Hello! I’m back with recaps!

Characters:

• Wallace Huo as Simon/Allen/Bo Jin Yan
• Ma Si Chun as Jenny/Jian Yao
• Edward Zhang as Jabber/Xie Han
• Wang Kai as Li Xun Ran
• Andrew Yin as Kris/Fu Zi Yu

Details:

• Chinese
• 24 episodes
• Original Run: October 15, 2015 – ???
• Based on internet novel of the same name by Ding Mo

Quick Rundown:

Bo Jin Yan is a criminal psychologist who recently came back from America (always America!). He meets Jian Yao aka Yao Yao, a simple girl who just happens to be perfectly observant and a great translator at that. He hires her as his assistant and they work together to solve mysteries and crimes and unintentionally become the center of one. Can they fight their way through or will someone lose more just than their heart?

Estelle’s Recap

I was utterly surprised when I saw this series already on Viki. I mean geez, talk about being speedy! Does this mean these mainland series are now as popular as Korean dramas??? That would be pretty awesome! It’s about time Chinese series get a little recognition and an upgrade on production value.

Anyway, onto the recap!

The first scene totally confuses me but also piques my interest. Here’s the protagonist I imagine? Chained up and totally bloody in a dark room screaming the f word. Not sure what’s up but it doesn’t give us much time to really think and analyze because off we go to the beach side!

We are introduced to the female lead, Jian Yao/Yao Yao, who visits this old and seemingly empty house with her childhood friend/romantic interest, Xuan Ran and sister Jian Xuan. Apparently she decided to interview for a short term translation job and this is the location. Her sister is all freaked out by the house and begs her to leave, but Yao Yao and Xuan Yan are super chill about it. Yao Yao, in particular is very calm and shall we say even intrigued? As they drive away, we get another snap shot of a bloody arm. Eep.

Back at home, Jian Xuan tells Yao Yao about some ghostly man who lives in the “haunted” house. According to their mother, he is very tall, skinny and pale, almost “skeleton like.” She exaggerates by saying the man floated from one place to another. Yao Yao disregards all this promptly and still plans to go to the interview the next morning. Coincidentally enough policeman Xuan Ran is unable to accompany her because he has to follow up on a few missing persons case. Hmmmm missing people and haunted house? Something smells fishy, but is it all just a ploy to misguide us? Perhaps, perhaps. Let’s continue shall we?

Yao Yao arrives the next morning by herself and gains entrance to the ivy clad house. Honestly, aside from being on a quiet street I think this house is actually very pretty and well lite, not at all the haunted variety.

In any case, once Yao Yao enters, the door shuts immediately after her. Though a little hesitant, she walks inside and finds a note asking her to wait.

After waiting for a while, a man appears at the bottom of the staircase. He introduces himself as Bo Jin Yan, presumably the owner of the Bo residence (aka the house). The two settles down to a relatively normal conversation about their mutual connection, a professor that recommended her to him. He shows her a binder of documents he wants translated as a “test.” She opens it to find a bunch of gruesome photos – he explains that these are pictorial inserts for the report and he had simply forgot to remove them. And the report itself? It is on the murder of a sexual abuse victim. Unfazed, she grabs a dictionary and gets translating as Bo Jin Yan peers up to a stone wall on the second floor.

Yao Yao finishes her translation in record time and surprises the heck out of Bo Jin Yan. He looks over the finished product and asks her about her career plans post graduation. She explains that she has been accepted at an international business corporation as a normal office worker. He laments that such a job would be too easy for her and invites her to guess his profession. Though he displayed lots of clues to mislead her, such as washing his hands multiple times and giving her a clearly medical related document to translate, she is sure that he is not a doctor. She points out that he does not have a steady hand as he lost some tea leaves while scooping tea and he is not careful as he put the wrong lids on the tea jars, making him unsuitable for a career as a surgeon. Finally, she guesses correctly that he is in software design. She reveals that she knows all this because there’s a magazine opened to a page about him right by the counter. He laughs and reintroduces himself as Fu Zi Yu, the real Bo Jin Yan’s friend.

Yao Yao is accepted as Bo Jin Yan’s translator and goes to the house to work. On her first day, she gets a tour from Fu Zi Yu who warns her not to go upstairs or to the locked room on the first floor. Of course, she doesn’t listen and wonders super close to it after hearing some loud clanging. He just happens to walk out of the room and ta-da! Their first encounter. Not at all romantic though…

On about the third or fourth day of her work there’s a terrible thunderstorm that kills the electricity. A worried and scared Yao Yao calls for Bo Jin Yan from downstairs. He proves he is not as inaccessible as he appeared. Well, sort of.

Yao Yao: Mr. Bo, Mr. Bo?
Bo Jin Yan: You called?
Yao Yao: Mr. Bo, the electricity has gone out.
Bo Jin Yan: You don’t need to purposely call me down to tell me a fact as obvious as this.
Yao Yao: Is there candle or emergency light we can use?
Bo Jin Yan: Yes.
Yao Yao: Where?
Bo Jin Yan: I don’t know.
Yao Yao: Then can this outage be fixed?
Bo Jin Yan: Judging from the way the electricty went out, it is probable that the electricity in the nearby fields are overpowered and therefore burnt out the transformer. However, I won’t fix it. I’m busy. Please do not disturb me. You can do what you like.
Yao Yao: Mr. Bo!
Bo Jin Yan: What else do you need?
Yao Yao: It’s really cold here, can you lend me some clothes?
Bo Jin Yan: I don’t like it when others wear my clothes.

All I can say is, Mr. Bo you are a tough nut to crack! I’m impressed you even have one friend who is more like your housekeeper than anything. Can someone explain to me why Fu Zi Yu, a successful IT man is spending his free time taking care of him???

Anyway, after the totally unhelpful conversation with our Mr. Bo, Yao Yao heads to the kitchen and locates an electric camping stove. She fires it up and lights a couple of candles with it. She then defrosts a fish (Mr. Bo only has fish in his fridge) and starts cooking. Things are beginning to look up when Bo Jin Yan suddenly reappears in the kitchen. He proceeds to taste the fish. I thought he was “busy”?

Bo Jin Yan: Not tasty. Meat is too overcooked and there’s too much salt. 

He then decides he must show off his culinary prowess by cooking up a storm, because clearly it’s important for her to know what “proper” fish tastes like. Alright man. Once he’s done cooking? He leaves the kitchen. Yup, won’t even dignify her by sharing a meal together on this stormy night.

After eating some yummy fish, Yao Yao returns to the living room to close the windows blown open by the wind. A window shatter and she barely dodges it. This is when Bo Jin Yan appears YET again…with night vision googles on and “rescues her” aka moves her from the floor to the sofa.

Yao Yao: What are you doing?
Bo Jin Yan: I don’t believe that you can, without wearing night vision googles, walk over the shattered glass pieces and return to the sofa safely. Not to mention you are not very agile.

He also brings her a jacket. When she thanks him, he tells her coldly that it’s Fu Zi Yu’s jacket. He also observes that she ate some of his cooking and asks her to confirm his previous statement about the fish. She admits that his is indeed tastier, but she doesn’t forget to mention that he is too mean. Ha, atta girl!

Haven’t had enough? Click for episode 2 recap!

Don’t Blink Yet!

• Fu Zi Yu offers Yao Yao a choice of water, tea and red wine during her interview. Uh, red wine? Who does that?
• When questioned about the need to test Yao Yao’s observation skills when she is just a temp translator, Bo Jin Yan tells Fu Zi Yu that “only a careful and observant person can capture the fine details of my writing and the soul of my words.” Oh gosh.
• Bo Jin Yan does not require Yao Yao to hand write her translations because her handwriting is deemed too “ugly.” –.–;;
• Bo Jin Yan has some sort of trauma history and the chained up sequence at the very beginning is part of that.
• Yao Yao goes out fishing in the middle of the day instead of doing her job… She texts Bo Jin Yan about leaving him fish and he thanks her in a response.
• Xun Ran thinks Bo Jin Yan and the house is suspicious because a child recently went missing nearby.
• Bo Jin Yan whispers into the locked room that “this is punishment.” Hmmmmmm.