Taiwanese Idol dramas appear to enjoy a small resurgence recently with the hit drama “Someday or One Day” starring Alice Ko and Greg Hsu.
A surprising hit I would say given that the 2 male leads Greg Hsu and Patrick Shih are considered newcomers and the female lead Alice Ko isn’t really that known internationally even though she is acknowledged as a good actress locally. (Update: She won Best Actress in Golden Bell Awards for this role.)
There have been much raves about this time-travel romance drama that I just had to watch it for myself to see what exactly is the hype all about.
*Spoilers ahead*
Brain-wracking time travel plotline
The drama does not tell the viewers immediately what the plot is about, and keeps viewers constantly guessing and equally confused as we try to figure things out with our time-travelling female lead Huang Yu Xuan (acted by Alice Kuo).
The story started with Huang Yu Xuan who appears professional and collected in her workplace, but we later realise that she is not as cool as she pretends to be for she is secretly nursing a heartache over her dead boyfriend who died in a plane crash.
Everyday she tries to look like she is ok, but when she is alone, she just can’t stop missing him and her only wish is to see him again.
One day, she receives a cassette tape in a cassette player, and while she fell asleep listening to the song, she woke up with a new identity as Chen Yun Ru in the year 1998.
Apparently she had time travelled to the past, taking on the identity of an 18-year-old high school student Chen Yun Ru who looks exactly like her, and guess what? She even has a classmate named Li Zi Wei (acted by Greg Hsu), who looked exactly like her dead boyfriend Wang Quan Sheng.
So what exactly happened?
Together with the female lead, we try to make sense of what had happened and as the story progresses, we realise that this is not just a simple time-travel story that happened to the female lead. It appears that these characters – Li Zi Wei, Wang Chuan Sheng and Huang Yu Xuan all exists in the same time space.
One allure of this drama is the rather confusing and brain wracking time travel timeline that make viewers very curious to organise the events in a chronological timeline so that we can make sense of what exactly happened and why this happened.
Someday or One Day: About Pure Love that transcends time
The essence of this drama is true love that transcends time.
Even while time travelling and taking on different identities, what did not change was the love between our leads and their ability to recognise each other and fall in love in different time periods.
Despite sharing the same appearance, Chen Yun Ru and Huang Yu Xuan have completely different personalities.
Chen Yun Ru is lonely and antisocial. She craves to be acknowledged and loved but feels invisible throughout her life. She harbours a crush on the outgoing Li Zi Wei but was rejected.
Huang Yu Xuan is confident, fiesty and outgoing. She entered Chen Yun Ru’s body right after the rejection episode with Li Zi Wei but took it with a pinch of salt.
Suddenly, Li Zi Wei found himself falling in love with this intriguing “Huang Yun Ru” whom he originally dismissed.
After entering into a relationship with Huang Yu Xuan who was in Chen Yun Ru’s body, Li Zi Wei fell out of love after Chen Yun Ru’s soul came back to her original body.
At the end of the day, regardless of appearance, Li Zi Wei only loves Huang Yu Xuan’s soul and would do anything to see her again, even if it means time travelling to the future and taking on another guy’s body- Wang Quan Sheng- to find her.
Mystery Thriller Aspect: Who killed Chen Yun Ru?
Not just a pure romance story, Someday or One Day also has a mystery crime element because our female lead Huang Yu Xuan realised that Chen Yun Ru was killed when she was 19 years old. After her death, everyone’s lives took a downhill turn.
So she was determined to go back in time to rewrite history and stop the killer from killing Chen Yun Ru.
Dreamy Greg Hsu wins fans in likeable portray of Li Zi Wei/Wang Quan Sheng
Greg Hsu is pretty fortunate to get this role of the vivacious loyal and loving Li Zi Wei that is almost a fullproof recipe for winning female viewers’ hearts.
For a romance drama to work, it is really crucial to have a male lead that female viewers like and dare I say, also harbour a small crush on, so as to find the romance between the male and female lead believable.
I don’t find Greg Hsu’s portray of the 2 roles particularly outstanding, but I do think he did a decent job, especially for a newcomer. Plus he looks really wholesome and clean-cut which makes for a really dreamy male lead!
How do you like this drama? Do you understand the whole time-travelling plot?
Chasing Carefree 