TV home from home (III)

This post is all about the HK drama I’ve just finished - ‘Inspector Gourmet’ (2016) (為食神探). Or as it should have been called in English - ‘What a Carry On’, ‘Carry On Cooking’, or ‘The Quick and the Deadpan.’

Plot: Chu Sau-Nah (nicknamed ‘Big Sister Nah’) is in charge of a detective agency which still bears her husband’s name - but they’ve been separated for 2 years and the date for signing actual divorce papers is fast approaching. To complicate matters, her estranged husband has set up a rival detective agency with a new name right across the corridor to her. Galling, but what can you do? Her younger brother, Yeung Dak-Hei (nicknamed ‘Bill Gei’ as a piss-take on ‘Bill Gates’) is a chef in a restaurant, but constantly solves tiny mysteries like his idol Inspector Pineapple Bun (a comic people, a comic) and frequently daydreams - and has no filter on his mouth. When he gets framed for snapping his boss with his mistress, he gets fired. To make ends meet he ends up working for his sister Nah and her detective agency. Business is not exactly booming, so after another ex-copper of a detective crashes one of their investigations, Nah forces Bill Gei to get the bloke on their team. This bloke, Mak Sai, is also a self-taught gourmet of any and all food and frequently stops everything to eat. Add to the mix a woman who’s a village mob boss, Ah Kiu (a play on the English word and triad ability to ‘kill’ those in their way), who can out-drive, out-fight and out-surveil anyone. Finally we add a woman who joins the agency as a young up-and-comer, Ga-Ga. Unfortunately for anyone without a sense of humour, Bill Gei suffers love at first sight and the consequent gags, near-misses and dating shenanigans keep the background plots going as the agency takes on all kinds of cases. There are so many subplots and complicated situations it’s impossible to go into them all here, but suffice to say, they’re all gripping and all work toward the final showdown. Food is also a massive theme the whole time - but as it's mostly HK food, what’s not to like?

Tone: this is first and foremost a comedy, a pastiche of detective shows in parts, a feel-good drama, a mystery, and a show about family, no matter how they came to be. As such it’s high on laughs and scenes that border on slapstick, as well as something Stephen Chow termed ‘mou lei tau’ a while ago. This basically translates as ‘came out of nowhere’ or ‘no real meaning’. Decidedly low-brow and depending heavily on puns in Cantonese as a result of cultural or societal standards, they can be hard to crack for foreigners and hard to subtitle. However, this series takes a pretty good stab at it and when they get it right, it’s priceless - and downright hilarious.

So characters, then. First of all, women. Let’s talk about the women. Nah is portrayed as a penny-pinching miser who charges high rent to her younger brother Bill Gei to let him move into the company flat, who doesn’t let anyone claim expenses for stake-outs from the company, and generally seems a right battle-axe. What the others don’t know is that she’s struggling to keep the company afloat and bring in new clients - but she can’t tell anyone because she can’t be seen to fail. Sound familiar? Sister Kiu (‘Kill’), the mob boss, only actually got into it to protect her mother and younger brother from typical street triads, and keep the family out of poverty whilst her dad was out gambling and drinking away all the profits from the family shop. It’s a shock later on to find she’s in her mid-twenties but has accomplished so much. Other gangs fear her, she’s competent at everything she does, and she has the ability to change when she realises her assumptions have been wrong. Most importantly, the gags at her expense are mostly remarks about her being ‘a tomboy’, ‘butch’, and ‘not girl-shaped’. This is because she’s confident and doesn't give a shit what people think about her - and the social commentary here is turned on its head a few times.

Ga-Ga, the new person and target of Bill Gei’s complete and utter worship, begins the series as a young, naiive woman who has a gap in her past and memory, who is easily swayed and can find herself intimidated. As she helps with cases and see Sister Kiu tackle anything with absolute confidence and a lack of shits to give, she gradually begins to assert more of a personality. A massive break comes halfway through and from this she turns into a self-motivated, decisive and capable character. Although a lot of the show is played for laughs, the basis for their actions and situations is set up well and always comes out of reasoning and tempered emotions. They are not air-headed, simple people without back story or reasons for behaving the way they do. It only takes a few hours of prep for writers to set characters up properly but few shows bother; this one gave them complicated motivations that drove them to be who they were and gave them so much to work with.

The men - ah yes, the men. We have an even split of good guys and bad guys here (as we do with the female characters). Mak Sai, commonly referred to as ‘Mexico’ (Mak Sai Goh - ‘goh’ being brother in Cantonese, but Hak-sai-goh being Cantonese for Mexico), has a complicated and tragic past that takes half a series to uncover. It’s nothing half the audience hasn’t realised, but he does come with a few shocking secrets of his own and when the show does finally confirm fan theories, it’s done in a way that makes you wish it weren’t true. Louis Yuen is a very good acting choice for this character - wily but always hungry, smart and efficient, with an ability to plan ahead that would make Hannibal Smith jealous. He’s quick with the banter and bang-on with his come-backs, providing a lot of the ‘mou lei tau’ humour by being so quick and so deadpan.

Casting Kenneth Ma as the equally wily yet easily distracted, flippant Bill Gei was also a good move by TVB. He’s proficient at Puppy Eyes, the Evil Jaw-Jut of Anger, and will literally do any role you throw at him. The fawning figure of Bill Gei in love is ofttimes hilarious and cringe-worthy all at once. Throw in the fact that he’s nearly 6 feet tall and has to keep stooping to fit in the frame with shorter co-stars and you have some built-in gags to tease and infuriate the audience in a good way. He’s often the foil for Mak Sai’s witty lines, turning what should be a one-liner into a volley of wit and clever puns that often made me laugh out loud (a few times I actually had to step it back and watch it again). The secret I think is that these two actors have rehearsed the shit out of this and they put their backs into it - the acting was awesome all-round, but these two did very well with the sharp wit and reactions.

Highlights of this ‘mou lei tau’ include Mak Sai protesting that Nah wants him to take a case for no money - by shouting ‘YOU ARE NOT A HORSE’ in English at her. Leave it barely a split-second, in which everyone concerned (not least of the all the audience) wonder wtf he’s talking about horses for, and then in steps Bill Gei with ‘mh hai a ma?’ (唔係呀嗎?) This is Cantonese for ‘wtf / you’ve got to be joking / no way’ etc., but it rhymes with the Cantonese for, you’ve guessed it, ‘not a horse’. That’s the level of humour we have here. I nearly spit my tea out when the gag dropped and I’m not ashamed to say I’ve used it since at work when I can't swear out loud.

Pair lines like “what are you talking about?” with the come-back “for Cantonese, please press 1”, and the running gag (that Bill Gei starts but then spreads to other characters) of using shocking Chinglish but prefacing it with a supposedly smart, learned comment: “1 word: hou-jyu!” (HKers frequently adopt English words, and anyone who has watched a police drama or film will have heard someone shout ‘hou-jyu!’ at some point. This is the borrowed word ‘hold’ - meant as in ‘stop’ - but with the Cantonese particle on the end, hence ‘hold’ = ‘hou-jyu’.) This phrase gets played more and more for laughs, like “3 words: perfect!” etc. The trick is to deliver it with such a straight face that I swear Kenneth Ma needs a TV award for Best Actor. He did win a 2012 Best Character Award for ‘The Hippocratic Crush’, but that’s hardly enough. He was one of TVB’s favourite character actors for years, but it wasn’t until a few years ago that he started getting main and then leading roles in dramas. This is meta’d during the scene when he’s professing his undying love for Ga-Ga, and she says ‘Wow - you looked so sincere just then. Almost as good as Kenneth Ma’, to which he replies ‘He’s just an extra - I’m one of the leads in this drama, thank you’.

Another highlight for me personally was the occasional patterns of words that would lend themselves very well to being indie band names. We had things like ‘green tea lava waffle’, ‘pak choi fiasco’, ‘scumbag militia’, and ‘sleazy boss with a side of vegetables’.

There were serious issues here, such as women drugged and then possibly molested, murder, adultery - all the usual fun. But all the issues were treated with respect. They may have made fun of the situation, but never at the expense of a victim and never to trivialise the gravity of the issue or the potential damage done. It even reminds the audience at times to cherish their own loved ones, that you shouldn’t copy TV shows simply because they look cool, that movies lie (my personal favourite), and that when the shit hits the fan, ask yourself if you actually saw it happen - i.e. not to fly off the handle until the facts are in. Bundle this up in Carry On style bawdy jokes or stunningly witty wordplay and you have a series that I will probably end up watching again at some point.

Verdict? 9/10 - would definitely recommend. The tone may not be for everyone, and your mileage will certainly vary where the humour is concerned, but for me this was a spot-on laugh riot that really cheered me up after the emotional investment and devastation in the wake of ‘The Hippocratic Crush’.

So peach and lube, everyone. Go watch some fun telly and be good to yourself.