Skip-Beat! Episode 1 Review (Day 118)

Episode 1

The television event of the season has finally kicked off. That’s right. Skip-Beat!, the Taiwanese show that you didn’t know you wanted to watch is finally airing.

Skip-Beat! is based on a Japanese manga about a girl who goes to the big city to help her lifelong crush with his music career, or rather, it is about how after he betrays her she tries to get revenge by becoming more famous than him. The Taiwanese live-action show stars two South Korean actors/popstars (from Super Junior!) who acted entirely in Korean. The question of how a show where two languages, Korean and Mandarin, were being spoken simultaniously was problematic, but the mystery has been revealed. Mandarin dubbing over Korean acting! It’s really subtle, and since 80% of the characters are speaking real Mandarin, it’s barely noticeable and quite believable.

The first episode is there to introduce and develop the main characters. Thus, first thing we find out just how much the lead character, Gong Xi (Ivy Chen), likes Bu Po Shang (Donghae of Super Junior) when she bikes faster than Superman in order to get a poster of him... and then endangeres her life to get him strawberry pudding. Dun Helien (Siwon of Super Junior) shows up briefly to prove that he is the most popular guy in Taipei and then is mean to an important media executive, because he needs to prove that he is the beautiful iceman character. Shortly after, Gong Xi finds out that Bu Po Shang is cheating on her and the locks on the revenge box in her heart break (seriously) releasing small Ivy Chen revenge angels (also seriously). Gong Xi goes home, rips down ALL her Bu Po Shang stuff, buys expensive shoes, gets a haircut and moves in with her employers. She then attempts to lure talent scouts while weaing an amazingly bad red/gold combo outfit. She will get her revenge! But...how?

It was at this point that the episode ended and they showed 'making-of' clips to remind us that Donghae is not a mean dirty scumbag man. Good job to them. Even I was forgetting due to his convincing acting.