"What a difference from Myolie's character of Ling from Survivor's Law! Michelle is lazy, immature, and irresponsible although good-hearted... "
SPOILERS! SPOILERS! SPOILERS!
Year
2004
Chinese Title
Ha Yut Jaam Choi Hung (translates to Next Stop, Rainbow)
No. of episodes
20
Cast
Myolie Wu Hang Yee as Michelle Koo
Tse Kwan Ho as Nick Yau Lik
Sharon Chan Man Zhi as Ella Kwan Bik Yiu
Michelle Ng Mei Sun as Elaine
Kenneth Ma Kwok Ming as Siu Lung
Supporting Cast
Rain Lee Choi Wa as Fei Fei
Chris Lai Lok Yi as Man
Plot
Michelle is a lazy university dropout with no ambition nor idea of what she wants to do in life. This creates a tense relationship with her businessman father, although she remains very close to her grandfather, a clothesmaker and teacher of internationally known fashion designer Nick Yau. Nick, who works as chief designer of Nee and Elaine, a famous model, have been dating for a decade but have not gotten married because of Nick's work. Soon after Michelle is taken under Nick's wing (when it is realized that she has both a love and talent for fashion design), their relationship goes on the rocks. They break up, Elaine begins to date Nee CEO Marco, and Michelle begins to fall in love with Nick.
The series' main drama revolves around Ella, a confident and impressively talented fashion design student who suffers from a frosty relationship with her mean and stingy sister-in-law and the worst luck imaginable. She and best friend Fei Fei befriend Michelle early on in the series, but when all three of them go to work at Nee, Ella becomes intensely jealous of Michelle and consistently attempts to sabotage her while trying to climb the company's corporate ladder. She eventually becomes chief designer at Nee, with the help of dopey and unknowing Siu Lung, Fei Fei's older brother. Meanwhile, Ella's schemes cause her to lose her two good friends, while Fei Fei leaves Nee and becomes a model, falling in love with Michelle's younger brother.
Ella finally learns her lesson when Siu Lung is hit by a car after pushing her out of harm's way. She apologizes to everyone, and enters a youth fashion design competition along with Fei Fei and Michelle. After re-entering the fashion design world by founding his own company, Nick realizes that he has grown feelings for Michelle. Unfortunately, she has decided to leave overseas to pursue her career, as Nick promises to wait in Hong Kong for her return.
Evaluation of Cast and Characters
Michelle / Myolie Wu
What a difference from Myolie's character of Ling from Survivor's Law! Michelle is lazy, immature, and irresponsible although good-hearted. Myolie's Michelle is slightly wild and unambitious although sincere in her treatment towards others. It was very interesting to watch Myolie in this role, because it's such a diversion from how I see Myolie in real life, a hardworking, focused, and down-to-earth actress. But she, like Michelle, is also young and fresh, and this never-seen-before character from her acting repertoire again proves the versatility of this actress. Good performance and good use of body language to portray Michelle. But was anyone else thinking "wtf?!" with Michelle's personal fashion sense? Half the time I thought she fell into a lake and and then became a wicked witch minus the hat.
Ella / Sharon Chan
One of the not-cutesy-real-pretty newbies who also somehow looks cunning and crafty, very appropriate look for the role of scheming Ella. A credible job, but she is missing that extra something. Which means, Sharon looks sad when she's supposed to be sad, looks happy when she's supposed to be happy, looks evil when she's supposed to be evil. But she's missing that "it" factor, the "it" that carries actors and actresses through a long and versatile career, the "it" that makes audience members remember both the character and the actress. I can't deny that she has potential though, if she carves out a self-image and some sense of identity, she could probably end up being a TVB Little Sister. Also has a Hong Kong model figure (i.e. tall and thin), because duh, she used to be a model.
Nick / Tse Kwan Ho
Never-seen-before actor who has the potential to be unbelievably boring if you don't watch him carefully. If you don't pay attention to him, Tse Kwan Ho tends to come off as monotone and expressionless, but under scrutiny, you realize that he's simply a subtle actor. A little too subtle for my taste actually. He's also too short for Myolie, although the two share a kind of strange but appropriate teacher-student chemistry (no romantic chemistry, though). This is surprising considering he has no teacher-student chemistry with his own teacher, the actor who played Michelle's grandfather.
Elaine / Michelle Ng
Always a reliable supporting actress but never TVB's Big Sister, Michelle did a good-enough job as Elaine in this series. Her Elaine is classy, intelligent, mature, and sexy. Perfect for the role. Unfortunately, Elaine is not a particularly memorable character, except near the end when she chooses neither Nick nor Marco. By the way, who played Marco? That man annoyed me to no end.
Other Characters
Rain Lee (Fei Fei) was cute for the first 10 minutes and it all went downhill from there. She speaks too loudly, overacts, and those annoying peace signs while screaming "Yeah!" made my stomach churn. Kenneth Ma did an average job as the clueless Siu Lung but he's pretty boring to watch. Chris Lai doesn't have much to work with although he's charming enough as Michelle's younger brother. The younguns' performances here are overshadowed by that of the actor who played Michelle's grandfather, both an underacted and charismatic portrayal.
Special Mention
The clothes
Nice for the most part, my favourite outfit was the white one Ella designed, accompanied with Michelle's hat.
Consensus
Fans of Myolie (for her portrayal of Michelle's relationship with Nick, her father, and her grandfather) would not want to miss this one. Otherwise, it's only a passable series one can watch to kill time.
Rating
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