Along parallel lines

i have my fair share when it comes to watching taiwanese idol dramas but nothing comes close to in time with you.

as the 13-part series is nearly coming to a close, there is a bundle of mixed emotions in me. this is the first time that i felt the show could have come to two possible endings: they either get together or they don't. surprisingly, i would be satisfied with both. why? min from noises from the closet explains this well:

They’re already walking life together in parallel lines, and they’re not even sure that they want to intersect, but like two lines that intersect they’re afraid that they’ll end up losing that easy companionship and be forced to move away from each other.

what is this show really about? basically, a woman and a man being best friends for a ridiculous long period of 14 years and going. we know how this will go down in idol drama terms: they will end up together. platonic relationships will never last forever. however, the beautiful writing makes everything in this show much more realistic and you will come to consider the option that they might never end up together once you've reached the halfway mark of the series.

in the first episode, the first half revolves around cheng youqing's life as she turns 30. we also learn about how she and li daren became best friends through various flashbacks: they were enemies in high school and slowly turned into acquaintances when they majored in the same thing while attending the same college.

as we move on to subsequent episodes, the focus starts to move towards their personal lives, their friends & families and who they are during work. i was absolutely delighted to see how well both of them can get along with each other's family and their own. it is good that the writer decided to place youqing as the cheng family's youngest child whereas daren is the li family's eldest child because the atmospheres of their respective homes are worlds apart. taking note of that, it will explain why their characters turned out to be the way they are.

apart from that, you'll get a more detailed look of their relationship as best friends - which i simply adore: eg. she knows what he doesn't like in his food and he could travel to taichung without any hesitance for the sake to console her.

at the halfway mark (episode 7, which is my favourite episode to date): youqing and daren's friendship will be strongly tested by the appearance of youqing's ex-boyfriend, ding liwei. to summarize it in simpler terms, daren doesn't like liwei just because youqing was totally distraught by their break-up and this was the relationship which she took the longest time to recover from.

from the 8th episode to the 12th, youqing faces the extreme ups and downs when she's back together with liwei. over to daren's side, he starts to struggle even more when his feelings for youqing starts to sink deeper. between this timeline, we get to know more about daren, his feelings for youqing and the path he purposely made to get close to her.

i have the original screenplay book with me but i am not going to spoil the ending because, like what i said from the start, the ending may go in any direction.

one thing which i have to praise this show for: the omnipresence of youqing or daren when either badly needs the other to be around or when one calls the other on the phone. this happens frequently in almost every episode. in episode 8, the scene where omnipresent!daren was helping youqing to wipe off her make-up as she lies in bed feeling very exhausted from quarreling with liwei and dealing with her own grief due to the death of their beloved high school teacher was amazing on its own. for girls, your inner soul will squeal at the sight of this.

on a random note, episode 6 and 10 are transitional episodes. i can't say these episodes are not interesting but it's more like the series take a subtle u-turn from time to time.

itwy is more of your comfort food drama as it takes on a more laid-back style and not your typical melodrama which pushes you to blow up at the characters at every chance you get. it's definitely suitable for times where you just want to snuggle in bed during a rainy day. even if you don't want to watch this show for the cast, do watch it for the brilliant writing and directing.