This very much favourable Hong Kong drama had its finale two weeks ago, but I only managed to finish the whole series up just now since I’m off for a long break oversea during the Chinese New Year holiday. Now, it’s time to sum up on what my thought over this drama is. The series tells the story of a tour guide (Roger Kwok), whom had a travel company with his long-time girlfriend, and was in last few months in state of bankruptcy. He then encounters several issues, like betrayals from his best friend and his fiancee, meeting new friends and relatives, and problems in marriage and family.
The drama starred Roger Kwok, Wong Cho Lam (first time as male lead too), Joey Meng, Ivana Wong, Angela Tong, Helena Law, Mimi Chu, and several others who are mostly new to most of us (which is good as we get to see new fresh faces with talents). Roger Kwok certainly did a usual good job in acting. For Cho Lam, this is his first role as a male lead here and I admire his effort in contribution to this drama. Besides than acting, he also contributed to the scriptwriting for parts of the story to make it much more creative, fresh and comedic. Yes, I can see it. The script is very well produced and he equally balanced out every character’s portion in this series without emphasizing too much on his own role too. For Joey Meng, it’s been a long time since her famous role in My Date with a Vampire, and I think she needs improvement, but still okay overall. Ivana Wong was seriously looking too fake in acting. She should go back to her singing path. Her crying and attitude of pretending to be cute is annoying sometimes as seen in this drama.
The story introduces us to the tour guiding job by Roger with his best friend and his long time girlfriend. Then, as the series progresses, there is nothing much concerning their job anymore which I find a bit disappointing. It’s a waste. There can be a lot of potential for the development to the story that surrounds the tour leader job but they didn’t explore it. Instead, the story runs elsewhere to singing (to suit Ivana most probably), fashion (as obvious on Ivana’s former boyfriend), and others unnecessary stuff. Yes, this drama is very relaxing and sometime entertaining, but I find there isn’t any focus or strength it is going to. And then, there is nothing exciting I watched from every episodes of this drama. Well, there are some touching moments, but this series needs some climax, man.
It goes plain all the way, only to be saved by Cho Lam’s comedic dialogues and appearance. But to be honest, I still don’t like him. I am still wondering how come this series obtained such positive and mostly favourable reviews from the audiences. Yes, it’s quite a good comedy drama, but I don’t see any reason this drama could get that much of praise. Anyway, it’s a light-hearted and peaceful 20-episodes long drama of family, love and friendship (as so usual in every dramas) added only with some great humors. That’s it. Out of 10 points, I rate ‘Inbound Troubles’ a total of 7.2.
(All images in this post are from various sources throughout the world wide web)
