Fire with Fire

I seem to be having a streak of good luck with Chinese dramas, as coming in as another near-perfect production is Lighter & Princess, a bad boy/good girl college romance that just about knocked my socks off, and demonstrated that with the right actors and script even propaganda and censorship can't ruin an awesome series.

The story: From the very first day at university good girl Zhu Yun (a deceptively simple character depicted perfectly by Zhang Jing Li) butts heads with bad boy Li Xin (superbly portrayed by Chen Fei Yu), a computer prodigy whiz who basically blows everyone out of the water the minute he taps a keyboard. At first their rocky relationship seems doomed to become a bitter rivalry, but somehow it doesn't.

Gradually Zhu Yun finds out Li Xin has a tragic past, partly the fault of her strait-laced mother, who got him expelled from middle school for hacking. While Li Xin does everything he can to scare off Zhu Yun, who isn't easily spooked, you get a real sense of their mutual attraction. This develops into a slow burn, epic kind of romance that you know is going to end badly, and still keep hoping for it anyway. Then terror and fury set fire to everything, and it seems like the end -- only it's not. Three years later everyone collides again to finish the story, and if you want to know what happens second time around, you'll have to watch.

Finally, finally, finally a Chinese series hired real talent to produce this drama, because it is consistently excellent in all areas: locations, wardrobe, dialogue, plotting, conflicts -- there isn't a single misstep at any point. It's modern, it's realistic, and it's clever as hell. The romance, while mostly tame and chaste, really made sense and got a little racy toward the end (for Chinese dramas, anyway). I have to credit both lead actors for fully immersing themselves in their roles. The rest of the cast did the same, believe it or not. The end was also realistic, in that not all the conflicts were solved, but it was hopeful, too. I would say the one (and only) hitch for me was the vagueness of Li Xun's old back injury, which seemed to be poorly researched (I know because I have the same back problem.) Available on Viki.com.