the aggravated ayi
Vancouver, Canada
Psychology lesson disguised as an average trope filled light romance
Lin Yi seems to be on a mission to raise awareness of disabilities through his choices of drama projects, like ALS with Angels Fall Sometimes, and now alexithymia (emotional blindness) with Smile Code. Unfortunately it's difficult to blend public awareness messaging into a drama & not turn it into a 34 ep long instructional video. Angels Fall Sometimes worked because of the storytelling & perfomances of Landi Li & Lin Yi.
Lin Yi plays Liang Daiwen, a successful accessibility designer who is unable to recognize emotions & unable to laugh at jokes. Early episodes suggest a childhood trauma resulting in a deep suppression, for which he is receiving treatment & counseling, & is recommended to go watch stand-up comedy. He navigates his relationships only through the visual/verbal cues of others, as he's unable to access his long suppressed feelings.
Guan XingXin, a long time friend of Daiwen, is a secondary role, but acts as stark contrast to Daiwen in that she is one who fully lives for her emotions. In the beginning, more energy is put into her story arc than the FL, Gu Yi.
I've seen sparks of Shen Yue's comic talent in her previous dramas, enough to see that she does have good timing & can be very funny. However, Gu Yi, who is supposed to be a popular comedian at her local comedy club, delivers pretty sedate G-rated jokes. Her face doesn't even change expression on stage. In fact, Shen Yue seemed to be downright uncomfortable in the role & didn't really settle into it until much later. Not until halfway did some of her comic spark come through with a funny dental accident. (Incidentally, Shen Yue seems to have gotten her teeth straightened; she is quite beautiful regardless.) I didn't really expect a Jimmy O Yang or Ronny Chieng level performance, but the character of Gu Yi had neither edge nor depth & Shen Yue also couldn't pull much out of her. And perhaps there's not too much you can make fun of in China due to the censors ("satire without malice") so maybe I'm missing the point completely if it's too subtle. Lin Yi should've had the least challenge by keeping a straight face, but he also was not able to convey any subtle notes of expression when Daiwen's emotions start to surface, which would've required a master level performance.
The leads' characters largely remained a blank slate as they simply went through the motions of the usual line up of tropes: living together, a lot of drunk piggy-back rides, bandaging scrapes & nursing fevers. The relationship develops rather inexplicably for the first 10 episodes. Why does the FL fall for someone who gives no emotional feedback? The dialogue is simplistic & turned into a mechanical Q&A, like an infomercial, whenever addressing alexithymia. The psychology always felt like a completely separate storyline, rather than integrated.
By the 11th episode there's a slight shift in tone with the arrival of Gu Yi's mother, who is an unexpectedly calming & insightful presence. Gu Yi seems to take Daiwen as her charity project as it's not quite believeable that she truly loves him, but nonetheless she slowly breaks through Daiwen's shell to help him feel once more. However, after trying so hard to understand him, she decides to stop trying after he makes a breakthrough with therapy. What follows is the formulaic parade of romance tropes as Daiwen pursues Gu Yi, which seemed to be the only consistent element of this show.
The show is visually surreal at times, with dream-like soft focus shots & dark, cramped interiors. It was difficult to see how these shots added to the story, except to illustrate that the story itself was also blurry & cluttered. Is it about alexithymia? Is Gu Yi the central character or Daiwen? The arcs just didn't seem to balance. The show overall was unappealing to look at, and the story didn't develop any cohesion until the final 1/3 when it just simply focused on the romance.
For a show about emotions, it doesn't delve too deeply into any character's mindset, while offering very dry psychology lectures. If it was about disabilities, that topic was given only light treatment as well. All in all, it just ended up being an average romance.
Lin Yi plays Liang Daiwen, a successful accessibility designer who is unable to recognize emotions & unable to laugh at jokes. Early episodes suggest a childhood trauma resulting in a deep suppression, for which he is receiving treatment & counseling, & is recommended to go watch stand-up comedy. He navigates his relationships only through the visual/verbal cues of others, as he's unable to access his long suppressed feelings.
Guan XingXin, a long time friend of Daiwen, is a secondary role, but acts as stark contrast to Daiwen in that she is one who fully lives for her emotions. In the beginning, more energy is put into her story arc than the FL, Gu Yi.
I've seen sparks of Shen Yue's comic talent in her previous dramas, enough to see that she does have good timing & can be very funny. However, Gu Yi, who is supposed to be a popular comedian at her local comedy club, delivers pretty sedate G-rated jokes. Her face doesn't even change expression on stage. In fact, Shen Yue seemed to be downright uncomfortable in the role & didn't really settle into it until much later. Not until halfway did some of her comic spark come through with a funny dental accident. (Incidentally, Shen Yue seems to have gotten her teeth straightened; she is quite beautiful regardless.) I didn't really expect a Jimmy O Yang or Ronny Chieng level performance, but the character of Gu Yi had neither edge nor depth & Shen Yue also couldn't pull much out of her. And perhaps there's not too much you can make fun of in China due to the censors ("satire without malice") so maybe I'm missing the point completely if it's too subtle. Lin Yi should've had the least challenge by keeping a straight face, but he also was not able to convey any subtle notes of expression when Daiwen's emotions start to surface, which would've required a master level performance.
The leads' characters largely remained a blank slate as they simply went through the motions of the usual line up of tropes: living together, a lot of drunk piggy-back rides, bandaging scrapes & nursing fevers. The relationship develops rather inexplicably for the first 10 episodes. Why does the FL fall for someone who gives no emotional feedback? The dialogue is simplistic & turned into a mechanical Q&A, like an infomercial, whenever addressing alexithymia. The psychology always felt like a completely separate storyline, rather than integrated.
By the 11th episode there's a slight shift in tone with the arrival of Gu Yi's mother, who is an unexpectedly calming & insightful presence. Gu Yi seems to take Daiwen as her charity project as it's not quite believeable that she truly loves him, but nonetheless she slowly breaks through Daiwen's shell to help him feel once more. However, after trying so hard to understand him, she decides to stop trying after he makes a breakthrough with therapy. What follows is the formulaic parade of romance tropes as Daiwen pursues Gu Yi, which seemed to be the only consistent element of this show.
The show is visually surreal at times, with dream-like soft focus shots & dark, cramped interiors. It was difficult to see how these shots added to the story, except to illustrate that the story itself was also blurry & cluttered. Is it about alexithymia? Is Gu Yi the central character or Daiwen? The arcs just didn't seem to balance. The show overall was unappealing to look at, and the story didn't develop any cohesion until the final 1/3 when it just simply focused on the romance.
For a show about emotions, it doesn't delve too deeply into any character's mindset, while offering very dry psychology lectures. If it was about disabilities, that topic was given only light treatment as well. All in all, it just ended up being an average romance.
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