The New World: The Ending

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How was it for me? I felt like I wasted the last fifteen weeks for nothing. I’m not saying that it’s bad. But I’m saying that there are several factors that have ruined it. The ending is always the most important part to convince us so I think it has to be really, really strong. It’s hard to do and it can’t all be perfect to everyone’s satisfaction, but it has to at least make sense. In some areas, it did make sense. But in others, I just felt so infuriated that it was like all was wasted.

First off, they have a great team with the special team. Why not focus more on it?

Instead, we were forced to watch Zi Hong and Miao Miao’s constant banter and their on and off relationship. Okay, I got it that they were the main couple, but it was too overused with their fights and then later they were so inactive in the final moments of the series that they could be easily forgotten if they weren’t needed to persuade Dong Han and Zi Yan to let go. Their moments were mostly episode fillers so we could wait for more developments of the main plot to unveil itself.

What was the most infuriating thing about the ending? Yang Yong Zhao got away. Seriously? He was the mastermind of the Returning Home Project, and I swear, I always thought that the mastermind was the guiltiest one. Even if Dong Han and Zi Yan carried out the later parts of the plan, they were misled by him to hate and to continue on. How could he get the free ticket out just because he was Chief Zheng’s senior and because he was Miao Miao’s grandfather? I don’t care how old he was, he was still guilty. If the others were going down, he had to go down as well. To think that Miao Miao was soooo into finding her childhood friends and in trying to protect people closer to her, I felt it strange that she accepted that Zi Yan went to prison and her grandfather didn’t. Not to mention how she fought so much with the police just because Zi Hong was in confinement twice in the past yet didn’t do anything for Zi Yan? Okay, so I got it that priorities with her and some others in here were seriously messed up. But what about Chen Jie? Chen Jie letting it go as well was somewhat unbelievable for me. Seriously? I know Chen Jie had calmed down since his last aggression with targeting Dong Han the first few episodes while trying to figure out who the mole was. Yet I don’t think that he would be the type to let it go so easily and telling Ah Gang and Xiao He so lightly that their boss told them to forget about it. He put his own brother in prison! How could he let a little connection get in the way? Just because Yang Yong Zhao was their advisor and was one of the most respectable cops in the good old days? To think that Chief Zheng was so strongly vouching to seek out the truth and do what was right, he sure took the cowardly path and brushed things under the rugs once again, like some people in here. I was really disappointed in him.

Yong Mei’s sole existence was for others to protect her. Then it changed to how she got a bigger role in the turn of events because she was carrying Dong Han’s baby. That meant she was the one responsible for breaking the whole hatred cycle between all parties, at last, uniting some families together. Aside from that, I swear I couldn’t even sympathize with her or anything. I’m not trying to pick on her, but the plot had led me to think so. The point that her pregnancy didn’t make sense made it less convincing too. I got why the writers wanted it to go that way since I already stated above with how it brought the families together. But it didn’t make sense. Dong Han was avoiding her like the plague previously. If it was the hospital scene, it was too unconvincing. I don’t even think he was well enough to do anything. (Sorry, but the writers led us there–like Percy had pointed out to me, so I don’t feel bad for going “there.”) If it was after they got out of the hospital, then I would understand. I think there were some scenes that got cut, but it was in one of the BTS regarding Dong Han and Yong Mei’s scenes. That might have explained it. Yet what was the point of making Yong Mei involved with Dong Han aside from just making peace with the other side? Even if Dong Han was revenge-driven and had gone insane with his tactic, and went into a killing spree, but we–as the audience–couldn’t help but feel really bad for him since he lost his whole family after all. Making him betray Zi Yan was the worst.

Who did Dong Han love–Zi Yan or Yong Mei? Many had asked this question on The New World Facebook page. Pan Bo Xi had posted a picture of Dong Han and Zi Yan as the final moments of the drama were airing. When he was asked, he had said whichever picture he posted, that was the answer. (Go here.) During the flashback of their face-off scene, Dong Han had told Zi Yan that their relationship had never changed. That was the obvious answer. Even if he had cared enough for Yong Mei, but with his words, it was mostly because of the baby (and possibly guilt from using her).

What was the point of surrounding the events on Zhang Guo Tang since the beginning and making a mountain out of it all? I swear it was another wasted route. Well, they wanted to create suspense and lead us astray, but after we found out it was only an accident, it seemed like Zhang Guo Tang’s existence was just there to fill time. Yet I felt if he was the final bad guy, it would have cranked up the hype even more. Because seriously? Although lots of things had happened after Zhang Guo Tang died, it seemed to be recycled and anti-climatic, to say the least. Like how Zi Hong already found out that Zhang Guo Tang said it being an accident. Yet they rehashed that again AND he (Zi Hong) didn’t just say it out to the others and try to convince from there? Yeah, Dong Han and Yang Yong Zhao were going wacko already so there was no talking to them. But I felt the last bits–even with the plot finally revealing Zi Yan as Xiao Cao, the details rehashed again. It was like, hello, we already know that. Could someone show some more proofs instead of crying out the innocent card and saying it was an accident? Yeah, I understand it was an accident because things didn’t turn out the way they thought it would so that was why it was called an accident. I got it. But I hated that they kept crying out their innocence when it was obvious nothing would come out good with the location along with the weather condition of that day. They wouldn’t know for sure if it would rain. But the curve and all? Just a little maneuver and an accident could occur. I don’t care how much they regretted it. And it didn’t matter if Project Jing Hai wasn’t what the others thought it to be. It was just a bunch of excuses to shrug off responsibilities. If they had said: “We tried, but we messed up”, it was easier to swallow. Instead, it was about “We’re innocent, we didn’t know that would happen” type of thing. The other reason for making Zhang Guo Tang the main villain works better? I seriously think he was the other person, aside from Dong Han, who actually helped move the plot forward. Or we would all be in a limbo of forever going through Zi Hong and Miao Miao’s banter and makeup scenes.

Jia Yuan’s death was really for nothing. Seriously? This was the other reason why I hated the ending. Or more like how Yang Yong Zhao got away with it. Although Jia Yuan sacrificed herself because she didn’t want to be used as a pawn for Zhang Guo Tang to put pressure on Zi Hong, it all had to do with Yang Yong Zhao’s grand plan. He was the one who called Zhang Guo Tang and got Zhang Guo Tang to come back. He couldn’t predict Zhang Guo Tang’s moves or didn’t care. He only wanted to execute his plan, so when it went haywire and Zhang Guo Tang was on the loose, running his own agenda, other people got hurt. One of the most innocent people in this matter was Jia Yuan. Her luck was seriously terrible. Her father incurred so much debt that she had to deal with it and even had to resort to being a call girl to pay off the debts, which she had borrowed from Hua Jie’s place to pay off the other ones first before getting rid of this one. She had to protect her brother so that was the only way for her, or at least she thought of it as that way. She didn’t paint herself as the victim or the pitiful one yet was pitied by others, including the audience. She said many times, especially to Zi Hong and later to Jiang Jian Ming, that she wanted to solve her problems her own way. She didn’t cling to anyone for help–or didn’t want to if it wasn’t necessary. She was also very brave, having endured so much already and having to protect her brother (as said before). In the end, what happened? Although it was her choice to sacrifice, I felt like her final moments were just a little crying from some parties and then that was it. She was forgotten away, it seemed like no one cared to seek justice for her anymore. They had other things to do, so they just wanted to brush her off. I’m not saying once a close one dies, we have to always be morbid. We still have to move on with our lives, but I felt Jia Yuan’s death was like it just happened and forgotten so quickly. Things happening made it hard to just focus on mourning for her, but I had a feeling like even Zi Hong no longer cared. That suck. Her brother didn’t know so it wouldn’t count. But I would expect more than five to ten minutes of crying.

Was it Zi Hong’s mother’s fault that the accident of twenty years ago happened? Well, I’m not trying to blame the poor old woman here, but Zi Hong said it himself in episode 15 that it could be an accident or not, because of how he and his mother might be the target of the “warning.” It might as well be so, but those other two families were seriously unlucky. Moral of the story: Stay away from married men! I don’t care how talented they are or like how it seemed that their married life didn’t look too happy or whatever else. They chose it. Don’t justify their actions or yours if you wanted to step toward that path. (And this was the other reason why I hated that Dong Han’s story sort of sounded like Jiang Jian Ming’s too. Not married but it made it similar to the triangle and all. I don’t care if Yong Mei threw herself in front of him, he could say “no” or stop her. So yeah, I’m not going to blame her only just because of my biases, I’m blaming his lack of self-control too.)

Who were the true heroes? Many might think I’m crazy by now. I did not put them in just because they’re my favorite couple. However, I think that if they hadn’t done what they did–minus Dong Han going on a crazy killing spree, no one would know. Everything regarding the accident and the other matters kept getting brushed under the rug. If they hadn’t created some commotion, the others would just plain continue to carry on with their lives, thinking they did right. Even if two wrong doesn’t make a right or whatever it is often splashed around, in this case, they got through. Even if it was because Yong Mei’s connection that forced her father to take some actions, it was still something. Then talking about them, it brought up another sense of frustration upon me again, because of how Yang Yong Zhao had involved both Dong Han and Zi Yan into the plot but never included Zi Hong or Miao Miao. Well, not until recently, but that had failed. Of course, it was already obvious that he wanted to keep Miao Miao out of it–as he had said before. Yet it meant that he was all right with using Dong Han and Zi Yan as tools to forgo his plans. His pitiful talks indicated that he cared for them, but to me, it seemed so fake. And obviously, Miao Miao was his granddaughter, so how could she be involved, right?

If the series is cut back to eight episodes, I think it would be a lot better and more enduring, even with the current ending–more or less. Just cut out some unnecessary bantering and some rehashed of information. I didn’t need fifteen episodes to tell me it was all because of some stupid misunderstanding. Lives were lost, people were hurt. How could the ones who were victims end up paying for it while the others who had–even if unintentionally–caused the pain lived so freely? (It didn’t count that Mrs. Jiang finally confessed, it was too late.) I didn’t even know why there were some details that were added if the Jiang weren’t that guilty about the whole matter, like how they paid Zhang Guo Tang off and didn’t tell Chief Zheng or the other police officers about it. Well, Zhang Guo Tang was crazy, but the constant hiding stuff from the others made it harder for them to move forward with their investigation or knowing what to expect.

And lastly, I don’t know why I need to justify myself anymore. But I guess I will have to do it or I’ll be facing a lot of wraths (even if invisible). I will say that I pick on characters in here throughout my review/summaries, but it’s seriously directed at the characters and plot, NOT the actors and actresses themselves. I think they’re a wonderful team. Watching BTS has made the audience understand more about them, but had also made me like them even more. Angela Lee’s actually really cute off-screen, it’s just that she has the weepy, weakling character throughout. Then there’s Rabbit Yang and Zheng Ting Hu’s hilarious rehearsals behind the scenes. The rest of the cast was equally funny, especially Zhao Jie (Chen Jie, lol), who was seen up to no good at times when they were practicing or just waiting for a scene change. Jean Lee was quite pro, slipping in and out of characters so fast that it had amazed some of the people working with her. Pan Bo Xi and Dou Hua Mei, no need to say more, but they were really funny–and cute.

*All images were captured by DTLCT

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5 thoughts on “The New World: The Ending

  1. Percy says:

    Reading your posts really just gave me a buffer to think about the New World for a sec. I was in denial for the past few days that revisiting it can be so infuriating and depressing lol.

    The main leads dissolve into mere background pieces is quite laughable. Miao Miao and Zi Hong’s angsty scenes seem rather pointless because it was obvious Zi Hong wasn’t going to do something dangerous or significant at all. No, leave that to the second leads. The direction the writer chose to go with reversing the position of the main leads and second leads is quite puzzling. It would make a lot of sense, with the assortment of scene proportions, for Zi Hong to take a more active stance in the Returning Home Project. The writer is kinda breaking all the rules like not making the protagonist the centre of action and motive that moves the plot forward, not making the protagonist the tragic figure, but failed to achieve much. I’ll all for unconventional, it’s refreshing, but in this case it’s just grating.

    Regarding Miao Miao and Chen Jie, I think Miao Miao couldn’t actually do anything because Zi Yan was publicly disclosed as a kidnapper and probably broke a few laws along the way. Nothing comes good from attacking authority. I’m sure Zi Yan would be let out soon, since she didn’t actually hurt anyone, unlike Dong Han. Chen Jie has always been one to respect authority, but this time I think he took sympathy to the people, and I think despite the betrayal, he really saw Dong Han as a good companion and brother. Plus, if they prosecute Ah Gong, all 88 families would have to be dragged into investigation, Chen Jie wouldn’t have wanted that, so…

    I actually thought they were gonna refute the idea of Zhang Guo Tang and make Jiang Jian Ming the real villain but the director wanted to frame a bigger picture and make it more macro. Again, it’s the realism coming in and I’ll all for dissing the whole “good triumphing over evil” cliche, but the storytelling is just a mess. I think we both agree it’s the revelations and anticlimax-climax did nothing for us. When they make the protagonist angsting over catching the imaginary villain the main plotline the whole thing is starting to make less sense. Not to mention they made a main character die for that purpose! If you don’t have a mindblowing conclusion don’t play suspense please. Well, no wonder the paramount importance of Zi Hong is that he’s the main target from the car accident. When the main lead is reduced to thus, you can tell how bad the story is going.

    Back to our favourite couple. Ah Gong obviously chose them because they had the most righteous motive, seeing both their families were dead. Ah Gong’s hatred travelled so far that he didn’t even bother to preserve the remaining lives of the 88 families, especially such young lives, and for that alone I couldn’t forgive him. I’m so torn because they lived up to my expectations for them as characters/heroes but part of me just want them to be safe, even if they took a backseat to the goings-on. At this point, we can be sure that Dong Han loves Zi Yan(Yong Mei’s pregnancy didn’t happen in my world), although I resent him for doing some things, they’ll still be the imperfectly perfect couple for me. Kudos to Pan Bo Xi and Dou Hua Mei for their excellent performance. I have some wishful thinking that they’ll play a couple in some other show but I probably wouldn’t like them as much in this one, so yeah 🙂 Speaking of which, I’m still grateful that the director created such lovable characters, just better work next time.

    Reply
    1. DTLCT says:

      Thank you for being the reasonable one since I sort of wrote this post right after watching SO I was still high on getting mad, lol. I understand what you mean with Miao Miao not being able to do anything to save Zi Yan since as you pointed out with Zi Yan doing the kidnapping and holding hostages, BUT I think with Miao Miao’s stubbornness right from the beginning, she could at least try to say some stuffs like, “Can’t we do anything?” But instead, she was just happily accompanying Yong Mei along and seemed to not care for Zi Yan. Like what in the world was that? Yong Mei went to visit Zi Yan in prison to gloat over the rose thing BUT Miao Miao didn’t even come to visit Zi Yan? I meant that was the Xiao Cao that she claimed to miss so much doing their hug in the mist of the whole kidnapping/holding hostages scene. So yeah, that didn’t sit well for me.

      AND you’re right. The show creators probably wanted a bigger scale by aiming it at Jiang Jian Ming instead of Zhang Guo Tang. YET like you said, they didn’t have the guts to go all the way yet wasted so much time creating the suspense.

      I saw comments on others wanting Pan Bo Xi and Dou Hua Mei to work together again too! Well, now he’s working with Angela Lee again. Hopefully he could work with Dou Hua Mei in the future – AND yes, definitely need a better story. Not leaving us so irritated like this one.

      Reply
      1. Percy says:

        I completely understand your frustration on Miao Miao’s unconcern. But like many Yong Mei and Dong Han scenes, it probably just got cut, or maybe the director thought the scene besides the reservoir was enough for them. But hey, she’s not always been a very endearing character isn’t she? Like, it’s ok Miao Miao you’re useless as the main female lead anyway so let’s make you appear as less as possible lol. But yeah, I’m feeling your love for Zi Yan.

        I also don’t hate Angela Lee, it’s Yong Mei I don’t like lol. But I definitely like him and Dou Hua Mei together better(duh). Pan Bo Xi’s such a quirk, he often laughs and giggles for no reason at all. Ha. But Dou Hua Mei still manages to be so funny around him. I keep thinking about the BTS from ep6 and they were HILARIOUS. Especially the part where Dou Hua Mei teases Bo Xi about the old school way he throws his bag. <3

        Reply
        1. DTLCT says:

          OMG, that was a riot! Toss! Then they had to do it again or something. Or more like get out of the way since he was throwing it without considering for the bts crew, lol. Happens! That reminds me the part where Zi Hong went to save his adopted father and he was fighting with Zhang Guo Tang’s gangsters. The BTS for that part was so funny because Zhang Ting Hu didn’t pay attention and almost knocked the guy holding the micro/board (I forgot exactly). So words were flashing across the screen, speaking up for the guy, “I’m innocent.” (LOL) I think they called the guy “Zhang Ge” so the next time Zhang Ting Hu was done with another scene, the knife tossing scene, he was turning around and yelling about, “Where is Zhang ge?” (i.e. joking about tossing the knife his way, sort of.) Then he realized the poor guy moved to another safe corner already, lol. Most fight scenes are funny off screen, lol. Pan Bo Xi was known to not to know his limits, lol. I think he had to apologize the most out of all the actors whom had fighting scenes, especially one time he had to apologize to Zhao Jie as well. But I guess they became closer after all those times. LOL!

          And talking about scenes that got cut, I saw that the GTV version of episode 14 was longer than the TTV version. Either way, I don’t think it made a difference with the ending we want. LOL! At least it seemed like choking too much. So yes, I’m ignoring some details like you said, because it just didn’t make sense.

          Reply

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