-too-long cringe-worthy scene where Lu Man literally writhes semi-naked in nice fabric.

She suddenly oddly gets up from the fabric, stares at it, and says “But it’s not the same as the ones from the secret method”.

Suddenly, General Lu shows up at her steps and beats her up (which was pretty hard to watch). He was angry that she didn’t heed his warning about not starting trouble, and now she’s done something even worse – committing arson to the Jiang mansion – especially when Jiang Yu is such a well-known man in Hu Zhou.

In the next scene, it’s insinuated that Lu Man was raped since she’s barely clothed and crying about being bullied by people. I feel pretty bad for her even though I don’t like her character – I guess some people can’t pick their circumstances, and they can’t always pick to be high and noble like Cai Hong right?

Jiang Yu has not visited Cai Hong at all along during this time. Cai Hong sneaks away while Shao Tian is gone to visit Mama Jiang to see if she’s ok.

Mama Jiang sees her and acts like the biggest a*shole (especially considering that Cai Hong had saved her from a fire) and tells Cai Hong to GTFO. Cai Hong kneels outside the door.

Meanwhile, Shao Tian is outside telling Jiang Yu that he only wants the best for Cai Hong, and even though that he knows that he can protect her and treat her well, Shao Tian acknowledges that Jiang Yu is the only one that can truly make Cai Hong happy.

Jiang Yu returns to the hospital and finds Cai Hong kneeling in front of Mama Jiang’s room. He cornily (but in an oh-so-manly manner) picks her up and carries her back into her hospital room.

I mean… it really wasn’t necessary to pick her up – it was a very drama-esque thing to do.

He picks her up and holds her closely and puts her down onto the bed (I’m sure doctors and nurses passing by are like “Uh ok that’s against our safety policies and we have wheelchairs available if she can’t walk”) and holds her hand.

Cai Hong in this scene shyly says “If you do this, I will misunderstand”, to which Jiang YU responds with “There is no misunderstanding, what you think it is, is correct”.

Long story short, Jiang Yu asks Cai Hong to be with him, and bravely face the challenges that Mama Jiang may bring – and Cai Hong finally agrees.

Even though she has verbally and directly agreed to be with him, I really still do not feel the chemistry or the ‘love’ from her to him :/.

Poor Shao Tian is outside hearing the whole thing.

As our new couple happily spend the first few days of their relationship in the honeymoon stage, Jiang Yu decides to step out to buy Cai Hong a gift.

Cai Hong takes this opportunity while no one is watching her to be a 多事精 (direct translation as a little troublesome gremlin) and decide to go find Mama Jiang to plead for forgiveness again.

HONESTLY though if Cai Hong was a real person if we knew in real life she would be damn annoying.

WELL as the plot would coincidentally have it, Mama Jiang was in the midst of getting kidnapped at the same time.

These kidnappers were Lu Man’s men. It was Lu Man’s last resort – to kidnap someone that was important to Jiang Yu in order to blackmail him for the secret method.

Since the self-sacrificial Cai Hong had discovered the kidnapping at the same time, Cai Hong had volunteered herself to the kidnappers so that they wouldn’t take Mama Jiang. Since the kidnappers trusted Cai Hong and took her instead, they are probably one of the most gullible and trusting kidnappers on the face of this earth (seriously, you’re about to commit a crime and you decide to switch from kidnapping a key figure to another person that you’ve never seen before).

\Before they leave, the kidnappers knock out Mama Jiang.

When Jiang Yu and Fei Fei find out, they find Mama Jiang unconscious and bleeding. By the time Mama Jiang wakes up, she starts crying and tells them what happened to Cai Hong. 

Shao Tian get mad at Jiang Yu for some dumb reason – ok Cai Hong self-volunteered – can you blame her instead? She is a full adult that is capable of making her own decisions and if she likes to always do these things where she will be subjected into danger, you can’t blame anyone else. It’s like blaming Primrose from the Hunger Games for causing Katniss to volunteer as a tribute.

Lu Man admits to killing Wu Hong Da to Cai Hong (FINALLY, in the last episode).

And she tortures her for the secret method – just to make sure that Cai Hong doesn’t have it. Obviously Lu Man’s form of torture is sticking pins into Cai Hong’s hands – for once I would like female forms of torture in dramas for the female lead to be more realistic and less dainty.

FINALLY – the start of Episode 34 (I told you, this is very concise). Shao Tian is walking around and he is stunned by the revelation that Jiang Yu was the child that had given Shao Tian that coin once when he was a child when his father was dying.

Now, I have rewinded it a few times to watch the last two episodes more carefully but I couldn’t find any scenes where the actual revelation was happening, only flashbacks of the scene and Shao Tian being stunned afterwards. Is it because I’m watching the cut version???

Anyways, I was so disappointed on how they made the coin exchange such a big deal in the beginning of the drama and it literally does not add to the plot at all. C’mon they could’ve done so much with that revelation or built up to it or something.

Anyways, we move onto the night where Jiang Yu and Shao Tian save Cai Hong from Lu Man. Shao Tian has dinner with his mom and pretty much tells her how much he appreciates her for having dealt with his shit for all these years. They have a sweet mother-son moment and you know, whenever there’s a sweet moment between two people before one person embarks on a dangerous mission, that very person is going to die.

Jiang Yu meets at Lu Man’s men at a secret meeting spot alone as instructed, and they take him off to a secret place.

Jiang Yu comes up with this genius and very fabulous idea of leaving a trail of glitter behind so that Shao Tian and the police chief would be able to find where he is.
So Shao Tian, the fei police chief and his fei underlings followed a trail of glitter to find where Jiang Yu and Cai Hong were hidden.

Jiang Yu is brought to Cai Hong by Lu Man’s men. He finds Cai Hong unconscious (but she obviously conveniently wakes up a few seconds afterwards). Lu Man demands that Jiang Yu uses the secret method in front of her to dye fabric, and that she’ll record down every step (instead of taking the one that he had already, in case it was a fake).

The 超級無敵廢警察局 (direct translation of super unrivalled useless police squad) exemplified their fei-ness (uselessness) when they suffered an ambush in the forest by Lu Man’s men when searching for Jiang Yu. The super fei police chief tells his men to disperse because the area is dangerous (and I seriously have no idea where they’re dispersed to).

The only capable person there, Shao Tian, manages to get up from his injuries, and somehow get to the hiding spot of Jiang Yu and Cai Hong 20 minutes before all of that squad combined.

Lu Man enjoys a semi-orgasmic moment with the high-quality cloth that Jiang Yu had just dyed. She literally rubs her face and hands all over the fabric.

She got what she wanted, so she orders her men to kill Cai Hong and Jiang Yu.

At this moment Shao Tian breaks through a window and roll  in like Ethan Hunt from Mission Impossible and shoots from the ground up with one hand.

Lu Man, Jiang Yu, and Shao Tian engage in a gun fight, and Lu Man’s right hand man, Lai Shu ends up dying and Lu Man goes full crazy (because in her ideal ending, her and Lai Shu would end up leaving this place together and living happily ever after. Now her happy ending will never come true).

Lu Man’s full crazy state involves her getting into a car with a lot of explosives and driving towards the police/Cai Hong and throwing explosives at them.

Taking a page out of Cai Hong’s self-sacrificial behaviour book, the fatally wounded Shao Tian manages to jump into the moving car and subdue Lu Man.

He throws Cai Hong’s bracelet to Jiang Yu, signifying that he is now giving the responsibility of protecting and loving her to Jiang Yu.

… While he drives into the building with the explosive with Lu Man, deciding to kill the crazy off once and for all. I would really like to add on to this death of a major character in the drama but I feel very indifferent.

Cai Hong wakes up and hears about the news and she collapses with sadness. This is when I determined that Zheng Shuang should not be an actress at all because her sadness was so forced and unbelievable.

Cai Hong mourn for Shao Tian, and in front of the grave Jiang Yu puts the bracelet from Shao Tian onto Cai Hong’s wrist (which is pretty morbid if you asked me).

In this drama, we are finally coming to an end with this last scene. It was so weird to see them be all lovey-dovey and happy considering that Shao Tian had just died, but I guess nobody wants to see a mourning and weepy ending.

Anyways, Jiang Yu gifts Cai Hong a beautiful jade necklace and tells her that he has a surprise for her.

He takes her to the fabric dying factory and releases a piece of fabric that he had painted for her, of them both when they were on the river.

He announces his love for her again and proposes to her and she says yes. And then we had to endure through an extremely awkward embrace and kissing.

– END –

Holy sh*t that was very unbearable for me, even with my love for Hawick. WTF. No seriously. What did I even watch?! LOL. I was waiting for to fall in love with the OTP the entire time but I couldn’t possibly love them two together since they had no chemistry at all, and the producers decide to taunt me and rub it in my face by arranging this awkward dragged out kissing scene. I loved when Tiffany Tang and Hawick were paired together in Lady and the Liar and their sweet scenes, but even 35 episodes later for this drama I could not enjoy this supposedly long-awaited union at all.

VERDICT: DO NOT WATCH – this drama does not get better.