Episodic Thoughts: “Captain of Destiny” Episode 3

Captain of Destiny <張保仔>
TVB Series 2015

Cast: Ruco Chan, Grace Chan, Tony Hung, Maggie Shiu, Ram Chiang, Elaine Yiu, Joel Chan

Disclaimer: This is a watch as I write episodic thoughts and some information may not be accurate since this is memory based. Certain dialogue is reproduced with some creative license adopted. I apologize if there is any mistake. All opinion remains my own.

SPOILERS ALERT

“There is nothing wrong with everyone else. The one thing wrong is you. You are too naive” – Bowie

FUNNLING METRE

The ok sign is 100% for Ruco who was kick-ass good in this episode, proving he can be a cool absolute villain if ever TVB wants to cast him as one rather than a good guy forced to do bad things.

Anyway Mui saw a fellow Cheung Chau friend and if I am not mistaken, is the Olympic gold medal winner in wind surfing and what I didn’t know was she came from Cheung Chau. So I googled, and here she is. And this is how she looks like. But the one on TV is not her, it is a TVB actress. So I am wondering, can’t TVB ask the lady to make a cameo appearance? Did they ask? Did they bother? Did the lady say no?

Anyway Mui felt encouraged by meeting the legend and she went wind surfing and she felt better. She went home and was showering and I am amazed in this day and age there are people who still don’t lock the doors and so Fu Ma, the bastard became peeping tom looking at her shadow showering when he heard the sister came back and he ran outside and sat down. Long story short, Mui and her sister found out he knew about Sam’s infidelities and he justified it by saying men can be very stressed, so the women should just let them “play” a little. Mui got very angry but again her sister said nothing and was told to go to cook. Also they both knew he had been peeping at her and Mui was blamed for being careless. Mui was speechless when her sister came out from the kitchen looking demure and..

Pause.

Someone who was watching with me said the sister will forever be spineless. I said a few things that were proven 100% accurate;

1. Sonny ain’t Bowie’s dog, he just picked up a random dog;

2. Mui will discover Bowie’s real identity, felt betrayed and will have the same misconception and misunderstanding when she meets his lookalike, Prince Man Ho who probably turns out to be a guy forced by circumstances;

3. the sister will leave her husband.

Well I was wrong about 3. She didn’t leave her husband. She did better. Anyway this is very predictable and my fellow sister who was watching with me did not believe me and I just shook my head in disbelief’ so many decades of watching TVB series and she still can’t see the obvious a million miles away. My fellow readers and TVB fans, I am sure YOU would have seen what I have said coming TWO million miles away!

Continue.

Sister came out and proceeded to use salted fish to beat the crap out of her husband who was crawling everywhere as she angrily said;

“I have had enough of you! You can bully me, you can push me around, you can order me around but I! WILL! NOT! LET! YOU! BULLY! MY! LITTLE! SISTERRRR!!!”

Salted fish broke into two pieces and she had one salted fish in each hand. Mui was so proud of her sister, she handed her a folded steel chair and the sister took it and was ready to go full force when Fu Ma begged for his life and ran I think. Can’t remember except the two sister laughed and each proud of the other.

Yeah!! Way to go!! Good!!

Anyway my mind went blank for some time for reasons I can’t remember so I had plot-blank here and what I do remember is Mui realising Bandit King is in Cheung Chau and warned her colleagues, warned Sam but Sam dismissed her as paranoid and trying to get his attention.

Next we see Ruco ditching his eyeglasses, dressed all in black and we see some flashback. His gun pointing at her, and he was ready to shoot. Then he saw her again at the back alley and he was there waiting and was about to reveal himself when she shot dead his accomplice and he was about to shoot her dead when her backup arrived and sensing the situation was not in his favour, and he also saw a stray dog that was Sonny, he banged his head hard and pretended to be injured. And that was where she first met him at the hospital. Also showed how he stole the info from the laptop which took a lot of jumping in reason because who knew this G4 member was so careless, that she would take his laptop, that the super secret highly confidential info in the laptop was not double encrypted? And so he knew the dot com tycoon was coming, knew the plan and said to himself;

“The last time you were lucky to escape. But now, you won’t be so lucky”

His fellow colleagues wanted to kill Mui but he said to him let him deal with her.

Anyway my mind went blank for some time for reasons I can’t remember so I had plot-blank here and what I do remember is Mui realising Bandit King is in Cheung Chau and warned her colleagues, warned Sam but Sam dismissed her as paranoid and trying to get his attention.

So Mui was walking about when vet stopped her and handed her Sonny’s meds. She did say Sonny ain’t her dog and the vet said it was weird that Sonny was micro chipped and the owner details showed that the owner was a gwailo. Mui was immediately suspicious.

Pause.

If it was me, I wouldn’t be. Routinely dogs are bought, thrown away and adopted. So why shouldn’t that be the case for Sonny and Bowie? I don’t remember Bowie said he had Sonny since Sonny was a pup.

So she called someone to check if someone lost their dog like Sonny and indeed there was. But why was Sonny owned by a gwailo at the small backalley in HK? Anyway she walked further and saw Sonny on a balcony. Somehow how on in Cheung Chau, not even Bandit King ever lock their doors so she went in and voila, on the wall was Bowie’s detailed drawings of Cheung Chau’s places and there was the laptop. Talk about leaving a trail huh? Evidence all there. Surely Bowie is more competent than that?! Anyway she knew Bowie was Bandit King.

Meanwhile tycoon arrived and dressed as pirate, doing some promo stuff for his company. Sam was on the balcony when he turned and saw a smirking black suit wearing Bowie and he asked;

“What are you doing up here? Here is now restricted area”

And then he sensed something was wrong and before he can react, Bowie kicked him hard and went on to beat the absolute crap out of Sam. He even pulled his hair and all sort of kicking and punches. Sam had no chance to retaliate because Bowie was super brutal.

Pause.

This scene alone is worth the watch of this whole episode. Ruco was awesome as he punched and kicked and smirked. It was an angry venom filled punches and he was super cool as the villain Bandit King.

Continue.

Sam was lying in surprisingly not so much pool of blood when he should be. Bowie looked at him and revealed to Sam he was the one who told Mui about his indiscretions and why he did it?

“Because I am in love with her”

Ahhh so this was personal!

Meanwhile, Mui tried calling a fainted Sam who was still alive. Why? Bowie should have killed him! Anyway she knew something was wrong and was guessing hard where Bowie may be. She rushed out and called her boss and warned him and he dismissed her at first until he believed her and dragged the tycoon away. Bowie was on the rooftop and took out a huge gun and he called Sam’s superior and pretending to be Sam he said security was compromised but he knew where they would be going and so he stood waiting and when they appeared, he shot Sam’s superior and another G4 in the head! Brutal! Tycoon panicked and he knew he was trapped when Bowie’s gang again kidnapped him and dragged him away. Mui arrived in time on the balcony and aimed her gun at him with his back facing him. He warned her;

“Don’t make me kill you”

Mui was very angry and bitterly disappointed;

“Why? Why does everyone lie to me? Sam and now you! You are the Bandit King. So nothing was a coincidence. Here at Cheung Chau, you were here on purpose. You tricked me into bringing the laptop to you! Why?”

Bowie still not facing her I think said;

“Remember I did warn you not to trust me”

Mui was near tears as she said;

“What is wrong with everyone?!”

And that was when Bowie said my chosen quote;

“There is nothing wrong with everyone else. The one thing wrong is you. You are too naive”

And he turned and she shot him and he managed to get out the way of the bullet and he shot her straight at her chest and she fell. He did not looked sad or remorseful and he left quickly and he told his accomplice she is dead.

Pause.

Yes he did shoot her.

Continue.

She didn’t die. Cheung Po Tsai coin blocked the bullet and she was in shock or maybe just Grace Chan overacting here. Anyway she ran after him and she and police reached Bowie dragging tycoon onto the boat but couldn’t and so the tycoon escaped once again as he sped off and she followed suit in a motor boat.

Pause.

The graphic here is not so convincing, sure, because the actors were obviously on a boat with green screen and not the sea but I gotta say, TVB looked like they spent more in CGI this time and so it was rather bearable for me.

Continue. So she chased after him when water cyclone was formed and Mui’s sister was on the beach and frightened she exclaimed;

“Oh no! Cheung Po Tsai is here to snatch the bride!!”

And she ran to hide.

Pause.

Remember? She mentioned whenever a water cyclone is formed and appeared, which I suppose must be quite often in Cheung Chau since they have a name for it, they say Cheung Po Tsai is here to snatch a bride.

Continue.

Mui was sucked into the cyclone, Bowie was blown into the sea and saw her sucked into it and in shocked. Everyone was in shocked. And for the LONGEST of time, we have Mui screaming like arghhhhh arghhhhhhhhhhhhhh arghhhhhhhhhh arghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh like so long I could have gone to the toilet and back and still she was arghhhhhhhhh arghhhhhhhhhhhhh arghhhhhhhhhhhhh arghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

We then see a different era. A huge wooden ship and on it the Qing army and they saw some floating bodies and Ram Cheung as Scholar Suen was next to the 2nd ranked Qing official and he said to the official those must be merchants being thrown into the sea by Cheung Po Tsai and persuaded the official to pick them up. In the sea, was Cheung Po Tsai and his men pretending to be merchants being thrown into the sea and they were smiling happily thinking they will capture another Qing ship when cyclone appeared, all were in shocked as they saw a strangely dressed woman flew out of it on a strange device which to us modern folks was the wind surfing board and she landed straight at Cheung Po Tsai and hitting them and they cursed at her and their cover blown. Naturally Cheung Po tsai (henceforth CPT) gave her dagger stares as she was very confused where she was when official arrested the spy Scholar Suen and lit the cannon and one cannon ball him the water and CPT and Mui both got blown out of the water and onto the boat. The official was very happy having arrested CPT himself when can’t remember what happened next but tides overturned and official was cornered and he took Mui as hostage and said he will kill her if CPT didn’t surrender and CPT looked at her and said coldly;

“Go ahead, kill her”

He didn’t and had to surrender. Mui realised the name she heard and was in shock that she was back in olden days and tried to arrest them all and they laughed wondering what SAR Hong Kong? WHAT? and she saw them peeing on the official and even put the official in the cannon and blown him into the sea. He survived. Mui looked at CPT coldly and said;

“You are a monster”

And CPT laughed and agreed and he didn’t like her one bit and next, it was her turn. So she was in the cannon and they were about to light the fuse as she protested when things went quiet and they were all looking at one direction at an approaching large ship. CPT and gang wasn’t too happy. On the ship was a super cool looking Eric Li as Wong Yee, rival of CPT and Wong Yee even had a scar on his face. CPT looked on as someone said;

“As usual, we do the hard work, he arrives just in time to take the credit”

Next episode, will we meet Prince Man Ho?

I tell ya, the moment Tony Hung appeared, he looked nothing like the feared legendary CPT who can command 600 ships. And when he spoke, it confirmed my greatest fear; he will drag this series down. He was an unequivocal total miscast as CPT. When Eric Li appeared, looking way cooler than the other pirates, got scar some more. to me THAT WAS CHEUNG PO TSAI. At least he looked the part and Eric has a certain inner strength and steel and meanness and all that to be a super cool CPT. When Tony dismissed Grace’s Mui and was rough with her, I didn’t believe it one second. If I were Mui, I would fear him at all. He was predictable to me. What an absolute miscast. And the myth is blown. CPT is just a squinty eyed boring dude.

I have much hope for Prince Man Ho to provide the charisma and the drama.

Ruco Chan was amazing in this episode. He was ruthless as Bowie and I can guess Mui will hate Man Ho until she understands he may be stuck between difficult times. He was absolutely convincing in action sequence and the action scenes were brutal, especially his beating of Matt Yeung’s Sam.

Grace Chan is strange. She can act but unfortunately she is so overacting it was hard to watch at times. I get her confusion and bitterness and anger at Bowie’s betrayal, hence her OTT acting. But everything else after that was just OTT to me. And I don’t like how she was physically transported back to the past which went on forever. I’d rather believe a knock by a car and her soul returned and went into someone else’s body but to physically transport her, and her Ipad and stuff is just to me unbelievable. I can’t explain why I am not convinced by this method of time traveling.

At least episode 3 speeds up the pace and she is finally in the past. The only problem is with her meeting CPT first, I feel the experience was so underwhelming and Tony Hung was already doomed before he even began. And since I knew so little about CPT, for me her time traveling back had no historical significance to me because if I want to travel back in time, I wouldn’t say I wanna meet CPT. I don’t think there was a Prince Man Ho.

Anyway hoping episode 4 continues at this pace and hopefully, get to meet Prince Man Ho soon.

Meanwhile, TVB should have given Eric Li this chance to be the second lead. You will know what I mean when you reach the last 3 minutes of this episode.

RELATED POSTS

• Episodic Thoughts: “Captain of Destiny” Episode 1
• Episodic Thoughts: “Captain of Destiny” Episode 2

This commentary is written by Funn Lim, a Contributing Writer at JayneStars.com and was originally posted at www.p2e-cod.blogspot.com.