Angels of Mission

Angels of Mission
无名天使3D
weekdays 10pm
Channel U

I saw this series online some time ago but wasn't that interested in it. I thought it was some low budget, chick flick kind of show, but after I saw the trailer Mediacorp did up to promote this show, I thought it looked great. At the very least, with the big explosions and gun fights, it didn't look like a low budget series. But because of school and stuff, I didn't get to watch it. Until one day, I saw snippets of it which the mother recorded to watch, she was following this show. After watching those bits, I thought it looked great. Hence I went back to the earier website where I first saw it and started watching the whole series.

It was great man, I finished it in almost one sitting. I only hadn't managed to finish it in one sitting because my window crashed and I thought it was some sign from above forcing me to go to bed, leaving me with two episodes more to go, but I woke up early the next day to finish off with those two episodes before I went to school.

Angels of Mission, starring Sonija Kwok as the head of the Counter-Terrorism Unit, Sam, who recuits in Fa, a mahjong-addict inspector who's also a car racer, acted by Charmaine Sheh, and a little policewoman Bowie who has boyfriends all over Hong Kong, but is also a highly skilled marksman, acted by Shirley Yeung. A cast of Miss Hong Kongs, so I guess that's what makes a show look good. Their figures were like, oh man... It makes me wish I was back when I was 19/20 years old when I was about their weight.

There are four cases in the series, each a different terrorism act, on bombs, missile trade, anthrax, political assasination. There's also a line of story chronicling the love lives of the three leading ladies. I really liked the cases featured in this series, but I thought that the love story was very weak and there could have been much more to develop.

***possible spoilers***
Everything to be written here might not have been screened on Channel U yet, so skip this whole part if you do not want to be spoiled.

The main reason I thought the love line was poorly developed was possibly due to the weak male characters featured in this drama series. Sam has a string of boyfriends whom she finds them difficult to communicate with, she got tangled up in a three-way relationship with an almost married man who's basically a possessive yet fickle asshole, then she got herself tangled up in yet another three-way relationship with the Dan, the supposed main male lead.

Dan had went after Fa earlier on in the show because he wanted to cheat her of her money. After being terrorised by her, they spilt up, but Fa has already really fallen in love with him while throughout the show, even after he was with Sam, there was still traces of him still caring a lot for Fa. Dan is the kind of person I'd say is afflicted with the Zhang Wuji syndrome, and I really dislike him. He's not successful, not ethical, not loyal, not anything, but yet two very beautiful and amazing women can fall in love with him. Worse still, he doesn't know who he likes.

Actually, I'd think it would have been a better ending had he ended up with Fa because their relationship was more wholesome than his with Sam.

But then, there's also another romance of Fa with this professional bodyguard Wallace. Wallace is possibly my favourite character in the show. He's damn shuai. He's damn cool. And he has this enigmatic aura around him. At first he appeared to be some aloof, incooperative bodyguard, but he turned out to be quite innocent, and shy. And he really likes Fa. A pity she didn't reciprocate his feelings.

It turned out that Wallace is Dan's separated elder brother. Dan had thought that Wallace had skipped town with their hard earn savings to live a life on his own, but it turned out that Wallace is an FBI undercover. I sort of like the arc of the brother relationship.

For Bowie, she has a string of boyfriends but she loved none and is always seen trying to ditch them. But there was this one persistent one who she in the end falls in love with but because of their inherently different lives and opinions, they broke up. I thought that was quite crap, what show has a couple breaking up at the very last episode?
***spoilers end here***

In all I thought all the actresses were good. The actors were also great although their characters were weak, but that's the fault of the scriptwriters, not theirs. I was pleasantly surprised by Patrick Tam who acted as Dan. Patrick Tam looked tanned in this show, and I thought he looked more manly than as he were in Seed of Hope some time back. Also, seeing him act as a loser, reminded me of Gallen Lo. Thought he looked a bit like Gallen Lo in the show.

Another actor that's absolutely amazing was Shek Sau. Lin Hok Man was the main baddie in the show, and he was every inch the baddie. But it's a pity that his story was not fully developed even though there were two parts to his story. I thought that the scriptwriters didn't give his character much depth, but it's still amzing how Shek Sau could manage to develop his character himself, sometimes giving him this romantic face, and sometimes portraying Lin Hok Man as a psychotic dictator.

Then of course, there's the gem of the show, Stephen Au. Actually when Wallace first appeared in the show and seemed not to be on good terms with Fa, I guessed that they'd later fall into a relationship. Then when Wallace went to visit Luk Cheh and she mentioned about Wah-zai (Wallace) and a Keong-zai, I guessed that Keong-zai should be his brother, and that would be Dan. Then when Dan mentioned that his brother left home over night, without leaving a reason nor explaining anything, I guessed that Wallace was an undercover. My mother would call my this guessings as being honed in the art of watching TVB dramas.

***spoilers*** All my guesses were correct. ***spoilers end here***

In all, I'd give it a 3.5/5 stars. It's entertaining, but the script's not well developed. Pretty stars and engimatic men are the only saving points.