The Cage of Love Episode 7 and 8

Stuff happens. Jiang Yu's being stupid but his stupidity cannot beat Cai Hong's. 

♦ ♦ ♦ Episode 7 ♦ ♦ ♦

At the factory, Cai Hong returns the vest to Jiang Yu noting that if he finds it dirty still, he could just discard it immediately. She’s this cold because she believes he was involved in the disappearance of Lao Cai and his family.

I breathe a little sigh of relief that Fei Fei gives Lao Cai’s mistress’s address to Jiang Yu instead of ripping it to shreds. He leaves everything behind to find the Mistress but first he drags Cai Hong along with him. He's determined to prove his innocence to the girl he loves. However, when they arrive there, they’re once again one step too late: the mistress is murdered. Cai Hong jumps the gun and automatically assumes Jiang Yu’s the criminal and he brought her here to witness his innocence. I’m amazed at this logic. You ARE his witness, Cai Hong ah! Thus Jiang Yu’s got another crime added to his yet to be determined criminal record.

He’s trying to rationalize this murder to her: first, there are two cups on the table; second, the windows weren’t broken; lastly, there are no signs of a brawl. In other words, the murderer was someone the mistress was familiar with and that could not be Jiang Yu. These logical deductions don’t seem to form a coherent train of thought in Cai Hong’s head as she continues to accuse him. Then Shao Tian joins the party and is “surprised” the mistress has died. Jiang Yu is suspicious of why he’s here but Shao Tian doesn’t explain it to him directly. He actually found out the address from Fei Fei a while ago. Hm.

When Jiang Yu gets home, he’s frustrated at all these dead ends. Fei Fei doesn’t understand his obsession with this matter but he explains this culprit could be a threat to them too. Don’t ask why. I’m having a little trouble wrapping my head around the nonexistent logical explanation but maybe that’s part of the plot because there really is no logical explanation; he just wants to clear his name and redeem some points from Cai Hong.

Meanwhile, real forensics is still going on for Wu Hong Da’s death. The chief reveals to Cai Hong and Shao Tian that metal residues were found in Wu Hong Da’s injury and this metal residue, is special: it comes from special pens. Bingo. Cai Hong jumps the gun again. She tells the two men that Jiang Yu has this exact pen. The problem is Jiang Yu has a strong alibi thus the chief can’t bring him in for an interview without solid evidence.

So what actually happened to the mistress: she was killed by Lao Cai. Wow. Previously, when Shao Tian had found out from Fei Fei that Jiang Yu and Cai Hong were on their way to visit the Mistress, Shao Tian had notified Lao Cai. Lao Cai went there first and tried to bribe her with some money. However, the mistress demanded more. He got so frustrated, he killed her. Now Lao Cai and his wife are begging Shao Tian to help them escape. Shao Tian was angry at Lao Cai for resorting to murder (adding yet another crime to his embezzlement) but he pitied his family so he agrees to help. 

Cai Hong pays a visit to Shao Tian’s mom (Zhou Mama). Zhou Mama wants to see her as her own daughter (i.e. daughter in law) but Cai Hong plays it dumb and agrees to that idea but without the intention of marrying Shao Tian. Zhou Mama doesn’t pick up on this though. When Cai Hong’s about to leave the hospital, she bumps into Jiang Yu’s Mom (Jiang Mama). The two share a friendly conversation and they find out they both like the same candy. Jiang Mama seems to really like Cai Hong. I get the feeling she’s viewing Cai Hong as a hopeful daughter-in-law too. Jiang Mama complains that she “forgot” her reading glasses at home and kindly asks Cai Hong to fetch them for her but I’d say she’s trying to create coincidences for Cai Hong to chance upon Jiang Yu. I thought Jiang Mama was supporting Fei Fei?

Cai Hong obeys Mom’s request and heads straight to Jiang Yu’s huuuuge house. Turns out she’s got another agenda for going to his place. When the servants aren’t looking, she sneaks into Jiang Yu’s room and steals the special pen. However, her thievery experience isn’t that successful: she bumps into Jiang Yu as she heads out. Clearly, Jiang Yu knows something’s up but he doesn’t corner her and lets her escape. (She doesn’t even bother taking Mom’s reading glasses she was originally here for.) It’s only later he found out she stole his pen but the reason remains unknown to him – that is, until he gets arrested. And since this era so advanced (you know with the forensics and everything), Jiang Yu tells Fei Fei to call for his lawyer.

At the police station, Cai Hong (and Shao Tian) are accusing Jiang Yu of being the murderer and this time they’ve got proof: the pen! Through some sort of analysis, Jiang Yu’s pen has the same metal residue found in Wu Hong Da’s body. I don’t know why Jiang Yu needs a lawyer because he pinpoints all the plot holes fine on his own: firstly, this pen has no evidence of being damaged; secondly, there is no proof that he bought the pen before Wu Hong Da’s death; lastly, there’s no proof this pen even belongs to him. Everything sounds logical but we know the last two are true. Jiang Yu does admit to the last point though but that's because he has an ulterior reason: he wants to catch the thief who stole his pen (i.e. Cai Hong). Without any sort of sufficient proof, Jiang Yu is free to leave.

The next day, Cai Hong arrives at work like nothing happened. I applaud her of her bravery. Everyone’s pointing fingers at her because the whole factory knows she got their boss arrested yesterday. Fei Fei is especially mean to her but Cai Hong is insistent on returning to work. A phone call comes in and Cai Hong is the first to answer it. It’s Jiang Yu and he needs someone to send documents to him. When he finds out Cai Hong is on the receiver end he gives her a final trial that will determine whether she can stay at Ling Long: she must find him and the only hint for her is that he’s under a blooming tree.

And so the search for a blooming tree begins. Poor girl ran all over the place.When she finally finds the right one, it’s already nighttime. And Jiang Yu’s still there, patiently waiting for her.

Cai Hong: You wanted me to find a blooming tree so no matter where I have to find this tree, as long it’s your words, all that work I did isn't anything. It’s a sarcastic remark at Jiang Yu for making her do all this work but she’ll do it (like a dog) anyways just because she can'y disobey his words.

Jiang Yu asks her: In your eyes, I must be very spiteful.

Cai Hong: Think whatever you want (i.e. yes, you are very spiteful).

They continue to stare at each other until they get interrupted by Shao Tian who was worried for Cai Hong. Taking this as his cue to leave, Jiang Yu tells Cai Hong to come work tomorrow at 8am. Yay?

The scenery is pretty and all but I’m not feeling much here because I feel like I’m getting a cheap compensation for having watched a very boring and dumb episode.

8am tomorrow: she’s there at work. However, someone’s clearly not happy. Fei Fei tells her to stop working immediately and fires her on the spot. Luckily Jiang Yu’s right behind her witnessing the entire scene.

♦ ♦ ♦ Episode 8 ♦ ♦ ♦

Fei Fei’s attempt at firing Cai Hong is futile. To appease Fei Fei though, Jiang Yu assures her he has his plans in keeping Cai Hong close to him. There really is no plan, I swear! He just loves her.

Meanwhile Cai Hong visits Grandpa Fu. She apologizes for not coming sooner to check on his family’s condition (you see, Grandpa Fu is the only breadwinner of the family) but instead Grandpa Fu is grateful to her. She learns that someone from Ling Long had hired Grandpa Fu’s mentally disabled son, Dan Ke (= Eggshell). My hypothesis for why Dan Ke is mentally disabled: when he was an embryo he knew that he was going to be named Eggshell and that had mentally scarred him hence impairing his cognitive development. Seriously, who calls their son Eggshell? Initially Cai Hong speculated this altruistic act to be of Shao Tian’s, but nope, it’s Jiang Yu. She even spots him personally teaching Dan Ke but in that process, he also gets himself injured. When Cai Hong sees Jiang Yu injured, she does jerk a little. Someone’s worried.  

I was a little surprised that the show made him this nice all of a sudden but this character of his was already established back in Episode 1 when he gave money to the young Shao Tian when his family wasn’t faring any better. 

Later that day, she thanks Jiang Yu for his kindness but he tauntingly reminds her that she may regret it. She agrees and is about to leave with a huff and a puff. Jiang Yu, why’d you ruin the mood? Before she leaves though, she places a bottle of medicine for Jiang Yu on the table with a thud. Jiang Yu was warmed by her gesture as he picks up the bottle but, forcing himself to remember his father’s death, he too puts the medicine back on the table with another thud.

Stepmom’s on a grocery trip and happens to see the newspaper headline for today: Cai Hong is out to seduce Jiang Yu. Stepmom is delighted. That night, Stepmom pesters (and pesters) Cai Hong that Jiang Yu is a great catch. Annoyed, Cai Hong slips up and accuses her Stepmom of marrying her dad for money. That gives Cai Hong a deserving slap on the face from Stepmom. With that, Cai Hong runs off. Listening to all this was Shao Tian (who happened to pass by in the middle of the night). Shao Tian may not be happy his love got slapped in the face but he is grateful to Stepmom for one thing: reminding him that a man’s gotta have money if he wants the girl he loves. Ummm… if you want a girl that loves you, you would hope that she’s there not there for your money…

The next day Shao Tian resigns from Ling Long. By nighttime, Shao Tian takes Cai Hong on an excursion. Well, not really. He makes her walk a few steps with her eyes closed to an unknown destination: it’s his new store: Fu Sheng. He tells her that this store not only belongs to him, but also her. Basically, whatever is his is hers. This show is making me like Shao Tian a bit too much, especially when he smiles like that. Shao Tian wants Cai Hong to resign from Ling Long too but the girl is set on her revenge plan (that hasn’t moved an inch since Day 1).

Cai Hong takes a leave in the afternoon of the next day to attend Fu Sheng’s opening. Originally, Jiang Yu approves of the leave but when he learns her reason he’s stubborn on not letting her go, unless she attends the opening with him (since he got an invitation to go anyways). Don’t be too happy though because Jiang Yu gets inexplicably mad from Shao Tian’s comment about not letting go of Cai Hong leave. I thought it was Cai Hong that wouldn’t give up of Jiang Yu. Jiang Yu  relinquishes his fury by driving his race car carriage recklessly with Cai Hong as his passenger. Cai Hong does a dangerous stunt: she jumps off the carriage. Jiang Yu chases her and grabs her into a forceful embrace. With much struggle she pushes him away and ends his rage with a slap across his face. Before Cai Hong runs off, she yells: “I never want to see you again.” She means it. The next day, she resigns. Meanwhile Jiang Yu’s regretting everything.

One more thing to note in this scene: before Jiang Yu left the opening party at Fu Sheng, Zhou Mama realizes that Jiang Yu is that Jiang Yu (her gracious boss’s son).  

When Cai Hong reports for work at Fu Sheng the following day, she finds Ah Li working there. Shao Tian’s a smart cookie and plays it naturally: he introduces Ah Li as his distant relative oh so casually pretending to not know a thing about Ah Li and Cai Hong’s previous encounter. Gullible Cai Hong doesn’t suspect a thing.

At Jiang Yu’s end he can’t work well or sleep well without seeing Cai Hong. He does have a new secretary but she’s lacking in skills compared to Cai Hong (in terms of brewing tea and note-taking speed). However, the major problem with the secretary is that she’s not Cai Hong. That night, he tosses and turns and finally gets up with a sudden urge to see Mr. Cat. Too bad he can't find him. What ever happened to returning him?

While Jiang yu struggling alone, Shao Tian is successfully wooing Cai Hong. Or so he thinks. He braids her a rainbow (=Cai Hong) bracelet and confesses to her once again. Despite Cai Hong accepting his confession, she’s not that elated. Actually, she’s not elated at all. However, Shao Tian’s already on cloud nine, too high up to pick up on reality.  He also plans for their marriage on the spot to which Cai Hong cautions him that maybe they should take things slowly. He’s like, How can I take things slowly when I’ve already waited for years? With that, he moves in for a kiss. :O

However the kiss doesn’t happen because some petty guy that’s spying on the them shouts: “Wu Cai Hong!” This petty guy is Jiang Yu.

♦ ♦ ♦ Comments ♦ ♦ ♦

Alright, so these two episodes were a little bit boring and dumb.

• #1 Dumb Thing: I don’t even know why the chief proceeded to arrest Jiang Yu without knowing the pen wasn’t damaged…
• #2 Dumb Thing: What’s with the carriage scene? That was so random. He got mad out of nowhere. I think he should have went berserk (or completely turned off) when Cai Hong did some amazing plot twist to accuse him of murdering Lao Cai’s mistress.
• #3 Dumb Thing: The logic behind Jiang Yu keeping Cai Hong is that there is no logic. Drama, can you not make Fei Fei question Jiang Yu for his logic over and over again? If that's your way of telling me Jiang Yu luurves Cai Hong, I get it already. 
• #4 Dumb Thing(s): STOP EAVESDROPPING. This is probably my number one most hated plot device. The drama makes Fei Fei abuse it so much and Shao Tian is a close runner-up.

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Links: 

The Cage of Love Episode 5 and 6