TwDrama Review: Devil Beside You (2005)

Devil Beside You
惡魔在身邊
3/10

Another "classic" lets me down. Lured on the promise of extra lovey-doveyness and that always sought after 'chemistry' between leads, I got to cracking on this 20 episode monster.

Verdict: It's 18 episodes too long.

Now, before I'm murdered in my blogger-sleep, I could try to explain some of my reasoning. It might even be as simple as, I was never in the mood for what this story was trying to tell. Or, the old drama bad quality meant nothing ever looked good on screen. However, after dropping it several times, and then redetermining to finish, nearly 4 months passed between when I started and when I stopped. And I was never in the mood for it. 

Here's the Story in a Nutshell

Qi Yue (Rainie Yang) loves Yuan Yi. He kind of likes her back. But devil boy Jiang Meng (Mike He) takes an interest in her as well. They fall in love. However, their parents have already fallen in love. They're about to become step-siblings. Kissing happens.

ewwwwww!

Before I start in on spoilers, and my disgust of the leads' romance, let me disect a few other plot points. I realize that Devil Beside You has a wide cast that is supposed to leave viewers loving all the connections and friendships/frenemies/family trials/etc. but to me side plots were nauseatingly boring, mostly for their lack of subtlety. Our show here is adapted from a manga, and I've already discussed some reasons why these plots usually don't entice me. Creepy clingy girls and totally stalkerish perverts (most of whom are completely redeemed by the end) do not make for a good story of human emotion. They're plot devices, through and through. So they make the leads grow and learn. Good for them.

Drama, if you want to get my attention - you need something better than caricatures. I'll take the devil concept any day. It's hot, and it usually works in a lead drama male. I don't even mind him teasing the girl in devilish fashion. I also have a relatively high tolerance to whiny spineless females. Bbbut...

Read on if you dare. I look at what's wrong with the lead couple, why I usually love this kind of concept, and confess at least one thing I thought was good. After all, I did finish it..