Pleasantly Surprised Leaves a Great Impression

So I've been watching dramas for like 5000 years now. Dramas are different depending on what country they're from. But no matter how long they are, or how many times they air in a week, you will always suffer the wait when you decide to watch a drama as it airs. If you happen to come across a good drama with intense cliffhangers, you will know that agonizing feeling when you realize you have to wait a whole entire week. Typical Kdramas are around 16-20 episodes, and they are twice a week, so it's not that bad. Jdramas only air one episode per week but they're usually only 8-12 episodes. Taiwanese dramas on the other hand are 20+ episodes long and ONLY AIR ONCE A WEEK. HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO LIVE OFF THAT?!?!

Okay, now on to my main point: I am dying because Pleasantly Surprised is just too good of a drama. It's also known as Love Myself or You. It has aired 6 episodes so far and I am absolutely obsessed with it. The pacing is perfect, the leads are perfect, the chemistry is perfect, the writing is perfect. EVERYTHING IS PERFECT!

If you haven't watched it yet, I highly recommend you to watch this drama. Puff Guo plays Du Kai Qi, an aspiring chef with a broken family due to her no good of a father. She prefers to live by herself and won't let anyone come into her life. Liu Yi Hao plays Bo Zi Jie, nicknamed Ah Jie, and is a new intern at Figaro Cuisine. He is in fact a highly trained chef and the son of the owner of Figaro Cuisine. He prefers to keep his identity a secret because he does not like being regarded as an incredible chef. Back when they were very young, Kai Qi and Ah Jie were actually close childhood friends before Ah Jie moved away. When Ah Jie realizes that Kai Qi is his childhood friend, he becomes confused as to why the little girl who always smiled brightly has turned into someone who likes to be alone all the time. And so, with only one month left at Figaro Cuisine, Ah Jie decides to hide his identity and help Kai Qi change and find happiness. There's also an adorable child that plays Kai Qi's niece. I swear children are the best plot devices ever in terms of pushing the main couple together.

Honestly, there are many more points to this drama that the synopsis simply does not do it justice. Pleasantly Surprised always manages to give me a fluffy warm feeling inside whenever I watch it. The back story of Kai Qi's past is written nicely and has a very real feeling to it, which is something that Taiwanese dramas typically miss. Even though you can't expect dramas to be realistic, I find that T-dramas are usually very over the top with their cliches and such. It's neither a good thing nor a bad thing, but in Pleasantly Surprised, the realistic style does it justice.

I must say that Puff Guo has come a long way from playing the bitchy girl in Miss Rose to the bright and cheery girl in Just You to what I can certainly say is her best role and performance in her career. I was okay with her portrayal of Liang Liang in Just You, but it was a bit ov
er the top optimistic at certain times. In this drama, her character just hits all the right notes. Even the best actor in the world can't make a poorly-written character good. And likewise, a well-written character will just get trampled on when played by a bad actor. Despite Puff Guo not being the best actress, her performance is solid and with such a well developed character, Du Kai Qi is one hell of a great character. Same can be said for Liu Yi Hao's character, Ah Jie.

Before this drama, I've never known about Liu Yi Hao's existence. And thats because I'm not too into the Taiwanese entertainment world. I used to be crazy about all the celebrities, but I've stopped since 2007 and now only know the old celebrities. Relatively new faces like Liu Yi Hao are often off my radar. I only found out about Puff Guo last year in Just You because Aaron Yan was in the drama and he was my favourite member of Fahrenheit.

Anyways, Liu Yi Hao might just be my new actor obsession. His portrayal of the warm and caring Ah Jie is probably the biggest factor as to why I'm in love with this drama. Lets all take a moment of silence and think about his smile. HIS SMILE IS JUST RADIATING. Seriously, he needs to win all the Best Smile awards if there are any. Every time he smiles, it feels like the sun is shining on my face because it makes me feel all giddy and warm inside. And his expressions when he looks at Puff's character just make my heart swoon like crazy. I can definitely say that Ah Jie is like the best male character EVER. He's perfect perfect perfect. And the most important thing is that he's actually realistic, which makes him even more perfect. He always manages to stay calm with a bright attitude despite Kai Qi's cold remarks. That kind of character is very very hard to portray because it often comes off as fake. But Yi Hao does it perfectly. And if you've watched the recent episodes, you'll see that he knows not to just blindly treat Kai Qi with kindness. It's just so cute watching him change Kai Qi and seeing Kai Qi softening up to him.

To me, the most important thing in a drama is chemistry between the actors. Puff Guo and Liu Yi Hao look so together that I don't even feel mad anymore about the whole Aaron Yan thing. I was actually a little bitter at the fact that Puff and Aaron couldn't go another drama together because of Puff's WGM filming, but I am now so glad because this drama is way better than Fall In Love With Me. I think I would've watched Fall In Love With Me if not for Tia Li's horrible textbook acting. If you watch the BTS of Pleasantly Surprised, you'll see that Puff Guo and Yi Hao are so adorable off screen as well! They look so good together and so different from their characters. Well, Yi Hao is kind and caring just like Ah Jie, but he is actually a big jokester! I will post the links to watch this drama at the end of this post and also the BTS clip from episode 6 that just aired today.

Ratings have also been steadily increasing for this drama. It recently broke 2 in ratings which is a pretty big deal, so the cast had a big water fight to celebrate! So yeah! this is basically why this drama is amazing. I'm really hoping that it stays amazing as well because there have been so many T-dramas that have started out great, and just hit rock bottom because of episode length and not enough material. Lets cross our fingers together because this drama really rocks my socks!

Here are some beautiful shots of the main couple. They seriously look so good together <3

Heres a bucketload of links just because I like to be informed and you should too:

Watch this drama on Viki!
If you don't need english subtitles, watch on Maplestage! Or from Youtube!
Dramawiki here
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