The Journey: Tumultuous Times

It's been a long while since a Channel 8 drama touched my heart in such a way.

The Journey: Tumultuous Times is currently showing on Channel 8 at the 9pm slot. While I can't watch it real time on TV, I watch the catch-up video on XINMSN while I am on the bus to work the next morning.

The show is set in the 1940s through to the 1950s, in Malaya and Singapore.This happens to be a period of time that I am very interested in, maybe because I'd heard so much about this period of time from my late grandmother and sometimes from my father when I was a young girl. I remember the "Price of Peace" was one of the epic dramas produced by the then TCS and everyone was riveted by the show. My grandmother kept cursing at the Japanese and cried on several occasions while watching the show because she reminded of the hardship she had to endure during those years. But still, she watched every episode religiously. It was during that time too that she shared many stories with me about the Japanese and life during the war and just after.

Maybe that's one reason why I am loving Tumultuous Times so much. Because it is of an era I am interested in and the show reminds me of my grandmother and those days when we watched "Price of Peace" together.

I am so loving the sets, the scenes, the props and the interactions between the actors in this show. Speaking of actors, I think Mediacorp scored big on finding Carrie Wong. She is a true gem and a talent with a natural flair for acting. In her first show she was already put alongside Christopher Lee and Rui En and she did good. Now in only her second show, she's paired with Shaun Chen and Jeanette Aw, veterans in their own right, and she has performed well. Very meaty roles for a relatively unknown newbie. I like her. She's only 20 but seems like a seasoned actor already. She'll go far.

And yes, Shaun Chen. This show affirms my liking for him as an actor. He's proven to critics that he can do both good and baddie roles, he can do drama, he can do action and he has some comedic flair as well. He's come a long way from being known as "Michelle Chia's boyfriend" then to "Michelle Chia's husband" and now finally people know him by his own name.

Romeo Tan. The name is cheesy yes, and he is a newbie who has his own critics and fans alike. I read online reviews of the show and people don't seem to like him. Why? I think he's not too bad. He plays a baddie in the show, disguised as a decent guy from the upper class. Given the fact that people dislike his character in the show and him as a result (an unfortunate consequence I might add), I think he has done well already and achieved his acting objective of being the baddie. I say he's succeeded!

Looking forward to the rest of the show..!