Last One Standing

Econs is officially over! I would say that today's paper wasn't easy, but I didn't expect it to be simple either. Overall I'll rate it as "Manageable" so that I won't give myself too much hope hahaha! I'm now left with Human Geog on Friday and gosh I dread Geog!! I was telling my classmates how I'll start to daydream about the things I will do when As are over even when I'm studying for a paper the next day. Really can't wait for next Friday to come!

Oh, and for all my readers, remember to leave me a message so that I know you're reading! The Live Chat thing is under-utilized since its installation hahahaha!

Anyway not much interesting things happened today, so I shall blog about Forensic Heroes III (法証先鋒III) which just ended on Saturday! I happened to learn of the ending through Weibo, and it disturbed me so much that I finally conceded defeat and went to watch the last two episodes although I intended to do that after my Econs paper today. I was supposed to sleep at 12 on Sunday night so that I can wake up at 8am the next morning and continue with my Econs revision, but I ended up watching the finale till 2am. Talk about discipline... -.- Being a loyal fan of the Forensic Heroes series, I've watched Season 1, 2 and 3, so I think I'm going to provide my opinion on the hotly debated Season 3 and compare it with its predecessors after finishing the whole series to provide a fairer opinion piece.

Warning: I might disclose some spoilers in my review (Not too much though), so if you are planning to watch the series, DO NOT CONTINUE! And for those who have no idea what I'm talking about, please watch TVB's Forensic Heroes! Its actually the HK version of CSI, definitely a must-watch if you like this genre of shows.

To refresh your memory, here's the list of the cast in Forensic Heroes. Note that Forensic Heroes III had an entirely brand new storyline and cast:

1. Cast

In the TVB Sales Presentation video, it was revealed that the same cast will be featured in FH3, but when the actual filming took place, they used a completely new set of cast for the sequel, much to the disappointment of Forensic Heroes fans including me. Though many preferred the old cast, some viewers gave credit to the production team for the fresh look in the sequel.

Not that I'm prejudiced against FH3, but the cast for FH1/2 was so much better than FH3. In FH1/2 we see a variety of different personalities from the main characters - Human Encyclopaedia Tim Sir, Romantic Sam, Charming Ivan, Cool Bell, etc. Since FH3 will be a completely different storyline from its prequel, I expected to see something different from what FH1/2 offered, but to my disappointment, many of the characters were either too similar to the prequel, lacking in depth, or the choice of actor was not suitable for the role at all.

Though Pro Sir is the main character in FH3, his character disappointed me the most. His personality, professionalism, and even facial expression was an exact replica of Tim Sir! I understand that the choice of personality of a Head Forensic Chemist is quite limited, but I didn't expect it to be so similar to Tim Sir, so I was quite turned off when they called him Human Encyclopaedia too. 

As for CID Chief Ada, I thought they picked the wrong actor for the role. Both Charmaine Sheh and Yoyo Mung had the career woman look (Possibly also due to their, erm, age.), but Kate Tsui looks a little too young and "weak" for the role of a CID Chief. She looks more like she'll get bullied by her team if they were made up of more experienced people. Perhaps a more suitable candidate for the role would be people like Jessica Hsuan, Sonija Kwok, or even Joyce Tang, who has the "professional" look of a career woman. Her character's personality was also pretty bland, like she's just the ordinary woman you find on the street, while Bell and Mdm Leung had their differences so that Bell will not end up being too similar to Mdm Leung when she made her first entrance in FH2. Mdm Leung was the give-all-out type of leader where she'll always take the first step in their operations, while Bell was the witty and cool type of CID Chief who specialise in interrogating criminals before heading for a well-planned operation. As for Ada? Plain. Nothing outstanding.

In FH1/2, the CID Team had more screenplay, and even the very minor characters have their own uniqueness, so you can really feel the dynamics between the team members. I can never stop laughing at Ah Sum and the stupid things he did with his colleagues. However, in FH3, the screen time was so pathetic that even Ada and Wind (Supposedly also the main characters of the series) was demoted to a mere celefare. Oh, what are the names of FH3's CID Team again? They are so insignificant I don't think I can even remember their faces.The CID Team is not made up of Ada and Wind only, so more screenplay should be given to even the minor characters and slightly develop them more to make the show more interesting.

However, I have to give credit to Maggie Cheung for her successful portrayal of the character Mandy, who also happened to be my favourite character in FH3. It could be due to the fact that Mandy was a very different Forensic Pathologist from Sam, so they had different backgrounds and very different personalities and you will tend to not compare the two of them since they already have their own uniqueness. If they had dedicated more effort in developing all the characters like Mandy's, I'm sure FH3 will garner their own group of FH3 die-hard fans. I also liked the Ken and Angel duo, because Ken was the more traditional Chinese guy and Angel the liberal Westernised woman. I didn't see a pairing like this in FH1/2, so the pairing definitely caught my attention.

Forensic Heroes I/II: ☻☻☻☻☻☻☻☻☺☺ (8 Stars)

Forensic Heroes III:  ☻☻☻☻☺☺☺☺☺☺(4 Stars)

2. Plot

A) Crime Case

I think The Mentalist is the ideal type of police procedural that I like, because you'll never know who the murderer is until right at the very end, yet throughout the show, they dropped a few hints here and there for you to guess who the murderer is. I'm watching forth season of The Mentalist now, but my guess-the-murderer skills for the show is still as bad. When I first watched FH1/2, the series gave me the same feelings too, except for a few cases where it wasn't that great when they tried to force the impossible to become the possible. But after every case, I'll think about it again and say "Why didn't I think of that!". 

The cases in FH3 was a huge, huge disappointment. It has been 3 years since FH1/2 ended, so I expected more intelligent and complex cases from FH3, yet it proved to be spending too much screenplay on developing Pro Sir's boring love story than do proper research for real solid cases. After all, the series is a police procedural, so each case must be captivating enough to get the audience involved in the drama, don't you agree? Frankly speaking, the cases in FH3 were too simple and I could easily guess who the murderer was before they revealed it. I've also noticed that FH1 and FH2 started off with a huge bang because their first cases were very very complicated and interesting. Remember in FH1 it was the murder of the Tam family for their diamonds, and the murderer was unexpectedly, their son who was gravely injured, while in FH2, they intelligently merged two cases that looks like they have nothing in common into one big case, which allowed the Narcotics Bureau with Bell to participate in the case. The first case in FH3 was pretty boring, with the only WOW factor being the improved technology used by the forensics especially for the gunshot simulation lasers or something. It's either I've become smarter in guessing the murderer, or the scriptwriter did not do his homework.

B) Love Story

In FH1/2, they had their usual triangle love storyline (Sam-Bell-Ivan), but the supporters for both sides were quite equal and both the male leads are quite competitive hahaha! (If only this happened to me in real life...tsk.) Anyway, they continued with that triangle love for Eva-Pro Sir-Mandy in FH3, but it was kinda boring cos I think everyone supported the Pro Sir-Mandy pair and nobody really likes Eva. For the Ivan-Bell love story, Ivan's romantic gestures really makes you go "Awwwww...." and fulfill your fantasies about all the romantic things that could ever happen to you if you met someone as perfect as him. (Maybe because I'm someone who likes really really romantic guys, so when I see such scenes in dramas I'll love it!) Perhaps Pro Sir and Mandy belonged to the "higher age group" couple so seeing an old couple getting all mushy will be quite disgusting to watch hahaha! I liked the hospital scene where they got together though! Very mature indeed.

Ada and Wind were the first couple to get together, so by right, they had ample opportunities to recreate another Ivan-Bell love story. But like I said previously, the pair had so little screen time that the only dating scenes I remember about them was how they got together at the rooftop, how Wind wanted to buy a car and start a family after meeting Ada, and how the pair always gets sandwiched between their bickering moms. But overall, the pair was more romantic than the Pro Sir-Mandy pair since they are younger. I thought it would be better if they went deeper into discussing the problems met in a relationship if the girl has a higher job ranking than the guy, something relevant to the society today.

And moving on to my favourite couple Ken and Angel! I feel that they are the pair with the most potential, yet receives the least screen time for further developments. They only got together in Episode 28 out of 30 episodes, though I've enjoyed their bickering throughout the series. Since they are the "Traditional vs Liberal", "Eastern vs Western" couple, they could have looked further into the conflicts between the two if they decides to get married or something, like how the Westernised Angel might want a simple wedding while Ken opts for a traditional Chinese wedding. I feel that since dramas are supposed to be reflection of our lives, it would be better if they could discuss about some of the issues relevant to the modern world which the audience could reflect on.

C) Finale

Similar in FH1/2/3, all three series ended with an exciting case that involved the kidnap of the main characters by some psychopath and an action-packed episode with the CID and Forensics racing against time to rescue their friends. I've mentioned to Trixy before that 2011 is TVB's Year of Tragedy. Out of every 10 TVB series I've watched, 9 of them will end up with a tragic ending. Like in Kevin Cheng and Yoyo Mung's Only You (只有您) where a couple dies of an accident in the most unexpected times, Angel died of a gunshot in the finale, quite to my surprise. TVB kept emphasizing on how "We should treasure the people around us while they are still alive" by making almost all 2011 series end up in a tragic way, but I think they should only do this for a few selected dramas, not most of them. I was quite disturbed by Angel's sudden death, but it lasted only a while because when I thought about it again, I should have expected an ending like this since I've already seen the trend in 2011 TVB series. Let's hope that this trend stops for the future TVB dramas I'll be watching after my As.

Forensic Heroes I/II: ☻☻☻☻☻☻☺☺☺☺ (6 Stars)

Forensic Heroes III:  ☻☻☻☺☺☺☺☺☺☺(3 Stars)

3.  ??! Factor

Like any drama, the Forensic Heroes series is not perfect, because they also have their loopholes and flaws in the series. In FH2, the Forensics Team managed to enlarge a video taken 15 years ago right to the smallest detail, which was quite unbelievable. In FH3, there seems to be this glaring discrepancy with the characters' ages throughout the show.

According to the TVB website, it states that Mandy's age is 32 years old, but when the drama talked about Mandy's tragic childhood when she lost both her parents while she was 5 years old in a murder that happened 30 years ago, I couldn't help but think, "Doesn't that make Mandy 35 years old this year?" No matter how I calculate, I couldn't get the ages right. If Mandy is 32-35 years old this year, her grandfather would be at least 80 years old by now. But watch the drama and you'll see that Mandy's grandfather seems to be very close to Pro Sir's father, and they look roughly the same age. This also means that Mandy's grandfather is roughly the same age as Pro Sir's daughter's grandfather?! And not to mention, Mandy married Pro Sir in the final episode, which makes her... Pro Sir's daughter's mother. What??! This whole messed-up generation thing is making me confused. Maybe I too particular about details like this, after all, it is hard to write perfect scripts.

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Overall, I think that the series is suitable for people who are not particular about serious crime-solving and is simply looking for a random series to watch. However, I have my reservations about die-hard Forensic Heroes Series fans like me liking the new sequel. Looks like I still prefer a continuation of FH1/2 instead of starting a brand new storyline yet retain the name Forensic Heroes III to attract fans from the previous two prequels. 

Wow, I took 3.5 hours to type this whole blog post when I actually stated in front that I have nothing to blog about today, hahahaha! Hope that my readers will not be turned off by the lengthy post and specific topic of discussion, because I really spent time evaluating my all-time favourite TVB dramas to provide my personal point of view. 

If you share a different opinion from mine, feel free to leave a message and tell me why!

P.S. Moose, if you are reading this, here's the reason why I preferred FH1/2 as compared to FH3! Watch the whole of FH3 and you'll know it!