We’re back for another TV Binge!
I’m not going to lie. This one has been sitting in backlog for a long time. I just always had something more important, well, like the Halloween marathon in October and then NaNoWriMo came by and I put a lot of TV binges on hold. Regardless, I mentioned this before when I did my other Taiwanese series write-up, but they hold a special place in my heart. Now that Netflix carries more and more of them. I just can’t help and rightfully binge watch them. Because if you are a Taiwanese drama fan, you know that when you can binge-watch it, you will. It is the only way to watch it.
The next one is Easy Fortune Happy Life. I’ve never even heard of this one before but that is because in 2009, I had basically fallen out of Taiwanese series completely. The reason of why I chose to watch this one is mostly because I know the cast in it for the most part and I like them quite a bit. Good enough reason for me usually.
Let’s check it out!
Easy Fortune Happy Life (2009)
Director: Liu Jun Jie
Cast: Joe Chen, Roy Qiu, Cheng Long Lan, Jocelyn Wang, Qiang Ding, Zi Xian Chen, Xiu Jie Kai, Dong Zhi Cheng, Wang Juan, Hsia Ching Ting
Love spans generations in this tale of the one of who got away. Huang Chun Xiang saves the life of a young hunter by treating him with herbal medicine. Despite years of waiting for him and eventually raising her own family, Chun Xiang never loses faith that he will return. Chance brings the man — now elderly and the founder of a successful pharmaceuticals company — and her granddaughter Xie Fu An (Chen Qiao En) together. Struck by her uncanny appearance to Chun Xiang, he swears to give away his fortune to the man who marries her. However, his grandson Yan Da Feng (Lan Cheng Long) is none too happy about the possibility of losing his fortune, but soon learns you just can’t fight fate. – Drama Fever
Taiwan series are obsessed with Cinderella story. It is probably because it can have a lot of fun twists to inject into it. Everyone likes the down to earth girl who meets a rich guy and falls into fortune. Easy Fortune Happy Life turns this around a little. Fu An is a kind and down to earth country girl who is actually quite naive to the evil in the world. When she meets this family, the audience knows how horrible this family is and particularly greedy and selfish. We learn that this is the fault of the grandfather who is almost on his death bed and also realizes that his family is no longer one that cares because of the way he has taught them and how he runs his business and treats others. Suddenly, Fu An is not only Cinderella but one with power. While she doesn’t know that she is the key to the inheritance and is being wooed by Yan Da Feng, she holds more power than she actually realizes. We all know how this story is going to go. Easy Fortune Happy Life can only be criticized as being way too predictable but then, in the most heartwarming way, it still manages to strike a chord and tug a little at those heartstrings as we see the truthfulness of Fu An and how she has genuinely changed Yan Da Feng. Full credit goes to Joe Chen and Cheng Long Lan that bring these two characters to life in their contrasting personality.
While our main couple’s story is a lot of fun to watch, their story sometimes gets a little dragged out and maybe at times repetitive. The only way this is stopped is with some great supporting characters. I’m going to admit (and I probably have a thousand times before) that I love supporting characters in Taiwanese series. Actually, they might be my favorite because they usually are the ones that prove to be the most well-crafted and just perfect in so many ways. In this case, I almost fell in love in Roy Qiu’s character of Han Dong Jie who plays an orphan guy who pretty much runs a loan shark business for the Big Boss but is trying to be as legit as possible. Right from the get go, we know that he is actually quite gentle and if anything, he can put a good front no matter what happens and very early, he becomes the protection that Fu An has. Actually, he is labelled as the guardian angel. This is the first time I’ve seen Roy Qiu and just the character design, from his physical appearance (like clothing, hairstyle) to his personality and the development of the character from the beginning until the end, I just love so very much. I connected with his character so much that I think his character made me care more about Fu An than if this character wasn’t there. Actually, he has a few other series on Netflix and I’m going to watch those soon-ish.
Roy Qiu is great but then, this story still needs comedy. It is a romantic comedy series after all. And no one does that better than the silly cast in the background that sometimes helps ease away the overly dramatic moments. The little brother of Fu An, the silly sister and brother in law of Yan Da Feng, the right hand man of Han Dong Jie and the Village Chief in Fu An’s village where she came from and even the grandfather played a huge part in having those moments. While they do contribute to it at times, a lot of times, the silliness and pure stupidity of these characters and their decisions and even the dialogue they are given can be a little excessively stupid in a WTF moment but at the same time, it is hard to not laugh.
With that said, Easy Fortune Happy Life might not be perfect but it has a lot of perfectly fun characters. The cast itself is the winning factor of this series. The story is predictable, just like what Id say about a lot of romantic comedies (Hollywood in particular), but it is how you twist the scenario that adds a little more flair and character to the story itself. For that, even at its lengthy and repetitive bits here and there, I still found that I liked this one a good bit. I’m not running back to rewatch it any time soon but I won’t hold off the possibility of watching it again (even if its just to see Roy Qiu’s Han Dong Jie again).
Tranquil Dreams 