Having been a Deric Wan fan for so long, I found myself missing out on a lot of his songs and series also. Maybe it was because I was not into modern series much when I was little since I was too engrossed in the whole ‘wuxia’ world that was paved out in different novels and ancient series.
To talk more about music, I can’t believe I haven’t even discovered this song yet. (Although I do know of the Vietnamese version and knew it was from a Chinese song from the sound of it. But never knew it was Deric’s.) It’s so awesome and really I like Deric’s voice in here (like any other that he sang).
Anyway, I’ve been hunting down his old TVB series to watch, such as Conscience and The Blood of Good and Evil but can’t seem to find the latter since I prefer it more after reading a review of the first one mentioned. Maybe it’s because I’m a Maggie fan so it’s hard to accept such a plot that doesn’t plan on letting Deric and Maggie end up together. I was only watching the first few episodes but I was really disappointed with the plot and where it was heading, not to mention the many flaws that were so apparent. (I must admit that recent TVB modern series are better since it managed to cover all bases or try to do research to not make a fool of themselves too much.)
As of Deric’s recent series, I haven’t been catching up on it but hope he comes back with an awesome role soon. (Not that I mind that he portrays any role since he’s capable but would still want to see some surprises.)
You mentioned Looking Back in Anger. You will probably get better idea about the whole plot if you visit
http://www.maggieshiu.net or www1.maggieshiu.net
http://www.maggieshiu.net/bbs
If you don’t read chinese, there is an “English Zone”.
s h a w
Thank you so much for the links. I will check it out later for more info.
I am been a great fan of Deric Wan for many years. I wonder can I get any of his cds as I don’t know how to download songs from the computer.
@Peaches – I don’t know where exactly to hunt for his CDs either, but I usually go to China Town around my area or those Asian related stores that sometimes have those. Or hunt it down at different sties where it sells CDs. One which I found at YesAsia.com: http://www.yesasia.com/us/get-into-life-crown-records-50th-anniversary-gold-discs-series/1023088155-0-0-0-en/info.html
And some more on E-Bay: http://shop.ebay.com/?_from=R40&_trksid=p5197.m570.l1313&_nkw=deric+wan&_sacat=See-All-Categories
Sorry couldn’t help anymore.
Thanks DTLCT – I shall definitely give it a go and hope for the best. Its lucky that I bought 3 cassette tapes of his around the mid 1990s. Now you can’t even buy those!!
@Peaches – I know! Even the ones in the links I gave you, those are quite pricey, LOL! It’s like so rare now so they have to crank up the prices to get the maximum benefits. But I guess that’s the whole thing with not being to get it back then. I’m still messing quite a few from my collection ’cause it’s hard to find around my area.
@Peaches, I’m actually in the U.S. so yes, kind of hard to find a good place to buy old CDs. Unless I just happen to stumble into some stores that still have those. Not just Deric’s CDs, but hard to find old ones so like you, I might have to buy it from collections of his songs instead of those original releases from back then. Yes, the days of cassettes, I still have some from other singers as well. (LOL!)
DTLCT, I ordered one yesterday from yesasia as I didn’t know how to order from e-bay. Its actually an identical to the one I already have but on cd. The one I have is on cassette tape so you can imagine how long ago that was. Unfortunately I can’t listen to cassette tapes in the car as its a cd player so thats why I need to buy cds. Even that was around £13 (sterling) including postage so its not cheap. I think e-bay would be even more expensive. I gather you are not residing in Hong Kong either.
DTLCT,
You are lucky to reside in the U.S. – a place I may go next year, i.e. L.A. and San Francisco – believe China Town is really huge there. Here in U.K. even China Town in London isn’t that big and there are hardly any old cds now.
DTLCT,
I assume you have watched “Looking Back in Anger” which was a true Deric Wan masterpiece I think. I just can’t think of another drama of his which is better than that one. The other one which almost comes up to expectation is “Gum Sung Mui Fui” – don’t know the translation in English. It stars Deric with Leon Lai and Kathy Chow – another excellent drama. Unfortunately Deric played another evil character. Which one did you prefer?
@Peaches – I guess so. Your trip is probably your motivation for next year? Could be exciting. I live near the L.A. area but rarely go there. (Strangely…)
Anyway, interestingly, my first Deric series is actually “The Commandments” and then I had to back watch some of his series. And no, I didn’t watch “Looking Back In Anger” since I don’t know if I could take it. I meant it sounds like a very depressing ending. Though I don’t care for happy ending much nowadays, but I read somewhere it was the same writer(s) for “Racing Peak”, “Heaven’s Retribution”, and some other ones so it would have the same type of formulas and I just don’t like watching repetitive stuffs.
Is “Gum Sung Mui Fui” – since the cast you listed seems like so – The Breaking Point? If that’s it, then I already watched it but that was a long time ago and I don’t recall much anymore, except that Maggie died at the end and then Leon ended up with Kathy. I forgot what happened to Deric but with those modern series approach – either death or prison. But I heard he was ten times worse in “Looking Back In Anger”?
DTLCT,
Yes, now I remember “Gum Sung Mui Fui” was “The Breaking Point”. I found it sad that Deric Wan was quite nice at first as he was a successful architect and was looking forward to a happy marriage with Kathy Chow. Then he turned evil towards the middle and turned against Leon for revenge. He died at the end during a fight with Leon and fell. Yes, he was ten times worse in “Looking Back In Anger”. I did not enjoy “Racing Peak” at all and found it very boring although I also like Wong Yat Wah. Did not watch “The Commandments” – what did Deric play in that? Was it a modern story or set in the dynasty days?
@Peaches – In “The Commandments”, Deric portrayed the main guy. It was somewhat of an ancient comedy that turned serious later – as most series would – and then back to its comedic moments toward the end. It was a series Deric did with Vivian Chow, Cutie Mui, and some others. I actually found it to be my favorite Deric character in there despite it not being ‘classic’ versus his other roles like some people have told me. I like the mix of his personality in there, honest yet not too honest to the point of dumb. He was funny and charming but not over-killed in it either.
Thanks DTLCT. Actually I wonder whether “The Commandments” is the one which just finished showing last week here. I can’t read very much Chinese and don’t know the name of it but just by watching some of the preview it did look a bit comical. He and Vivian Chow got married in the end, am I right? I have 5 TVB Chinese Channels but I watch mainly only two of them. 無綫翡翠台 and 無綫星級劇集台 which I really like as they show a lot of the older dramas. “The Commandments” (if I am right of course)was shown in the 無綫星級劇集台. I don’t think you have that channel in the U.S. as most Chinese there would be happy to watch the most up-to-date dramas. I must be the only person in the universe who prefers to watch the older dramas!!
@Peaches – I don’t watch stuff on TV that often anymore unless it’s like a must-see, LOL! I meant I just hate commercials and the wait would be too excruciating (and that means I don’t have cables or all those fancy channels). But yes regarding “The Commandments”. I watched it during the days when we were still going to video rental stores, etc – and VHS format too, LOL!
And don’t worry about being the only one since I know several people still preferring old ones over new ones. I’m stuck in between. I meant like I don’t want to close the door on the other ones since at times, they would have stuffs I like or there are still a few I still support so just want to see both, etc. If you click on the link I have with the title ‘LL’s Musing’, you’ll find a lot of oldies stuffs too. There are varieties but she also prefers old ones.
@Peaches – No probs. CYF is also one of my favorites too. And llwy12 was summarizing it from one of the books she was reading. You could comment and interact with her there and she’ll be happy to answer more questions, lol. She’s quite knowledgeable with all the ’80s and 90’s stuffs. And possibly the ’70s but yeah. Quite fun to know some detailed stuffs. Oh yeah, retrotvb’s link is also about related stuffs – mostly reviews and other topics. I think there are some articles I saw of Deric there.
DTLCT, thanks a million for reminding me of your other link ‘LL’s Musing’ which I didn’t even notice before. I have just read the life story of one of my favourite actors Chow Yun Fat and it was really very interesting. By the way, who wrote it and may I congratulate that person who did. That person really must have taken lots of time and effort to find out all those things in the past and it was truly amazing. I only knew that he was from Lamma Island and was from a poor family but certainly didn’t know that he worked in a post office at one time or a bellboy in a hotel. Is he one of your favourite actors? I shall go and read the others now. Once again, many thanks.
DTLCT, Thanks and I’ve just got onto LL Musings but couldn’t find a section for me to comment. I am sorry to say that although I work on computers all day long, there are certain aspects I find difficult. Could you please help me. Can you also tell me, did you create this site and is this llwy12 one of the members? I’ll get onto this retrotvb’s link also and what’s there. There are millions of questions I could ask and lots to discuss of the older dramas so it should be fun. Yes, I wish to find out more of Deric also. By the way, did you watch “Misleading Track”? It was about four or five years ago and also starring Louisa So (definitely not one of my favourite actresses) and the real life wife of Kwok Chun On. She plays Deric’s wife in the story and Louisa So plays his ex wife. It was a thriller type of drama but I cannot for the life remember the ending and its bugging me. If you have seen it, can you remember was he Louisa’s husband as she thought that he was dead.
Sorry DTLCT, I forgot to ask something. I went on the retrotvb link and got onto The Breaking Point section and type in some comments but it had anonymous. I couldn’t find a section to put in a name. Can you also please tell me where do I put my name on, many thanks.
Regarding LL’s Musing, it’s not mine or anything. But I just know her from a forum and started to follow her blog.
How you comment on that is you click into a topic title (like for CYF) and you should get this: http://llsmusings.blogspot.com/2011/03/book-review-cong-ling-kai-shi-post_19.html <- a page of its own so the comment box would appear below. After you put in a comment (I suggest you copy & paste a back-up into a document or notepad or something since sometimes it doesn't go through the first time because of blogger's system and not 'cause of llwy12's doing, lol), you could select for it to show your e-mail or whatever in that. If you don't want to identify yourself using one of the e-mail listed, just click on 'Name/URL' option so you could put in a username and url (sort of like how you did for this one). After you click 'Post', it goes to the next thing aka wanting you to type in a code to confirm. So just type that in and click the 'Submit' (Or is it post again? Don't remember but it's there). Then you should see your comment. But that's for new posts since llwy12 moderates posts that are written more than 5 days already so you will see a message saying your comment is still in the moderation process or something like that.
Regarding retrotvb's page, the default option to comment is as Anonymous. But you could click into that box and it should drop-down to a list for you to select (almost like Blogger's), just choose one and then comment. After entering all necessary information, the 'Comment' option will appear and you should be able to proceed. Again, good idea to save a copy of your comment somewhere first since I haven't been on LiveJournal for a while so not sure what changes it has been through but that's the basic that I managed to get out of looking at the page for now.
Regarding "Misleading Track", I didn't even watch. I'm not a Bowie Lam fan and when seeing Deric's in a villain role again, I'm like, "Again?" I know he could portray those roles but it gets repetitive with some series nowadays that I didn't bother. Not sure if I should even check it out in the future.
Hi DTLCT, Thanks for the above. I’ve had a really good time reading LLMusing’s blog and retrotvb. Its strange that I typed my comments and it came up but then after a few hours I went back on it again and it had disappeared. Do you know why that is?
From Peaches
@Peaches – Not sure. Maybe it’s there when you submitted it but the other person (blog owner) hasn’t had time to check their blog yet so they didn’t approve? Sorry, I don’t use blogger and Live Journal (as the two sites operate on those) for a while now so that’s my guess. I think llwy12 (LL’s Musing) has a chatbox, you might want to comment in there and ask her.
Hi DTLCT. I couldn’t find “chatbox” anywhere in LL’s Musing blog. Can you please help me again, sorry for keep bothering you all the time.
From Peaches
@Peaches – I capped an image for you so you know where the chatbox is: http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v144/lamtieuyen/tut/random/chatbox.png
It’s labeled ‘Tagboard’ instead on there so that might be the confusion.
And I think I might know why you didn’t see your messages when you come back onto the blog. You have to click back into the title of the post to view the post by itself (as most blogs are) to check for comments, etc. NOT sure if that was the case but I’m guessing here.
Hi DTLCT, Sorry I couldn’t find Tagboard either!
Thanks for your image thing which I tried clicking on but it came up with a little picture thing which I didn’t know what to do. Sorry to sound dumb!
@Peaches – I’m just giving you a little picture so you could see what it looks like. Then you go to ll’s page and locate a box that looks similar to that.
@DTLCT – I haven’t come onto this site for a few months now. Been really busy at work. I wonder have you watched Cold Blood Warm Heart by Adam Cheng, Julian Cheung, Jessica Hsuan, Nnadia Chan, Louis Koo, Gallon Law? Its really very good. I am in the middle of it and definitely one of the best 1990s TVB drama series. I think after this one, things slowly started to change. Dramas became less interesting and acting not as good. The 1980s actors left and then replaced with new ones – not necessarily better either. If you have seen it, what did you think and can you remember the name of the actress who played Louis Koo’s cousin? I think she ended up marrying Gallon Law.
Peaches
@Peaches – I never watched “Cold Blood, Warm Heart” though I do know the theme song and watched the theme video quite a few times. I hunted down some more information regarding when it several years back since I didn’t get to watch it the first time it came out. YET I felt that the plot was a mess from reading some spoilers. I guess it’s expected since the huge cast, etc. I was a bit turned off though with some of the cast that I don’t really like. I wanted to watch Louis and Nnadia though I think that might be another messed up story too though some of the scenes look cute with them together.
So sorry, I don’t know which character you’re talking about but I think if you hunt around the net, you could find some reviews regarding it and more cast/character information.
Regarding TVB series though, I felt it has always been lacking, regardless of then or now. What kills the story are mostly their endings. YET I think sometimes it’s because of the cast that people felt it’s good YET it’s not really that good, except for a rare few that managed to have a decent ending thus not ruining the foundation already established since the beginning. But that’s just me after hunting down more of the old series to watch.
@DTLCT, Well you’re the first person I’ve heard who doesn’t like CBWH. It just shows everyone has difference of opinions even though you may still prefer the older dramas. I found out the name of the actress who played Louis Koo’s cousin. Its Astrid Chan. She was never that famous but have done some chatshows.
@Peaches – Can’t really say that I don’t like it when I haven’t really watched it yet. More like I don’t want to watch it or not really that interested in it. And yes, I said many times already on this blog that I operate on my own wavelength so I might not think like most of the people who like old series, etc. Also, I tend to focus on plot more so sometimes a big cast might not draw me to a certain series as much versus others.
And great that you found out who the character was. Astrid Chan? That’s interesting though since I would imagine someone else, lol. I’m not sure if Astrid’s going to gain more popularity in the future but as of now, she’s gaining some more fans in her new series? Can’t say for sure.