SPOILER WARNING: DO NOT READ IF YOU STILL PLAN ON WATCHING THIS SERIES OR HAVEN’T FINISHED IT YET!!

With You
(最好的我们 / Zui Hao De Wo Men)
MyDramaList rating: 7.5/10

Hello hello! I’m back with a new review! I wanted to take my time writing this because the series was relatively long and a lot happens and I have multiple things to note.
I think I once saw a trailer or teaser of this drama when I was still following the facebook page of Dramafever (and they post a lot of clips from old and new dramas so I got a lot from there) and thought it looked really cute.
In the end, I think it really resembled A Love So Beautiful which I watched before, and it also reminded me of Rush to the Dead Summer. These are all stories depicting the lives from a group of friends that meets in high school and follows them through to graduation and after.
I think in my rankings With You lists second after Rush to the Dead Summer. I liked it better than A Love So Beautiful and I will certainly explain why.

But first of all, a summary. With You is a 24-episode Chinese drama about a girl called Geng Geng (played by Tan Song Yun). Geng Geng isn’t particularly bright, but gets into the prestigious school Zhen Hua by chance (because it was the year SARS broke out and the rules became lenient all of a sudden). On her first day on her way to school she has an embarrassing encounter with a fellow student, and this fellow student later turns out to be her future desk mate, Yu Huai (played by Liu Hao Ran).
Fun fact: ‘geng geng yu huai’ as a proverb means ‘to take troubles at heart’. It seems fate has been in their favor since the beginning. Despite some initial irritation, the two click like no other and become close friends. It doesn’t take long for it to look like more than friendship.
The story is basically about Geng Geng struggling in school to keep up with her competent classmates in a strict educational system while also getting used to her father remarrying. It’s about how she makes friends and how people help each other out. And of course her relationship with Yu Huai.
The drama starts around the year 2000 in Shanghai and makes time jumps to show the passing of time. Through this we can also see the evolution of technology (the use of mobile phones, like Rush to the Dead Summer) and ways of communicating with each other. The biggest time jump happens in the last two episodes where we suddenly jump from 2005 to 2015.

Let me introduce the group of friends surrounding Geng Geng and Yu Huai because these side characters were a big contributing factor in why I liked the series.
On Geng Geng’s side, there are Jiang Nian Nian and Jian Dan. Jiang Nian Nian, nicknamed Beta (played by Dong Qing), is a seemingly confident and mischievous girl. She’s the kind of girl who always stands up for her friends in a cool way and strives to empower the people she cares about.
However, the truth about her is that she feels very lonely inside. Her parents both work in Beijing and the lack of parental guidance sometimes does bother her. She eventually develops a crush on their homeroom teacher Zhang Ping (Fang Wen Qiang), and when the feeling isn’t mutual she starts showing her more vulnerable sides. Beta is one of my favorite characters from the series because of her layers. She doesn’t want her friends to see her weak, because she is always the shoulder to cry on, but in the end I’m glad she does show those feelings.
Jian Dan (played by Chen Meng Xi) is a simple-minded girl who followed her childhood crush Han Xu (Li Jia Cheng) to Zhen Hua. The two have been together since they were kids and Jian Dan has made it her mission in life to always take care of him.
Initially I liked the relationship of these two because I really thought it was going somewhere. It seemed to me like Han Xu was actually warming up to Jian Dan as well, but in the end I was confused when the whole thing happened where he couldn’t accept her feelings of love. Anyway, I thought they would be cute. Their relationship is different from a typical ItaKiss couple because he isn’t a jerk to her. He just gradually gets used to her next to him and he only finds out he took her affection for granted after he loses her. Overall, the relationships that were portrayed were very real to me. The main reason I love Geng Geng and Yu Huai’s relationship is because they are so real to each other, they are joking around, occasionally the flirt is ON (dang), and they are completely at ease with each other. No awkwardness in ‘omg he looked this way’ or in the mutual approach; we know from the first moment that these two are interested in each other, even if it’s just as friends at first.
Another classmate that has a slightly bigger role than the other classmates is class supervisor Xu Yan Liang (played by Liu Qi Heng). He has a secret crush on Beta, but is (kinda harshly) rejected by her when she leaves for Beijing in the end. He is a loyal friend nevertheless.
Zhou Mo (played by Liang Hao), is a friend of Yu Huai’s who is the only one from another class than the rest. He is smarter so he is in a higher class (yes, that’s how the school ranks its students). He is depicted as the typical guy who is constantly trying to impress girls but keeps failing until he gets a chance to play Jian Dan’s knight in shining armor in the situation with Han Xu. He suddenly shows a softer and more caring side there.
And lastly, the indispensable second male lead, Lu Xing He (played by Wang Li Xin), whose attempts to gain Geng Geng’s love last well into their future.

Before I go on to my positive and critical criticisms on the story and characters, I wish to share my opinions on the cast and elaborate a bit more on what I mentioned above.
I think the acting in this drama was very good and realistic. The actors very nicely portray the fickle high school student characters, both in happy and in struggling moments. The characters all have different sides to them, no one is one-dimensional and that is great.
My first compliment goes out to Liu Hao Ran who plays Yu Huai. He was really nice to look at, I don’t mean just looks but he just has this really kind face with a lot of expression. Everytime he looked at Geng Geng this little smile would start spreading on his face (or even just in his eyes) it made me really happy. He and Tan Song Yun portrayed their mutual feelings really well. If there’s one thing I love it’s a build-up in a relationship where it takes the couple a long time before they reach the touchy kissy part, but it’s so obvious even without skinship how much they like each other. With Yu Huai and Geng Geng it was mostly just teasing touches, pats on the head and stuff but the chemistry spat off the screen with just that.
When eventually they had a kiss in the future when they hadn’t seen each other in a long time, it was explosive (and initiated by Geng Geng which I thought was very good). So props to the two main actors! I enjoyed watching them together, they were adorable and I shipped it. I was looking forward to whenever they would have scenes together and that’s a good sign.
Furthermore, I liked how we get more insight into their friends’ lives as well. I loved Beta because, as I said, she has so many layers. She hides her loneliness in being the protective tough friend but she actually needs someone to cry on in return. I think in the future she does end up with Xu Yan Liang and that’s good because he’s always been the only one who looked out for her and cared about her for who she was inside.
I also iked that it wasn’t about ‘pretty people’. I mean, both Xu Yan Liang and Zhou Mo weren’t exactly ikemen or flower boys. But they still put their feelings out there and both got the girl in the end. There were all sorts of kids in school and that was a well-made representation. Sometimes the focus in Asian dramas only seems to be about how pretty or handsome people are and I personally find that very shallow. So this was also a good thing in my opinion.
I liked that Jian Dan eventually realizes that it’s no use to keep pursuing Han Xu while getting nothing in return. It shows that she isn’t just a mindless naive girl – she comes to a realization and is strong enough to let a guy go that she’s loved for at least 10 years. That shows a lot of courage. She stands up for herself by letting him know that she won’t walk behind him anymore and focusses on her own path in life, even if that means literally separating classes from him in school. She changes back to liberal arts to do so and leaves him crying with regret. And rightly so. He shouldn’t have taken her for granted.
Overall, I think every character has something to contribute to the story, even if it’s the senior in school Geng Geng would get advice from or the snobby girl in class. Everyone eventually shows different sides to their personality and that made it really realistic and enjoyable to watch.

Most of the actors were new to me. I only knew Zhou Mo’s actor from My Girlfriend’s Boyfriend where he played the main lead’s best friend. I don’t usually see actors I know in Chinese dramas so this was nice. I also feel like I knew Lu Xing He’s actors from something (dramawiki says he was in Meteor Garden but I don’t remember who he played there lol).

In terms of satisfying elements: I really liked the opening sequences. By this I mean the sequence that shows the title of the series: a bird’s eye view shot of the six friends (Geng Geng, Yu Huai, Beta, Jian Dan, Zhou Mo and Xu Yan Liang) running away after being caught sneaking into school at night to watch a famous Chinese athletes’ running on a school television. This is the opening scene of the series before we flashback and officially meet all the characters. This approach is similar to Rush to the Dead Summer, because that one also starts with the graduation scene before rewinding all the way back to the beginning.
The first scene already shows Geng Geng and Yu Huai’s closeness and promise to always be desk buddies. I loved seeing the sequence where they one by one snuck out of the classroom after guards came to chase them away and I liked that they made that the title sequence, because it’s a scene that is a constant reminder of their youthful school days.
I also really liked each episode title sequence. Every episode is introduced by a short sequence that would later in some way or another appear in that particular episode. I just loved how these short clips are all very simple but beautifully illustrated.
While writing this review I found out the literal translation of the series’ Chinese title is ‘The Best of Us’. I think this would’ve been a great English title for the series as well. It seems to include multiple meanings, it could stand for the period when the main characters were at their best, their youth. It could also refer to the social hierarchy at school and achievement pressure which the characters are exposed to (being the best in school and life). Anyways, now I kind of wished it was the official title, it would make much more sense. I think ‘With You’ is a bit vague because it’s about so much more than just Geng Geng and Yu Huai being together (at least that’s what I assume this title indicates).

I will now jot down my thoughts on some important themese that pass by in this series. First of all: family.
The first thing we learn about Geng Geng is that her parents are divorced and her father is starting his remarried life. Geng Geng gets a stepmother and a little stepbrother and getting used to this new life influences her a lot. Geng Geng keeps in touch with her mother, who is busy working and a lot stricter about her education than her father, but she’s still always there for Geng Geng when she needs counsel or comfort. Geng Geng misses her mother a lot and it takes her a while to warm up to her new step-family.
It may not seem like a big plot in the story, but I think it actually is. Having divorced parents contributes to Geng Geng’s reputation of ‘being a minority’ as is mentioned a couple of times later on in the series. Some guy she goes on a blind date with even calls her parents ‘dishonorable’ for getting divorced. Geng Geng is always the underdog who’s not smart enough and family situations in these matters always come up in discussion.
The theme of family is important for more characters than just Geng Geng. For Beta, it’s a sensitive subject because her parents are both away in a faraway place she can only reach by plane. For parent night at school she actually pays a butcher in the market to pose as her fake dad. She never admits how lonely she feels except during her one-on-one talks with the homeroom teacher who sees completely through her and forgives her because he sees what a good kid she is (which causes her crush on him).
But it almost seems as if Beta feels like she needs to be a parental protective figure to her friends because she lacks parental guidance herself and doesn’t want anyone else to miss that. Even in the arc when a new student joins their class and befriends Jian Dan while also getting closer to Han Xu, Beta feels like she needs to protect Jian Dan from getting hurt even though that’s what turns her into the nosy friend from Jian Dan’s perspective.
I think this is a very important point in the seemingly unbreakable friendship between the inseparable Beta and Jian Dan (they’ve been friends since middle school). Jian Dan feels like Beta is obstructing her from forming new friendships. But I can imagine that Beta is just scared of change and doesn’t want anyone else she cares about to leave her behind.

Another heavy theme that appears later on is social pressure.
While the series starts out very cheerful and optimistic and the focus of the characters is merely to enjoy their time at school, when senior year approaches something else comes with it: ambitions. And in many cases this is the parents’ ambitions for their children.
I was a bit shocked when this part came along.
The snobby girl in class, Zhu Yao (Liu Wen Qu) attempts suicide while crumbling under the pressure. Yu Huai also starts falling apart. He starts out as one of the best students in class, but when both his mother and his teachers start pushing him to go study physics at a good university, he suddenly loses his focus and starts failing. And slowly but surely we see him lose it. Still emotionally bound to his promise with Geng Geng and the desire to also show her that he won’t fail her, he starts slipping up and in the end he doesn’t even have the courage to face her anymore so he disappears.
Showing this part of Chinese society in this way in something that seemed to be a simple story about friendship made it even more realistic to me. I knew there was high achievement pressure in Asia, but to see it depicted like this got me really uncomfortable.
In Korea, there’s a whole series devoted to showing school life and related pressure issues, also including the influence of parents on the school board (The School Series [1-4] and [2013/15/17]).
Yu Huai’s mother is like that too, and while her love for her son is undebatable, she takes it too far. She starts coming to Yu Huai’s school uninvited and spies on him to see if he’s doing his best in class (and I’m talking actually peeking through his classroom window). It’s crazy! And then when it looks as if he’s too busy playing around with Geng Geng, she calls Geng Geng out for distracting him even though she’s only been busy helping him study.
It always breaks me to see this theme in dramas because I truly think from my heart that people should choose their own futures and follow their own dreams. Especially when they’re young, people can literally waste away when forced to pursue a study or career they don’t find personal joy in.
Isn’t being young all about finding your own way in life? Why should that be forced upon you? It’s about finding your own strengths.
This makes me quite angry sometimes, although I know it’s just because I’m personally not used to such strictness.
I found it heartbreaking to see that when Geng Geng and Yu Huai both couldn’t fulfill their prospects of being accepted into a university in Beijing, while Geng Geng’s first instinct was to reach out to Yu Huai, it was Yu Huai’s instinct to run away because he couldn’t face the consequences of his failure while he really needed Geng Geng at that moment.
I watched a documentary once about ‘losing face’ in China and how humiliating things like this can be for them so I’m taking this very seriously.) When they meet again after 10 years or so and Geng Geng is a professional photographer, Yu Huai still thinks he doesn’t deserve her and then it’s Geng Geng’s turn to step up and show him that she won’t leave him alone. In the end, the two truly are meant to ‘take troubles at heart’ and face them together.

I mentioned before that every character in this series had a contribution to make to the story. One of these cases is the story of Geng Geng’s senior.
During the main story, Geng Geng has occasional encounters with a girl who is some years above her in school. This girl is Luo Zhi (Chao Ran). She seems to be the typical beautiful popular girl, but she’s actually struggling with unrequited feelings herself. She’s in love with the school’s golden boy Sheng Huai Nan (Nie Zi Hao), but she can’t express her feelings for him. Geng Geng one time discovers a secret message from her written on the school’s rooftop saying ‘Luo Zhi likes Sheng Huai Nan but nobody knows it’.
In the future, Geng Geng meets Luo Zhi again, now about to get married with (three guesses) Sheng Huai Nan. Luo Zhi specifically asked for Geng Geng to take their wedding pictures at their old school. Luo Zhi tells her that they started dating after both starting their studies in Beijing and now they couldn’t be happier.
The greatest moment was when Sheng Huai Nan revealed that he’d written on a wall somewhere ‘Sheng Huai Nan loves Luo Zhi and now everybody knows it’ (or something along those lines), as a parody on Luo Zhi’s old message. As it turns out, Geng Geng told him about the message in secret. Seeing this love that had seemed impossible still coming to bloom, it inspires Geng Geng to admit to her remaining feelings for Yu Huai after all and reject Lu Xing He for good.

I haven’t talked about Lu Xing He much yet. Geng Geng and Lu Xing He meet when Geng Geng is sneaking through the storage room at school to find her camera that was confiscated and Lu Xing He is taking a nap there. Lu Xing He is immediately interested in Geng Geng and starts pursuing her and from the first moment this creates a rivalry between him and Yu Huai.
Although it was very cute how he was so obviously in love with Geng Geng, one problem I had with him was that he didn’t know when to stop.
I’m sure he was well aware that Geng Geng didn’t like him back like that and only had eyes for Yu Huai, but he kept trying. Now there’s nothing wrong with trying but at a certain point he should’ve accepted that it was no use.
I was confused because at least two times it seemed like he got closure to accept Geng Geng and Yu Huai’s relationship and back off. The first time was when he decided to quit Zhen Hua and move to Beijing to follow his dream of entering art school. The second time was the scene with the train barriers where he stayed back and yelled that he liked her while the train came rushing by. In those two moments, I thought ‘okay, he got it.’
But then he returned anyway and still continued his attempts. In the end it just became a bit annoying to me.
On the other hand, Geng Geng also annoyed me a bit in terms of never giving him a clear answer. She knew how he felt about her -he said it at least 10 times- and she still wouldn’t clearly state ‘sorry, I don’t like you back like that’. There was never a clear stop sign from her, she would just continue going with him whenever he dragged her away (a trope I hate in Asian dramas) or when he would invite her places. She should’ve been aware that going with him meant giving him hope. And it did, because that’s why Lu Xing He kept trying.
Even in the end, after the encounter with Luo Zhi and Sheng Huai Nan, she sends him a rejection THROUGH TEXT. And not even a rejection of his feelings, but a rejection of his PROPOSAL. THROUGH TEXT. “Sorry I can’t accept your ring.” Like, seriously, how cowardly is that?!
They were good friends and he deserved a sincere face-to-face explanation.
But this only resulted in him coming at her the next time kind of aggressively with ‘what did you mean by that text?!’, which was kind of scary. And this puts her on the spot, but even then the only thing she says is ‘I’m sorry’ without any further explanation. I mean, a single ‘Sorry but I like Yu Huai’ would’ve done the job. At least he would’ve gotten closure. But it dragged on too long between them until it just became awkward and annoying when he made advances and Geng Geng was just standing there like… haha what are you doing, while both of them knew their hearts weren’t in the same place.

Despite the great story developments in the main part of the series, I felt a bit disappointed with the last two episodes. This was mainly because it felt too much like the other similar series I’ve mentioned before. They always tend to end the same way and I’d hoped for this one to be different.
The construction of all the stories remain practically the same: the bonding during youth which builds up to an actual relationship, their plans to stay together in the future, then something goes wrong, someone disappears, and then they meet again years later and find that they still love each other. Also, in the period of separation the second male lead has started taking his woo-ing to the next level and the female lead is almost admitting to move on with him, even if that means actually lying to her own heart. I just felt like the ending didn’t give much new insight or possibilities. I had hoped for something different because Geng Geng and Yu Huai’s relationship distinguishes itself from other typical dramas. In the end they still end up together of course, but there is no real talk about their feelings or a mutual apology. Somewhere I just wished they would’ve honestly talked the whole thing through.

Another example where I wished they would’ve communicated better is the part during their senior year when both Geng Geng and Yu Huai are determined to study in Beijing together. Geng Geng goes to Beijing to audition for a film school there and Yu Huai goes to a training camp where he needs to take a test in order to nominate for early admission at this prestiguous university he’s striving for (or that his mom is striving for, at least). They are apart for about 10 days which is already hard for them, but they promise to call every day. However, Yu Huai finds out that cellphones are prohibited and need to be handed in because it’s a distraction according to the insanely strict teacher there. He is there with Zhou Mo, and Zhou Mo literally calls Jian Dan to tell her that his phone will be confiscated and that he won’t be able to call her so she at least knows what’s going on.
But for some reason Yu Huai doesn’t do this. He keeps calling Geng Geng in secret until a teacher catches him and he’s forced to hand in his phone while still in mid-conversation with Geng Geng on the other line. And even in that moment when Geng Geng is literally on the line asking ‘what’s going on?’ he doesn’t tell her. He just hands the phone over to the teacher without even finishing his conversation, without even saying, ‘sorry I have to hand in my phone so I won’t be able to call you’. I just couldn’t understand why.
If he’d just done that Geng Geng would’ve known and not worried. Instead he left her hanging, wondering and worrying why she suddenly couldn’t reach him anymore. In that scene I was so confused and frustrated why he couldn’t just tell her that simple thing just like Zhou Mo did. What was so difficult about that? It’s not like Geng Geng would’ve been angry at him if she’d known he wasn’t allowed a cell phone.
I can’t stand it when people don’t communicate in dramas, but this was such a trivial thing – I couldn’t imagine he felt like he couldn’t tell her something as simple like that. Luckily, he eventually finds an old public phone and manages to reach Geng Geng to explain the situation and tell her that he misses her. But it all goes downhill from there, because that training camp is the start of Yu Huai’s deterioriation.

I mentioned before there was one kiss, and this is in the 2015 time period where Geng Geng decides to fully pursue her feelings for Yu Huai after all. There’s a moment where they play video games and for a second it’s old times and she just grabs him and there is a passionate kiss. However, since Yu Huai is still in denial here he pushes her away (for some reason I still don’t understand) and doesn’t even dare admitting he’s been in love with her since forever. So it didn’t really feel satisfying as a kiss where they both finally admitted their eternal love for one another.
The series ends with Yu Huai walking in on Geng Geng while she visits his mother in the hospital and (I think) overhears his mother talk to Geng Geng about her regrets in being so strict to both her son and being harsh to Geng Geng. After being pushed away by him Geng Geng starts texting him all sorts of quotes and sentences that Yu Huai said to her and vice versa that were important to their relationship. In response to that, Yu Huai comes to her in their special place where there’s a piece of wood Geng Geng carved their names in and that’s the end of it.
Though ending up together was the least they could do, I kind of wished there was a final hug or kiss to seal their feelings for good.

Overall, I enjoyed watching this series. I liked it better than A Love So Beautiful because the characters were less stereotypical and the bonds portrayed were realistic and sincere. The bond between Geng Geng and Yu Huai was beautiful and pure and still there was this passionate affection. The simple but strong love between two kids who knew nothing of love created a very innocent but strong chemistry. The friendships depicted were very real and every character contributed something to the story. There were no characters that served just as comic relief or anything like that. It showed a lot of different lives and relationships, not just between friends but also between families. It’s about embracing youth and dreams but also experiencing heartbreaks and changes in life. Because that’s what life is about: a constantly changing thing. Even if you’d like time to stand still and be in a certain moment forever, you’ll find that that’s not how it works.
The writing was good, the characters were well constructed, the cinematography was beautifully illustrating. Apart from some tiny details, it was a very fun but still realistic series to watch.

I will now go back to some Korean dramas, but I still have some Chinese dramas left to watch. Even though Chinese dramas are kind of the underdog in what I usually watch, hidden gems like With You are what keeps me interested in keeping them in the running.

Until next time!