any good TV series recently?

[EnergyReaper]

On 9/20/2021 at 6:34 AM, matteo said:

I checked the various youku, IQIYI etc. but  only seem to find either japanese audio with chinese subtitles or chinese audio without subtitles...can anyone help here?

You can try ixigua.com or bilibili.com

[Jan Finster]

I just finished Your Secret: 

https://mydramalist.com/31125-your-secret

 

It is not bad at all and the actors are quite easy to understand. As with all Chinese dramas, they should have stopped after episode 15 or so, but since the whole drama covers at least 3 different "crime cases", you can just stop if you get bored.

[malazann]

yo guys this is for any Terrace House fans (or someone wanting a slow paced reality show that uses every day language).

 

It's called Shanghai Share House (同一屋檐下). I know there has been a couple other Chinese copycats but this one is an official partnership with FujiTV that made the original Japanese Terrace House and IMO its better than most of the Japanese seasons. I watched if before I really got into learning chinese proper but I feel like its a good show for learners. Especially since there are certain types of conversations that repeat through-out the series whenever a new house mate joins.

 

Anyways here is a link and its been fan subbed if you want the english translation - Amara – Award-winning Subtitle Editor and Enterprise Offerings. Its also on the Youku youtube channel if you have no need for the english subs

[Jan Finster]

The Bad Kids

 

Hands down the best Chinese drama I have see so far

https://mydramalist.com/51571-cat-s-cradle

 

[amytheorangutan]

On 10/18/2021 at 11:01 AM, malazann said:

It's called Shanghai Share House (同一屋檐下)

Thank you so much for this! I like Terrace House.

[Guest realmayo]

On 9/17/2021 at 10:02 AM, amytheorangutan said:

I just watched a censored GL drama on YouTube called Couple of Mirrors or 双镜

 

I've just finished watching this, it was fun, despite the silliness of the plot. Some of the long pauses and lingering looks didn't make complete sense until I went back and googled what @amytheorangutan meant by "censored GL drama" and it became a bit clearer!

[amytheorangutan]

@realmayo haha yes! It was a bit silly and dramatic but enjoyable. Mainly just really love the couple ? I think they’re making a second season. 

[Guest realmayo]

On 10/21/2021 at 9:18 AM, amytheorangutan said:

Mainly just really love the couple

The one with the guns is pretty good at the "uhm this is highly awkward" facial expressions.

 

OK what next? Given I also started but gave up on the Longest Day in Chang'An because it was too slow, I'll follow you in giving 《 沉默的真相》 a go.

 

[MiaVirga]

The Untamed, You are My Glory and The Long Ballad are good options. 

[amytheorangutan]

On 10/21/2021 at 9:33 AM, realmayo said:

Given I also started but gave up on the Longest Day in Chang'An because it was too slow, I'll follow you in giving 《 沉默的真相》 a go.

Let me know what you think ?

[Insectosaurus]

Talking about The Long Night, what accent is this, as pinpointed as possible? I love listening to it. I understand most of it so it's not anything weird, it's just a few features here and there that I really like. She sounds a bit like Glossika's Beijing accent, but I'm hoping for something more specific. I've mostly listened to Taiwan material so I still suck at sorting mainland dialects even remotely correctly.

[Insectosaurus]

On 10/27/2021 at 12:31 AM, Insectosaurus said:

Talking about The Long Night, what accent is this, as pinpointed as possible?

 

For anyone else who might run into this in the future: the answer seems to be Changchun.

[Balthazar]

Since this has become the de facto "What are you watching these days?" thread (or is there another one?) I'm posting here. Eight episodes into "中国式离婚" and I highly recommend it. It's not something to watch if you're in the mood for something cheerful, this is pretty bleak stuff. Difficult to watch at times. Yet it has this captivating and eerie atmosphere (in no small part due to the music, which reminds me of Harold Budd with a gentle touch of Twin Peaks) and feels very "real", more so than any other Chinese show I have seen so far. The acting is solid, the storyline and characters are all pretty believable. In terms of language difficulty, I'd say this is one of the easier if not easiest shows I have come across. Beijing accent and generally slow and clear speech helps a lot. Maybe it's an "old show" thing (the show is from 2004 and I'm not really young enough to refer to that as "old", but hey).

 

The whole show is available on Youtube.

[StChris]

I've been watching more Taiwanese stuff on Netflix. These three shows are all mercifully short (usually less than 10 episodes per series, not like the huge 40+ mainland Chinese ones), and I think are worth giving a try:

 

Light the Night

 

 

This series is set in late-80s Taipei and tells the tale of a group of women working at a Japanese-style hostess bar. It begins with the murder of one of the women (it is not revealed which one), and the action then skips back to a few months before and relates the events leading up to the murder. The first series (8 episodes) isn't really a whodunnit, it, it instead focusses more on the drama between the hostesses. I just watched episode 1 of series 2 yesterday and it continues on from the day of the murder and it looks like we are going to get a murder mystery after all (there are several people each with there own motive).

 

I think the strength of this one is in its well-rounded characters and the high-production recreation of 80s Taiwan (at least it seems authentic to me - If anyone here was actually living in Taiwan back in the 80s then I'd like to hear what you think).

 

Nowhere Man

 

 

If anyone is looking for a gangster series, then I thought the 4 episodes of this one was pretty good. It was the final 2 episodes where things got confusing for me (lots of plots and betrayals etc)

 

Detention

 

 

This is set in a small town school in 90s Taiwan, and also has plenty of flashbacks to the 1960s "white terror" period. The two timelines intertwine to create a spooky (although not scary, I thought) 8 episode show. 

 

 

[feihong]

On 10/18/2021 at 5:01 AM, malazann said:

It's called Shanghai Share House (同一屋檐下). I know there has been a couple other Chinese copycats but this one is an official partnership with FujiTV that made the original Japanese Terrace House and IMO its better than most of the Japanese seasons.

Very late to the party, but I finished this not too long ago and it was really good. It was the first season of Terrace House in China, but stands up pretty well with the two seasons of Japanese TH that I saw before. The formula is nearly identical with the original, but the main difference is that they only shoot for 105 days, not for nearly a full calendar year. So the number of episodes stands at a mere 15, instead of the ungodly number from the Japanese version.

 

The nice thing about this show from a language learner's perspective is that it strikes a middle ground between something like Super Sketch Show (一年一度喜剧大赛) and the average contemporary C-drama. Super Sketch Show can be ridiculously hard to understand because of the speed at which the actors talk and their tendency to use more obscure vocabulary. But most C-dramas set in a modern setting tend to be too easy once you've seen several of them and have gotten used to them. In Shanghai Share House, you get some relatively easy dialogue in the house scenes, and then you encounter more difficult dialogue during the celebrity commentary.

[malazann]

On 1/10/2022 at 2:10 AM, feihong said:

and then you encounter more difficult dialogue during the celebrity commentary.

definitely my fav part of the show! Other chinese tv shows with panels i've usually not been too fond of, but this show has maintained that Terrace House panel quality whilst being completely different. I'm currently on a rewatch actually, since the first time I watched it was with english subs

[feihong]

On 1/10/2022 at 4:22 AM, malazann said:

I'm currently on a rewatch actually, since the first time I watched it was with english subs

I watched it on Youku.com but I’m curious to know how good the English subs were. With two professional standup comedians on the panel, it felt like some jokes would be a very difficult to translate.

 

The second season set in Shenzhen was announced way back in April 2021 and still hasn’t materialized yet, hope it hasn’t been canceled! ? 

[malazann]

On 1/11/2022 at 4:12 AM, feihong said:

I watched it on Youku.com but I’m curious to know how good the English subs were. With two professional standup comedians on the panel, it felt like some jokes would be a very difficult to translate.

I'll let you know when i come across them, but i found the translation on my first run through to be pretty damn good. The sub group shares a member with the Terrace House sub group and they take it seriously. Official eng subs on dramas on Youtube tho.... they aren't even trying sometimes!

I just came across Curry's Weibo and it is FILLED with 2-5 min vidoes of him eating hotpot (even inviting strangers to eat on the curb???). Dude is a hotpot lunatic. @DevilCurry刘可力 的个人主页 - 微博 (weibo.com)  (shanghai sharelife spoilers within, not that it matters much)

[mouse]

Anyone else having difficulty watching 返校 (Detention) on Netflix? I have VPN and have tried a number of options, with no success.

[幽默感]

Hi all.

Just wanted to share that there is a new drama I highly recommend airing right now called Reset (开端).

 

 

Brief description: "Game designer Xiao He Yun and university student Li Shi Qing are caught in a time loop after a bus explosion and must work hard to put a stop to it."

The closest western movie I can think of in terms of feel would be Source Code starring Jake Gyllenhaal.  

I was hooked from the intro of the first episode. It's a lot of fun, and I don't want to spoil the plot in any way but it really keeps you guessing what will happen next.

It's on Youtube and the first four episodes have Eng subs already. It's also available on Tencent video (VIP only) and various free Chinese sites up to episode 8 as it's still airing as of today.

I'm finding it pretty good for Chinese listening immersion too (especially as I'm enjoying the story so much) but possibly not for complete beginners.