As I am watching "The Double" Mo Yu Yun Jian" 墨雨云间 starring Wu Jing Yan, who rose to fame with Wei Ying Luo in The Story of Yanxi Palace, I marvel at how an ordinary-looking actress with ordinary acting skills can keep getting coveted lead roles that other better actresses can only dream of.
The Double is totally my kind of drama, which ticks all the boxes on my checklist: period drama, fast-paced, revenge-themed, intelligent female lead. Ironically, the only thing I deem lacking is the female lead actress Wu Jing Yan lacking.
Wu Jing Yan stars as Xue Fang Wei, the daughter of a magistrate who is happily married to a scholar. Unfortunately one day she wakes up in bed with another man due to a scheme by her husband and mother in law. She was promptly buried alive by her husband with her good name in ruins.
She got saved by Jiang Li, a daughter of a minister who later died. Xue Fang Fei took on the identity of Jiang Li, who was previously framed by her stepmother and vowed to help her saviour and herself take revenge on everyone who bullied them.
Ordinary Acting AND Looks From Female and Male Lead
The only other drama I watched with Wu Jing Yan in it was The Story of Yanxi Palace several years, and remarkably it feels like her portrayal of Jiang Li in The Double is pretty much the same as her portrayal as Wei Ying Luo in the former.
Call me picky or superficial, but I need to watch beautiful people falling in love with each other on screen for my daily dose of escapism in reel life. This is especially so if the role is supposedly beautiful.
It is quite jarring when the scene goes into slow motion with music serenading to introduce the beautiful and talented heroine Jiang Li, and in the end it is Wu Jing Yan's face that appears. It would have been better if the female heroine is not frequently mentioned to be especially beautiful where we have scenes of passerby gaping at her beauty.
Looks aside, it would be more acceptable if Wu Jing Yan can act well, but I feel that there is often no depth to her acting and such one-dimensional acting can be quite distracting. Also why I think Wu Jing Yan is seriously very very lucky to keep getting such meaty roles where the plot and characterization itself drives the drama to high ratings.
(Fun fact: According to Chinese news reports, a lot of Chinese netizens have also feedbacked that even the servants are prettier than the female lead role Jiang Li who is supposedly beautiful.)
Moving on to the male lead, Wang Xing Yue, I think I am ok with his acting for the role of Duke Su. Actually this role is the typical stoic sort so generally it is hard to go wrong with such roles. But I think his makeup is really too thick. I am all for flawless looking gorgeous males, but I prefer them to look more natural instead of pasty and sticky due to heavy make-up. Eg. Liu Geng Xin was really flawless yet natural looking in The Legend of Shen Li.
Fast-Paced Plot tHat Reels Audience In
Aside from all my criticisms about the 2 leads, the drama is still a good watch. There are a lot of drama and setbacks for the female lead role which she had been overcoming one by one smartly.
I am only 5 episodes in, so it is still in a bit of an introductory stage but I can sense good things coming along with the female lead strategizing plans to bring down enemies to emerge victorious. I am also keen to see how she can get away with taking on a fake identity.
Other than the 2 leads, Joe Chen (Chen Qiao En) also caught my eye in her role as the conniving stepmother of Jiang Li who appears virtuous but who in fact kept scheming to bring down Jiang Li.
It is interesting for me to watch Joe Chen, as I watched her since around 20 years ago? when she was still in young and sweet roles, but she has now progressed to acting as the mother of Wu Jing Yan.
Shall continue watching and keep everyone updated!
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