Disclaimer: this is a review, and as such it contains spoilers of the whole series. Please proceed to read at your own risk if you still plan on watching this show or if you haven’t finished it yet. You have been warned.
Put Your Head on My Shoulder
(致我们暖暖的小时光 / Zhi Wo Men Nuan Nuan De Xiao Shi Guang /
To Our Warm Little Times)
MyDramaList rating: 6.5/10
Hello~ Back with a new review and with this one I am welcoming the last month of this year. Isn’t time going by incredibly fast these days? We’re already starting 2023 in a couple of weeks! Anyways, I was worried that this drama would take me a long time (since Chinese dramas often tend to be quite lengthy) but it was actually a relatively short and very light watch. I watched it on DramaCool, even though the English subtitles aren’t that good. I guess I could’ve also watched it on YouTube, but oh well. So yeah, I’m finally officially finalizing my 2019 batch of Asian dramas, and this is actually the only Chinese drama I watched this year! Not to fret, there are many more to come!
I think I put this on my list after thinking something about it looked cute, and that’s really what it was, a simple cute love story, not too much drama or intrigues. It can be nice for a change not to have too much characters, storylines and plot twists in a drama. So let’s start this review right away!
Put Your Head on My Shoulder is a 24-episode Chinese drama series that focusses on the relationship between two college students who end up living together in the same house. Si Tu Mo (played by Xing Fei) is an accounting major who has a hidden ambition for advertising, but she never gets into any advertising jobs because of her irrelevant accounting background. She lives in a campus dorm with three other girls, and they are all quite close with each other. There’s Wang Shan (Zheng Ying Chen), Meng Lu (Gao Yu Fei) and Hu Niu (Chen Jing Jing). Amongst each other, they all call each other Mo Mo, Shan Shan, Lu Lu and Niu Niu (I found it easier to remember that way). Mo Mo is especially close with Shan Shan. At the beginning of the series, Mo Mo has a crush on Fu Pei (played by Tang Xiao Tian), and it’s shown that the two of them have had a crush on each other since high school, but for some reason nothing official has happened between them yet. Fu Pei told Mo Mo to wait until they’d graduated before they would date, and Mo Mo just went along with it, but even in the present, she keeps being let down by him. When they’re together, he tells her the sweetest things, he tells her he’ll always be there for her, but when she actually needs him to accompany her somewhere or look out for her, he never shows up. And it’s starting to eat away at Mo Mo – she’s losing her patience with him, for good reason.
Fu Pei also lives in a dorm on campus with three other guys, amongst whom Gu Wei Yi (played by Lin Yi), a science major. Unlike Mo Mo, Wei Yi is studying what he wants to pursue, he even gets a place in an esteemed professor’s experiment class despite being only a junior student. There’s only two other students in this class, and they are both seniors, so it’s a pretty big deal.
Mo Mo and Wei Yi meet for the first time when Fu Pei and Mo Mo crash into Wei Yi with their bike and when leaving, Wei Yi and Mo Mo incidentally swap bags (they’re both black with letters on it, it can happen in the chaos).
What already stood out to me from the start was that, even though Wei Yi already knew Fu Pei, the first thing he did when the crash happened was ask Mo Mo if she was okay. That immediately told me that he wasn’t a coldhearted guy who’d just walk away, he already had really good manners and from the start he was always kind to Mo Mo even when he didn’t even know her yet.
I just wanted to put that in there as a first observation.
Anyways, as Mo Mo is just on her way to a job interview and Wei Yi to an important exam (the one that would give him the chance to participate in beforementioned professor’s class), the bag swapping happens at a very inconvenient time. Mo Mo isn’t able to show her artistic work that she prepared for the interview, and Wei Yi isn’t allowed to participate in the exam without his student ID card. However, they don’t hold any specific grudge against each other, they swap their bags back and Mo Mo even helps Wei Yi to get another chance at proving he earns a place in that professor’s class, causing him to be admitted anyway.
They keep meeting on several occasions, and it keeps happening that whenever Fu Pei fails Mo Mo, Wei Yi always ends up appearing instead of him. In the first few episodes only, even when Fu Pei doesn’t ask him personally to go in his place, Wei Yi is always looking after Mo Mo, even when they’ve not developed feelings for one another yet.
Mo Mo is struggling a lot with her feelings for Fu Pei, because seriously, what was this guy’s deal. He kept acting like he was Mo Mo’s boyfriend when they were together, but then always let her down. He didn’t show up, he was supposed to go to this interview with her in a remote neighborhood but didn’t show up and then she went alone and got mugged and injured on the street. And for some reason, Fu Pei would always ask Wei Yi to go in his place when he couldn’t make it to something with Mo Mo, but still when he noticed that Wei Yi and Mo Mo were getting along better, he be like, ‘wow wow what’s happening here’. Like, bro, you literally pushed them together.
Anyways, when Mo Mo eventually gets an internship at an accounting firm, she keeps struggling because it’s very far from her dorm and she keeps coming back very late, to the dismay of the dorm manager. At one point, her mom calls her to say that a friend of hers has a house closer to her workplace where she can stay, if she’s okay with that friend’s child also living there. Assuming it’s just another girl her age living there (otherwise her mom wouldn’t have suggested it so easily), Mo Mo eventually agrees and goes to stay there for at least a little while. SHOCKER. The other person living there is actually Wei Yi. Turns out, their mothers are friends from way back and they didn’t even think about the fact that the other child was of the opposite sex, but then again, they also don’t really mind. Honestly, what is it with Chinese moms that just want their kids to get settled so quickly, lol. But yeah, stuff happens and Mo Mo also moves back and forth to the dorm a couple of times, but they ultimately end up living together in that house for good. And that’s what the whole story is about.
The story is about how they start living together, how they start getting involved in each other’s lives more, and how they gradually fall for each other. As far as we can see, Wei Yi is the first one to fall. I personally think it all started when Mo Mo’s mom came to stay with them for a few days and there was just this kind of ‘family warmth’ around the house, with the three of them eating together, there was chatter, there was bickering, there was laughter. Wei Yi didn’t have that kind of warmth in his own family, so you could see how much good that did him. When Mo Mo’s mom left, and then Mo Mo went back to her dorm as well, the house was just so quiet and empty, and he immediately decided that he wanted to have Mo Mo back in the house. I actually think that missing her presence there after having spent just a short time with her, was already the first sign of him falling for her.
And honestly, could this boy be any sweeter? He did so much for Mo Mo, even behind her back without her noticing. He always kept her company, he sacrificed stuff so that she could be happy, he pretended to be allergic to stuff just so she could have it instead. He tried to confess to her several times, and if only Mo Mo would’ve had his level of knowledge when it came to science, she would’ve known it was the sweetest thing ever, but unfortunately Wei Yi was kind of socially awkward and his message never came across. He even got help from his professor and fellow science classmate, they helped him come up with all these ideas, but it was never clear enough to Mo Mo. It’s funny how in these scenes, we see more from Wei Yi’s perspective and we don’t actually know for sure if Mo Mo is really that oblivious or if she’s just faking that she doesn’t see what he was trying to do. I think she did at some point figure out what his intentions were, even though she didn’t exactly get the execution of it. So imagine my relief when that scene came where they were having breakfast together and Mo Mo was just like ‘Yo, do you like me?’ Instead of continuing this endless cycle of misunderstandings and failed confessions, I was so happy that she just came out with it like that, and they were both like ‘Yeah, me too’ and that was that. It was pretty refreshing and simple for a confirmation of love, haha.
As Wei Yi and Mo Mo are getting closer, there’s still the issue of Fu Pei. Mo Mo is still mad at him, and this doesn’t get better when he almost kisses Shan Shan in a drunk state when the four of them are hanging out at Wei Yi/Mo Mo’s house. We see Mo Mo get properly hurt by his actions, she cries about it and properly processes it by herself. I liked the metaphor that was mentioned through Mo Mo’s narration, because it so clearly wrapped up her final feelings for Fu Pei. “Every product of glass will have a caution sticker on the packing. But not everyone will take caution of it. They’ll think it won’t be broken easily, it’s all right, it’s always gone well in the past. However, when they open the packing, they will find it broken. And then what do you do? You’ll have to throw it away.” She initially also is a little mad at Shan Shan, even though I thought that was a bit misplaced. Shan Shan was such a supportive friend to Mo Mo, even though she developed a crush on Fu Pei herself, she still tried to get the two to make amends first before following her own feelings. She kept hanging out with Fu Pei, she helped him study and eventually helped him through his official ‘breakup’ with Mo Mo, after which he realized he really cared about Shan Shan as well. But I will talk about that a bit more later. Anyways, as soon as Fu Pei and Mo Mo are officially not a thing anymore and the two couples are established, which happens in the first half of the series, the whole rest of the show focusses on how their relationships progress, the ups and downs, the tensions and the snuggles, etc.
What I found so refreshing about this series was the fact there was actually no drama. Normally, even in Chinese series, there’s at least one bitchy girl character with her eyes set on the male lead who will do anything to get in the female lead’s way, or there will be at least one another aggressive male character that’s also pining for the female lead, but even that didn’t happen here. Yes, Wei Yi had some admirers, for example that senior from his experiment class Xie Yu Yin (Zhou Zi Xin), but she never even got close to getting Wei Yi’s attention in that way, she was never a real threat. And she also wasn’t a bad person, because she never tried to get between Wei Yi and Mo Mo, even though she still had to get over him. In the end, hearing that they got married in Germany, she even smiled at them as she walked away, because she also just couldn’t deny that they were always meant to be.
Fu Pei, even though he may have been a kind of ‘love rival’ in the beginning, also didn’t turn out to be that bad. He definitely needed Shan Shan to be brought back to his senses, but after that these two were also a really cute couple and there was never any real drama between them and Wei Yi and Mo Mo.
And I guess there was that celebrity that Mo Mo worked with a couple of times, Lin Zhi Cun (Zhou Jun Wei), he could’ve been a possible love rival for Mo Mo, Wei Yi definitely eyed him suspiciously, but that never really went anywhere either.
So in that aspect, it’s a fairly uneventful series. There’s not much spectacle or drama, it’s just really fluffy and romantic and cute. That doesn’t necessarily mean anything bad, because as I’ve mentioned many times before it can be really nice to have a casual and light romantic story without too much drama, but in the end this also made it not so special for me. I still rated it as I usually rate cute stories without much depth, because I did like watching it, but that was pretty much it. It’s just really cute.
Let me first go by the characters one by one to get deeper into my analysis.
First of all, Si Tu Mo. Our girl Mo Mo is a very self-righteous girl, she’s not insecure and she really stands up for what she wants and believes is right. This becomes very clear when she manages to fulfill her dream of starting to work at an advertising company, and she’s put off by a scheme the company pulls. She and her fellow intern have entered an ad for a design contest and they win, but then find out that the company put their boss’ name on it. When they are determined to say something about it, they are cut off as their boss offers them a full employment, obviously to keep them silent. It was nice to see how, in the 6-months-after jump, it was shown that, even after being appointed employees of the month, both Mo Mo and her fellow intern resigned because they still didn’t stand for what the company did and how they tried to get away with it. Until the end Mo Mo was determined to get all the credit she deserved for her own work, and she wouldn’t let people get away with excuses anymore. Maybe she learned from her experience with Fu Pei, I don’t know, but it was very empowering.
Other than that, we can see she’s very straightforward, but also quite whimsical. It seemed like, even if she got the idea that Wei Yi might like her, as soon as he would do something confusing, she immediately discouraged herself again. I’m not sure if she was just playing hard to get, but she definitely gave Wei Yi a hard time trying to please her. When they officially got together, she still kept acting kind of awkward and got mad at him for the tiniest things. One thing that did annoy me a bit about Mo Mo at some point was her constant distrust of Wei Yi’s relationship with Xie Yu Yin. Like, as I said, there was literally nothing going on between them. Yu Yin may have had a crush on Wei Yi, but Wei Yi had always been very clear about his feelings for Mo Mo, even in his science class, so Yu Yin knew that she didn’t stand a chance. There was nothing to worry about there, but even when she would just see them talk to each other, Mo Mo would start acting super petty and childish, ignoring Wei Yi until he went through the dust to apologize to her (even though there was nothing to apologize for). I don’t know why she kept convincing herself to be intimidated by Yu Yin while everyone knew there was nothing to be suspicious about. So that put me off a little. However, Mo Mo’s mom also explained to Wei Yi at some point that Mo Mo would start acting weirdly when she got reluctant or anxious, so I guess that explained it. But it still didn’t stop me from going ‘Omg, come on girl, don’t be such a petty child’ every once in a while. Other than that, I didn’t really have any problems with Mo Mo’s character, I liked how straightforward she was.
I also really liked Mo Mo’s mom (played by Xu Mei Ling). The way she was just shipping her daughter with Wei Yi from the start was so funny, and how she literally made Mo Mo sign this contract of not being allowed to move out of the house and would just send it to Wei Yi to use it against her whenever Mo Mo was threatening to leave again. She kept sending Wei Yi stuff that would keep Mo Mo with him, haha. She may have been a bit fussy, mostly to Mo Mo, but she was a really friendly and lovely mother figure and nothing but supportive to the two from the start.
On another note, can we just appreciate how well this drama normalized things like periods and sexuality? I never expected to see these kinds of things in a Chinese drama, but even though overall things didn’t get too graphic (there was no skin shown whatsoever and the makeout scenes were all cut off pretty fast before it skipped to the next morning – which was kind of a bummer), they showed several instances in which Mo Mo was on her period, with all the physical and emotional consequences. After the bag swapping when they first met, Wei Yi was made to buy Mo Mo new menstrual pads as he incidentally lost the ones that were in her bag. The scene in which the store employee started to explain all those different kinds of pads to him, which ones were softer and such SENT me. I really never expected to see this kind of menstrual talk in a Chinese drama, that was really funny. Also, after the couple fails to have sex for the first time (Mo Mo’s ‘It’s okay. As you said before, theory is different than practice’ comment, I COULD NOT), Wei Yi very earnestly starts researching the female genitals online, even starts following international webinars. Like, the moment this image of the female sexual organ appeared on his screen I was like, “👀Is this even allowed in a Chinese drama??👀” I liked how they were so open-minded and didn’t make a big awkward deal about it.
I thought Gu Wei Yi was an absolute puppy. He seemed so certain of himself, but as soon as he started falling for Mo Mo he just kept getting so confused by her emotions and whimsicality that I felt sorry for him a couple of times, haha. She really didn’t go easy on him. And still he always remained this super patient, loyal and sweet boyfriend to her. It was so funny how serious he got about it, that he even went to have after-school gatherings with Professor Jiang (Jie Bing) and his senior classmate Zhou Lei (Zhang Hao Lun) and they’d come up with strategies together about how Wei Yi could confess his feelings to her in the best way. It was always just so sweet and respectful, and he never ever crossed her boundaries, except probably when he drunk-kissed her after her birthday celebration and forgot all about it the next day. Seeing him after Mo Mo had made him remember was very entertaining, because he was just so shocked and ashamed of himself, it was adorable. Anyways, the scientific ways in which he tried to confess!! Can we just admire his originality and sweetness in that?! He literally wrote out this formula that came down to the meaning of that Mo Mo was ‘the structure of this world’ and another one that, if you’d drawn the lines completely, it would form a heart shape. Admittedly, yes, he could’ve anticipated better that Mo Mo wouldn’t be able to understand science at his level, but they were still really cute gestures.
He may not have had a very close/warm relationship with his parents, but he also wasn’t on bad terms with them per se. His father was a renovator, so he spent a lot of time helping him out with dismantling stuff and putting things back together – which explains a lot of his behavior and love for science. He just has this genuine curiosity for things, whenever he doesn’t know something he immediately just looks it up, from emotional stuff to how to actually fix devices, I thought that was a funny and cute character trait that he had. His mom (played by Rong Rong) was clearly eager to get closer to him, but he never really felt that comfortable around her or maybe she hadn’t been very present in his youth because he got along better with his dad or something, I’m not sure. Anyways, it was nice that both parent couples were shown and how the mothers just immediately started planning their kids’ wedding and the dads were still just sitting there like, ‘Wait a minute, are you saying my kid is already dating someone?!’ But there was no real quarrel between them or anything, everyone was on board with everything.
I appreciated the limited number of characters in this drama. Sometimes, a lot of characters are created that are then somehow bound or connected to each other’s past and stuff, but in this drama, there was one small core of characters and that was it. There was Wei Yi, his family and people around him at college, and there was Mo Mo, her family and people around her at college, and eventually at her internship, but that number of people was also few. When she starts at Ori Advertising, she finds out her fellow intern, Tu Jie Er (Yi Sha) used to be her classmate in high school, a girl who also had a crush on Fu Pei. But even after finding out that Mo Mo and Fu Pei were still kind of seeing/hanging out with each other, the girl didn’t make a big deal out of it, she also didn’t become spiteful towards Mo Mo at work even though she was clearly been favoritized because of her background. It initially seemed like she wasn’t putting in as much effort as Mo Mo, even asking her to do stuff for their project by herself although Mo Mo was already swamped with both college and work-work, but in the end the two did stick together. I guess the only reason why they gave this girl the connection to being Mo Mo’s old classmate was that she could already know about Mo Mo and Fu Pei’s prior relationship, but otherwise, in my opinion, there wasn’t really a reason why she should’ve been connected to Mo Mo. It didn’t really matter anyway, and she was the only character that was revealed to have some sort of past connection with any of the main characters.
Fu Pei was definitely a bit of a tormented guy in the beginning. In the first half of the series, I referred to him as ‘a hot mess’. He just couldn’t make up his mind about Mo Mo, instead of talking about his feelings he went and got himself drunk all the time, it was a little pathetic. He was introduced as such a cheerful and sporty guy, and he kind of lost that side of him at some point. It’s only after he’s already gotten together with Shan Shan that we meet his dad and this puts a bit more clarity on the situation. His dad may have been wealthy, but he was the kind that was never there for his son as a father, and he was always seeing different women. He wasn’t faithful to Fu Pei’s mom yet he still felt like he had the right to tell his son what to do and how. He kept meddling in his life, setting him up on blind dates and actually got angry when Fu Pei told him he already had a girlfriend because even without meeting her, he already knew ‘she’s not good enough for him’. Well, let me tell you sir, Shan Shan was EXACTLY what Fu Pei needed. I really appreciated how the both of them stood up against his dad, and I believe in the final confrontation Shan Shan really did manage to impress him. Fu Pei shook off all the pressure he’d been feeling because of his urge to always please his dad, and he decided to start up his own company. He and Shan Shan stay together after graduation, he proposes, they manage to get a loan for the company, and all’s well with the world. It was nice to see how, once the ‘mess’ was lifted from his shoulders, Fu Pei quite easily went back to being his bright self, and I still believe it’s all thanks to Shan Shan.
I really liked Shan Shan. Like Mo Mo, she wasn’t the typical ditzy cutesy girl, she was really strong and just, and strict whenever she needed to be, especially towards Fu Pei. She wasn’t shy to tell him how she felt about him from the start, but she still told him to deal with his feelings for Mo Mo first before committing to her. She literally helped him through his lingering feelings for Mo Mo by just being by (and on) his side, helping him study and just being there for him and that’s what he needed. There is one moment where they do break up for a short while. If I understood correctly, it was because Shan Shan felt like she was forcing Fu Pei to study and take an exam while he didn’t actually want to, even though he kept telling her he did. He kept accompanying her to study but stopped doing what he loved to do, playing basketball, hanging out with his friends etc., and it was tiring for Shan Shan to see him pretend to go for something he didn’t actually want. All in all, I think her behavior during this situation also contributed to Fu Pei getting his act together, because that’s when he started thinking about what it was that he really wanted to do.
There was one scene that took place during this situation that bothered me. Of course, going through their break, Shan Shan wanted to talk about it to her friends. She wanted to talk about her feelings, about her reasons for being mad at Fu Pei, but no one had time for her. She kept calling and texting Mo Mo, but Mo Mo was busy getting it on with Wei Yi. At one point, Shan Shan just comes over to their house and kind of imposes on Mo Mo, even though the main couple was planning to have a nice romantic home date. I was actually bothered by all three characters at this point, even though I understood everyone’s perspective. Shan Shan really wanted to talk to her best friend and ended up imposing on her without seemingly caring if Mo Mo was available for it. Mo Mo went along with it, she took Shan Shan to her room but then barely even listened to her while she was talking. I believe she was just on her computer or writing/drawing something and even semi-falling asleep at some point because Shan Shan talked for hours. I thought that, even though Mo Mo wasn’t actually up for talking, once she decided she would hear Shan Shan out, she could’ve at least listened to her and give her some friendly advice, not openly acting so indifferent about it. It was so clear that she and Wei Yi just wanted Shan Shan to leave, but instead of just telling her ‘Sorry, I understand you’re in a tough spot and I really want to be there for you, but now really isn’t a good time, can we talk tomorrow?’ or something like that, they let her in and just sat there acting annoyed about it. Wei Yi too, he was just getting impatient and kept texting Mo Mo to get Shan Shan to leave, which, while I understood his feelings, still was a bit rude to Shan Shan in this situation. I don’t know, this whole scene was just awkward because it felt like every single person was uncomfortable in a different way. But luckily, Fu Pei managed to make it up to Shan Shan quickly enough after that and Wei Yi and Mo Mo didn’t have to deal with conflicted Shan Shan ever again.
I just want to talk a bit about some side characters before I move on to the final part of my analysis.
As I mentioned before, Wei Yi’s ‘crew’ at college consisted of three people, Professor Jiang, Zhou Lei and Xie Yu Yin. The dynamic between these characters was really funny. So Professor Jiang (who is incidentally married to the manager of Mo Mo’s dorm) is an elderly man and he is in charge of a special experiment project class that prepares only several students for admission to an esteemed university in Germany. Once you get into Professor Jiang’s class, you know you’re on the right path. He may be an elderly man, but he’s very friendly and easygoing with his three students, and even starts giving Wei Yi tips for getting closer to his girlfriend. He even lends him a super old-fashioned ‘How to Seduce Girls’ book that he used way back when he was wooing his current wife. As much as he supports Wei Yi, he still is professional enough not to actually favoritize him, even though it sometimes may seem like that. But Wei Yi is just that talented, and as his professor he just wants to support him as much as he can.
Zhou Lei considers Wei Yi to be his rival in science. He is the kind of senior who keeps wanting to prove that he is smarter than Wei Yi, but always fails. Not to mention that he is also talented enough, but he just keeps falling shorter than a junior student and that hurts his pride. Zhou Lei is generally a comical character, but I still felt for him, he was still a really nice guy. I thought it was really funny how panicky he would get when someone would start coughing or sneezing in the lab – that definitely made sense watching it during the pandemic. And I really laughed when Wei Yi had a slight cold and was working in the lab and Zhou Lei came to bring him some food from the cafeteria in a freaking hazmat suit. This guy was on a different level of cautiousness, haha.
I also liked Xie Yu Yin. She would’ve been this really obvious choice for a love rival, and although she did have a crush on Wei Yi, she never imposed her feelings on him and when he just put it out there that he was wooing Mo Mo, she silently resigned and didn’t bother anyone with the fact that she got a bit heartbroken by that. She never even approached Wei Yi with any romantic intentions after that, and she also didn’t get bitchy towards Mo Mo. When she and Wei Yi were both selected to go to Germany, it also wasn’t like she was excited for getting a chance to be alone with him or anything like that. I really liked it when the three ran into each other in Germany and that she was able to smile so genuinely after hearing that they’d gotten married. She never meant any evil towards their happiness and I appreciated that.
The only person I didn’t like was that other senior student that came by somewhere in the middle, Lu Jian Shi (Li Meng Fan). Like, what was her deal? She was so judgemental. She was actually the girl that Fu Pei was set on a blind date with by his father, and where he brought Shan Shan in to tell him that he already had a girlfriend. I don’t think Jian Shi was even into Fu Pei, but still afterwards she just went and badmouthed him behind his back, like he was such a loser and all that and I was like, girl… you literally met the guy once? Is that how hurt your pride was that your blind date already had a girlfriend? And she also just went and told Yu Yin that Wei Yi should be into her rather than Mo Mo, which, again, who the heck are you to meddle? She just went and poked her nose into other’s people’s businesses. I liked the scene where Wei Yi just told her off in the library, that was really satisfying. Seriously, some people really have nothing better to do in their lives or something.
As I was expecting Yu Yin to become a love rival to Mo Mo, I was expecting Lin Zhi Cun to become one to Wei Yi. There were definitely more opportunities there, but all those chances were cut off before they could even grow into some very serious. So when Mo Mo starts working for this advertising company, one time she has to work with a celebrity (I believe he’s an actor) called Lin Zhi Cun for an advertisement shoot. In the beginning he seems quite snobby, but he likes how down-to-earth Mo Mo is and although he seems not very intimidated by Wei Yi, he doesn’t put any further effort into approaching Mo Mo romantically. He even finds out coincidentally that she resigned from that advertising company in the last episode, and then he supports her by making her resignation letter go viral which says, ‘My boss was too ugly so I quit’. I mean, LOL. Was it really his place to do that? Mo Mo didn’t seem to mind it, so we’ll just let it slide. I guess he was just trying to remain on Mo Mo’s side by also exposing her company for what they did or something. Anyways, I couldn’t really dislike him because he didn’t do anything wrong, and I’m glad he didn’t become a love rival because it would’ve just been a waste of time. It was just Wei Yi and Mo Mo, all the way, always.
Also, can we please quit using western actors in Chinese dramas only to give them such awkward lines? There was this one girl in Germany that kept bothering Wei Yi because she was in love with him and it was just so awkward. Like, I feel the only times western actors appear in Chinese dramas (possibly with the exception of Christine in the Taiwanese ItaKiss) it’s just to show a westerner and make fun of the fact they don’t speak Chinese OR to show that the main lead speaks great English, it’s never actually to highlight the performance of the western actor. Sorry if I said something mean there, but I just always feel awkward seeing western people in Chinese dramas, they never contribute anything serious and they’re always kind of meh.
When Wei Yi heard that he was selected to go to Germany, and he and Mo Mo had to say goodbye, it was so sad because here I finally felt all Mo Mo’s true feelings for him come to light. She’d acted so coy and whimsical before, but now she really couldn’t stop herself from crying at not being able to meet him for six months. And Wei Yi… the fact that he took her favorite mug with him to have something of her with him T^T I was kind of scared that they might pass each other, because just before Mo Mo decided to go to Germany six months later, Wei Yi had mentioned already having bought a plane ticket back to China, but luckily that didn’t happen. The scene where he realized she’d come to visit him and he found her sleeping in his bed, the suppressed joy he showed there (only suppressed because he didn’t want to wake her) and the way he just kept saying her name was so cute T^T
Also, and this was a major heartpuncher for me, but Wei Yi was the only one to constantly keep calling her ‘Si Tu Mo’ while everyone else called her Mo Mo, and then during one intimate scene he suddenly called her ‘Mo Mo’ for the first time and that had me SCREAMING. That was just the cutest thing ever, all the more because that just showed she’d finally broken down all his walls. He’d always been nothing but respectful to her, even when she was being difficult he never vented his frustration on her but just went and tried to figure out by himself how he could fix it. He really was one big walking green flag and it was the cutest thing ever.
I do have to admit I was a bit disappointed by their marriage though. When they went into that church in Germany (btw why was everyone talking fluent English, I didn’t hear a single word of German lol), and that priest just started reciting those vows I was like, no wait, this isn’t actually already it, right?? I felt just like Mo Mo, I mean, there wasn’t even a ring or anything! In my head it just didn’t count, there was no record or signature or ring or whatever thing to prove they’d gotten married and she didn’t even get to wear a wedding dress! And then back in China they only went to register their marriage, which was also sweet but still not the whole thing. They did put on the wedding clothes for a photoshoot, but it wasn’t clear to me if they would actually have a ceremony or some sort of party with their family and friends. Either way, I kind of hoped for a nice ceremony, but oh well, haha.
By the way I liked that there was a short special episode that showed some brief scenes leading up to their marriage registration and Mo Mo’s pregnancy. This special episode is only 14 minutes long and it gives just a tiny bit more information on when Mo Mo supposedly got pregnant and some in-between dialogues they had that weren’t shown in the series, such as Wei Yi showing Mo Mo how to make a piece of glass harder than a diamond after she boasted about how Fu Pei proposed to Shan Shan with a diamond ring. The idea of Wei Yi making his own wedding ring was just so sweet. I would totally see him do that, too. He kept saying such sweet things to Mo Mo, he really loved her more than he could put into eloquent words.
So yeah, the series ends with Mo Mo and Wei Yi racing off in a car in their wedding clothes on their way to the photoshoot, and Wei Yi briefly reflects on his journey with his new wife, mentioning that he would always find himself getting into a fast car when she was driving and that was put so accurately. He got swept off his feet by this whirlwind that was Mo Mo, full of emotions and mood swings, but he still didn’t want to change it for the world. And in the final after-credit scene of the series and the special episode, they suddenly have this little bratty kid that orders them around, lol. Gu Mo Wei, a perfect combination of both his parents, and not only in name.
Before I go on to the cast comments, I want to mention something about the soundtrack and the series’ English title. It reminded me a bit of Something in the Rain, in which the original Korean title translated to something different than the English title. The original Chinese title apparently translates to something along the lines of To Our Warm Little Times/Moments. So I wondered what made them come up with ‘Put Your Head on My Shoulder’ as the English title, and then I noticed that one of the OSTs had this exact line in it, just like with Something in the Rain, where one of the OST tracks had this as the title. I wondered if they took this as inspiration for the English title. I personally think To Our Warm Little Times also fits the series very well, as it’s really a compilation of Wei Yi and Mo Mo’s lovely moments together. Put Your Head on My Shoulder also has a really nice and warm comfortable feeling to it, and as a matter of fact Mo Mo does put her head on Wei Yi’s shoulder a number of times so in that aspect it’s also not an inaccurate title, haha. Anyways, all in all, I agree with both titles. And I really liked the soundtrack in general, too, I saved at least two songs.
The thing with Chinese dramas is that I know very few Chinese actors, so I never have a lot of references to compare their performances to other shows I’ve seen them in, which can be refreshing since I just have to base my opinions on my first impressions.
Incidentally, I did know Xing Fei, I saw her in Master Devil Please Don’t Kiss Me last year. Again, I really liked her character. I just really like that she isn’t the typical apathetic heroine, but she always gives the female lead some spice and it’s nice to see that, especially in a Chinese drama since they tend to be a bit conservative sometimes. I liked that Mo Mo’s character was so realistic in her ambiguity and whimsicality. Like, I finally understood how guys sometimes say that they can’t figure out women – admittedly, Mo Mo was pretty hard to follow based on her actions sometimes, even for me as a woman. But she just has this quirkiness about her, she’s cute and small but she can also be really demanding, and I just liked how she could be so matter-of-factly about some things. I still appreciate the normalization of the menstruation thing, because I’ve only ever seen people get super awkward about this in dramas when it was mentioned or suggested. The way she talked about it was as I would do as well – for women, it’s a natural thing that happens every month and it’s freaking uncomfortable so please, men, don’t go all ‘EW TMI’ because you don’t even know how TMI it can get. We should be able to express our discomfort regarding this, so I was grateful that it was finally depicted as such. I believe I will see more dramas with her in the future, but so far I’m really liking her performances as a female lead.
I can’t say I’m actually surprised, but Lin Yi is actually 5 years younger than Xing Fei in real life. I kept thinking that he looked really young despite being so tall, so I can’t say I’m actually surprised. During this drama, he was 20 years old while his co-star was 25. I really liked his performance, from his confused puppy moments to the moments where he realized he had to step up his game towards Mo Mo. The scenes where he was able to express his love for her where the sweetest, because it just oozed from his face how much he loved her. I liked that the writers gave him specific habits, like looking up things and his genuine curiosity to take things apart and try and fix them by himself again. It made him a very realistic character, the tiny things that he did in-between, the quirks and the habits. And how some things just became habits to him, for example keeping a hair band of Mo Mo’s in his desk drawer so he would have one within reach whenever she asked for one and stuff. It was these tiny details that said more than words about how much he loved her. And I also loved how naturally it came to him too, once he realized he liked her he never went into denial, he just accepted it and moved forward with his new intentions. He was such a pure character, a loyal puppy to the end.
I see that Tang Xiao Tian is in another drama with Xing Fei where they’re actually the main couple, so I might try that one out as well, haha. Fu Pei started out as kind of problematic character but really just needed to be sorted out. I think that Shan Shan was responsible for a big part of his character development, but we have to give him some credit as well. I feel like the situation with his father was weighing more heavily on him then anyone would expect, and more than he himself would initially admit. But it could be that this is what caused him to be so indecisive about what he wanted, even in personal things like his relationship with Mo Mo. He was only able to see this clearly after he met Shan Shan and that’s when he just became better and better as a person. He got to show some different sides to his acting, both funny and silly and serious and messy. I’m curious to his performances in other things now!
I really liked Zheng Ying Chen as Shan Shan. She was calm and serious, but she really had her act together all the way. She took the right things seriously, but still created room to enjoy things like getting into a relationship. She first meets Fu Pei when he comes to the dorm looking for Mo Mo, but she keeps bumping into him a couple of times when things between Fu Pei and Mo Mo go sour, and then she just starts looking out for him. I liked how she and Mo Mo made up so quickly after the drunk-kissing thing, because honestly I didn’t see how Shan Shan was at fault, she was the one being drunk-kissed without having asked for it. Anyways, I liked the earnesty of her character, how she worried about practical things. No matter how much she wanted to spend time with Fu Pei, she also cared about him not giving up what he wanted to do just so he could be with her. She was really mature and I liked that a lot.
I’ve seen Rong Rong (Wei Yi’s mom) before in Love til the End of Summer, she seemed kind of familiar to me. I thought she and Xu Mei Ling (Mo Mo’s mom) had a nice dynamic as well, Rong Rong played a more serene mom and Xu Mei Ling was a bit more adamant when it came to getting their kids together. I liked them both equally as they both just fully supported their kids and their relationship. Mo Mo’s mom’s appearance in a scene always made for a funny moment and Wei Yi’s mom was always just really sweet. I liked how they portrayed these two women, and that Wei Yi’s mom was still able to get a little closer to her son.
I see that I recognize Zhou Zi Xin from A Love So Beautiful, but I don’t actually remember her from there. She is so pretty! I liked that they kept her as a nice character and didn’t make her into a jealous bitchy girl that wanted to sabotage the main couple’s relationship. It was nice to have so many mature characters in a Chinese drama for a change!
This also went for Zhang Hao Lun, I really liked his character Zhou Lei even though he started out to be a bit bitter towards Wei Yi, he didn’t succumb to his envy of him but only used it to work harder and get smarter and I appreciated that about him.
I could’t help but think it was funny how Professor Jiang and that dorm manager were married, especially when it became clear that the dorm manager was definitely wearing the pants in their relationship and still the professor was trying to give Wei Yi tips on how to approach Mo Mo, haha. I liked how Jie Bing made the professor appear so approachable, like the students were so at ease with him and even though he was still the teacher, they could really talk to him about anything. Even when the whole thing went down that Zhou Lei had to take care of a kitten but no one could take it, the professor even (albeit reluctantly) let him keep it at the lab and in the end he even took care of it after Wei Yi’s allergies didn’t allow him to take care of it at his house any longer (the fact that Wei Yi even brought it home despite his cat allergy again proved that this guy was too sweet for his own good). I liked all three characters as they all became really supportive people to Wei Yi.
So yeah, that’s about it for this review! I had a good time watching it, it wasn’t a very eventful series but it purely focussed on the romance between the two main leads. Sometimes happiness can be found in the tiniest of things, the tiniest attention to detail or the minimal effort to be there for someone. I really liked how this drama managed to address such details. Wei Yi was a true genius when it came to the details of taking care of Mo Mo and the other way around, although Mo Mo kept enjoying teasing him about it more, like how she confronted him with the fact that he pretended to be allergic to mantis prawns that one time at the beach. They really go through all sorts of situations together, taking care of a kitten, living with a vacuum robot (Circle was their official first child and no one can tell me otherwise), they comforted each other, they bickered with each other, they went through all their daily routines, but they always ended up on the couch together watching a scary movie. I liked the use of recurring themes and objects, like the mantis prawns, the stinky snail noodles that Mo Mo loved to eat and Wei Yi couldn’t stand because of the smell, these were all things that just added to their relationship. It was cute, funny and romantic. It may have lacked depth, but that didn’t take the fun out of it for me. Cute romantic stories are my go-to genre, after all, they’re the best pallet cleansers and the most comfortable kind of watches for me, so I’m not complaining. It’s uncomplicated and uneventful, but in a refreshing way, a true slice of life romance. The relationship between the two leads happens so naturally, and neither of them goes in denial after they find out how they feel, they both face their feelings head on, so there are barely any misunderstandings – the only misunderstandings happen because of Mo Mo’s occasional stubbornness, but that’s usually solved within a single episode. She always ends up with her head on Wei Yi’s shoulder and then all’s well in the world again.
For some reason I really like watching these kind of comfy romance series at the end of the year, as it just makes me feel all cozy and warm inside. So I’m just going to keep watching some more cute romance now! I hope everyone is keeping themselves (and others, maybe?) warm in these cold days at the end of the year, and I will be back soon with a new review. Thanks for reading!
Bye-bee~!
