What’s Up 2020: Week 21

Welcome to What’s Up weekly recap of Week 21 of 2020! Last week was somehow very busy or perhaps, its just that I had some writing slump as I’m trying to push through some TV binges and they take a little more writing motivation. Either way, it seems balance is the hardest to achieve in these categories on a weekly basis. This time, I’ve managed to get more reading during the week and now, movie watching is decreasing. I’ll talk more about it all in the different parts below!

READING

Currently reading: To Wake the Dead

I’ve been working hard on reading To Wake the Dead. So far, I’m almost halfway through the book and its been a pretty fun read. I can’t say that I’m quite as enamored with it as I was in the first book at the moment but its still a solid sequel. There’s still half a book to go and I’m in a semi crunch time to start up the next book so you should be seeing a review for this one sooner rather than later!

It sure feels nice to get back into some morning or evening reading time! Its been actually rather motivating and a nice change in pace to not stare at the PC monitor all day.

PLAYING

• Color Spots

Currently playing: Orwell, M.O.N.I.T.O.R.

Steam released their Spring Cleaning Event so I’ve been playing around their suggested games. After a little bit of a back and forth on what to review for the next Game Warp, we finally decided on Orwell and that’s what I’ve been playing lately. Its very weird because the event queued up a bunch of surveillance style games on my list including the free game MONITOR that I’ve played less than an hour of before it got hit with a bug that froze it (probably before a save point but I’m scared to go look to find out that I have to replay the section) so I had to shut it down.

On a fun note, I don’t finish a lot of mobile games unless its story-based but Color Spots has 100 levels of main game and 9 extra levels and I actually was having so much fun with this one that I finished all 100 levels and working through the bonus levels right now. I’d say that’s as close to finishing a mobile game as I’d get, right?

WATCHING

• Zodiac (2007)

Currently watching: Flavors of Youth

As the week ended, I had started up Flavors of Youth but didn’t finish yet. The very sad watching section consists of one movie. Maybe its the long Fincher movie that took a lot of energy to watch and then I just didn’t feel like watching anything. Its not the truth though but more that real life took over and I had to make choices and movie watching was put in the back burner. However, my first time watch of Zodiac (if you don’t count the unfinished first time watch that I dozed off and forgot to go back to finish it) was pretty good. I’m not a fan of the length but its a pretty good movie to say the least.

BINGING

• Oh! My Emperor (Season 1, 2018)
• X-Fire (Season 1, 2015)
• The Love Equations (2020)

Currently binging: Me To Us, Youth With You 2, Produce Camp 2020, Oh! My Emperor 2, Welcome Back To Sound, Yes I Do 2, Go Fridge S6

I’ve been on a Sean Xiao revisit lately since its been pretty much 2 months and I’m still stuck on The Untamed and a little bothered by the whole stupidity (my opinion on the situation) that he went through or is currently still “kind of” going through, I guess. Either way, I went back to watch the competition show that he joined that kickstarted his career called X-Fire and then went on to watch the TV series with the X-NINE boys called Oh! My  Emperor. I only finished Season 1 and needed to take a moment before continuing Season 2. Love Sean Xiao’s character but not a big fan of the main male lead though. The female lead though has already been in 2 Chinese dramas in 2020 so its inevitable that I’ll watch her in more shows and she’s actually rather fun to watch.

However, the highlight of the week goes to The Love Equations ending and its still such a sweet romance. Its a little quirkier than the previous sister series but this male lead is also rather memorable. I’d have to say that pros and cons in all three. I wonder how long they can make these series because its a nice break from those really dramatic ones, plus these ones usually stay around the 25 episode length which is a well-paced length.

Lots of TV going on so I’m losing track of when certain shows release their new episodes so I’m taking a little break from TV right now to catch up on all the series that I need to do TV binges for. Probably will go back to rewatch some of them in the background as I write or something (if I can stop rewatching The Untamed…).

That’s it for this weekly recap!
What have you been watching/reading/binging/playing?

Music Obsessions – May 2020

Welcome to the May Music Obsessions! April was a month of intense need for music and because of staying home for everything, music was a constant. There was a lot of new discoveries whether it was via TV or variety shows. Let’s check it out!

彩色的黑 Colorful Black-吉克雋逸 Jike Junyi

The Singer 2020 introduced one of the challengers Jike Junyi also called Summer. She is rather unique in the music scene in China. Her voice is pretty nice and she has this really big strong female lead in her music that mostly isn’t about love songs (at least the ones I’ve heard so far) but more about strength and chasing dreams and you know, positive things. This song is by far one of my favorites of hers that she also did perform on The Singer 2020. I usually listen to her The Singer 2020 version more but this is the actual music video so I figured it was better to use it here. You can find her The Singer 2020 version HERE.

我想 I Want- 余佳運 Jia Yun Yu

Another song that was performed on The Singer 2020 in a mash-up by Tia Ray who does a great version of it and honestly is one that I listen to more. The original  here by Jia Yun Yu is also really good. The lyrics itself and the rhythm has this really sweet and carefree love story enveloped in it. Sweet love songs are such a rarity that sometimes its really nice to have these upbeat songs.

Running Wild (feat. PollyAnna) – Yves V & Futuristic Polar Bears

One of my college friends was running live Instagram DJ session in March to April during this quarantine period and he played this song. I’ve never heard this one before but its really fun. We all need a little Electronic music every once in a while. At least I do.

致我们甜甜的小美满 The Love Equations – 刘人语 Renyu Liu
(“The Love Equations” Promotional  Theme)

If you’ve been following What’s Up, the last few weeks have been all about The Love Equations which is a really fun and cute series. The promotional theme song is sang by the female lead of the series, Renyu Liu who (I believe) got her fame from the Produce 101 series on Tencent. The song reflects the series and the tone of the series pretty much. I’m a big fan of these short 24 episodes series in the whole sister collection with A Love So Beautiful and Put Your Head On My Shoulder (both on Netflix and Youtube). They are just showers of joy and happiness and sweet romance with a little bit of bitter here and there. The song just makes me smile and probably why I like listening to it so much.

曲尽陈情 Song Ends With Chen Qing -肖战 Sean Xiao
(Wei WuXian Character Theme Song for “The Untamed”)

I finally got around to binging The Untamed. Call it a fight for Sean Xiao who got a lot of unjustified garbage since March until recently. I wanted to see what the big fuss was also and well, I totally get it because I love Sean Xiao even more. An all around great actor and singer. He gives off huge “boy next door” vibes. Other than fangirling over him, the point is that The Untamed has an amazing soundtrack and I decided to choose his Untamed character theme for Wei WuXian sang by himself. The Untamed is some uncharted territory executed really well and a lot has to do with his character. I love ancient times series for the soundtrack a ton as it uses some Chinese instruments.

想見你想見你想見你 Miss You 3000 – 八三夭 831

Surprisingly, I didn’t find this song because of TV series. I actually found it because it was chosen as one of the songs for Youth With You 2 and one of my favorite performances. I actually listen to the Youth With You version more than this one. You can find that below:

The song is pretty nice in both versions but one of my favorite trainees from Youth With You that I think has to end up being in the final 9 girl group for Youth With You is Xin Liu. She is unique and so well-rounded in both dancing, singing and rap. This group of a few girls that I think have some great potential to be in the final ending. I’m just hoping that it happens as I hope.

That’s it for this Music Obsessions! A lot of new finds!
I’m trying to listen to more female singers again and get back to practicing singing.
You can see why partially in my last Adventures post HERE.

What have you been listening to?