The Love Triangle
Episode 2 of The Ghost Bride begins with Amah questioning just how Li Lan will find the killer in 10 days. After some debate, she sets to work in trying to bring her Father back. Tian Bai arrives, immediately causing her to exhibit suspicions around whether he really was the one responsible or not, going on to steer the conversation with him around whether he poisoned Tian Ching. Tian Bai brings her back to the Lim Household where Li Lan winds up searching for her earring until she runs into Er Lang, who questions just what she’s doing in the storage cupboard. As she hurries off, Er Lang suggests she look in the bathroom. Instead, she shifts through some letters on the side until Tian Bai arrives and escorts her outside to the courtyard. Once there, they sit together drinking “coffy” while a clumsy Er Lang intentionally disrupts the table and spills tea across the plates. Li Lan promptly spills the drink down herself too, taking this opportunity to head upstairs, intent on searching the house for clues until she runs into Er Lang, who claims to be a Heavenly Guard. After showing her his powers, she pleads with him for help but he tells her there’s nothing he can do about her Father and that he’s unable to prevent Tian-Ching’s actions. As Li Lan and Er Lang continue their tirade, taunting one another in the bedroom, Madame Lin and Tian Bai arrive burst into the room which leads the servant to be fired from his position. Before Li Lan can return home, Madame Lim asks how Li Lan’s Father is and tells the girl if she needs anything then she’s welcome to come back to their house. On her way home, Li Lan stops the rickshaw and sees Er Lang again in the streets where she berates him for not allowing her to look through the Lim household unchecked anymore. As she continues to annoy him, he floats a robe over and wraps it around her mouth. An angry Li Lan heads home, seething in rage, until she falls asleep and has another nightmare, this time of Tian Ching swinging a pendulum and taunting her about running out of time. The next day she tells the truth to Tian Bai and admits she made a spiritual deal with Tian Ching. He tells her he didn’t have anything to do with his death and despite how ridiculous he feels the entire situation is, he’ll stand by and believe whatever she wants. As they eat together that evening, Tian Bai introduces her to his fiance Isabel as Er Lang watches from afar. As the episode closes out, we see Amah has awoken with a burn on her arm while Mr Won continues to be haunted by ghosts of his own. Tian Ching flexes his ghostly muscles and this ripples across to all of our characters, including Yan Hong who appears to be scheming in the underbelly of Malacca. Does she have something to do with the murder? With a minimal amount of supernatural elements and an early introduction of the controversial love triangle that divided fans of the book late on, The Ghost Bride is a show that appears to have taken some of the worst elements of the book and spun this into a full blown six-episode series. With the awe-inspiring neon-lit streets of the Netherrealm and ox-headed guards seemingly a long way off from being shown, The Ghost Bride, so far at least, appears like a long way away from introducing these elements. The melodramatic acting continues here too and although Er Lang and Li Lan do have some great chemistry, it feels like there’s far too much emphasis on their investigation in the real world here compared to the much more interesting after-life. For now though, The Ghost Bride continues to tick along, even if it’s feeling like a very pale and ghostly imitation of the book, and a pretty generic teen romance on its own.
