Pretty Li Hui Zhen

                                      

Episodes: 40

Synopsis:

This is the Chinese remake of the Korean drama "She Was Pretty." The story follows a woman named Li Hui Zhen who is clumsy, messy, and unlucky in life. As a child, she was very beautiful but after her family went through bankruptcy, it took a toll on her physical appearance greatly as she struggled to support herself and help her family. One day her childhood friend Bai Hao Yu comes back to China and attempts to find Li Hui Zhen. When Li Hui Zhen saw that the childhood "fatty" friend became an extremely attractive and successful man, she suddenly felt ashamed of her current state. Hoping to leave only beautiful memories and impressions of herself with Bai Hao Yu, she asks her stylish and attractive best friend, Xia Qiao, to take her place. At first, it was supposed to be a white lie where Xia Qiao meets him and then tells him she's going to study abroad so they can't meet in the future. However, things get complicated when Xia Qiao becomes touched by Bai Hao Yu's love and when Li Hui Zhen gets an internship at the company Immortal only to find that Bai Hao Yu is her new boss. As Hui Zhen continues to try to hide her true identity, she has constant interactions with a fellow coworker Lin Yi Mu who is interested in her and with Bao Hao Yu who constantly berates her for incompetence. 

Review:

    I actually enjoyed watching this drama because it was fun, light-hearted, and also fairly realistic. I love watching characters who are all good at heart but struggle internally with their moral compasses. It is also refreshing to watch characters manage to balance life, romance, and their careers. The support everyone showed one another and the constant idea of having to work for what you want was constantly seen throughout the drama. The main reason I enjoyed this drama was probably because it made me want to be a better person and work harder for the things that I want.
     I also love the friendships in this drama. Every decision and action the characters made, no matter how selfish, were all somewhat rooted in good intentions. It was hard for me to hate anyone in this drama and I heard that the friendships in this drama felt more realistic in comparison to the Korean version. There are many people who really like the Korean version and I have not watched it yet. However, I did enjoy this drama despite many complaining about the similarities, differences, and character/plot changes.
      This drama gave me a severe case of second-lead-syndrome. I really couldn't see the first male lead be the actual love interest. He was so biased toward Li Hui Zhen and I didn't like how he could treat someone like trash the moment he finds out they aren't Li Hui Zhen. Throughout the entire drama, the redeeming point for him was that he fell in love with Li Hui Zhen without knowing that she was his childhood sweetheart. However, it doesn't change the fact that he treated her poorly before that and it doesn't change the way he treated Xia Qiao after finding out she had been lying to him about her being Li Hui Zhen. I loved Lin Yi Mu because he treated Hui Zhen well from the beginning and liked her for who she was, not how she looked and not because of what her identity meant to him.

Favorite episodes:
- All of the scenes with Hui Zhen and Xia Qiao being close friends because they are actually friendship goals and it's actually fairly realistic to how a lot of girls love/treat their best friends.
Ep 15: Bai Hao Yu following Hui Zhen because he starts piecing things together
Ep 24: Wasn't that spectacular of an episode but this was when Hui Zhen gets a transformation
Ep 26: Lin Yi Mu went out and bought Hui Zhen a bag and he shopped for days just for her. I found this so sweet and at this point I was already suffering from second-lead-syndrome hard.
Ep 31: Bai Hao Yu drinks one glass and passes out. It's so comedic.