Surprise (2015) 万万没想到 - Part 2 (Movie Recap)

kynkari: We left our story with Dachui being frightened by a friendly pig demon and running headlong into a portal in the woods.
SakiVI: All totally normalish so far.
My hat might do that too if I met a talking pig in the woods…

Screaming and crying, Dachui slides down a giant, psychedelic tube into a temple directly under Stone Ox village. He looks up and sees the green glowing demon seal. He must be beneath Murong Bai’s creepy ass hero lair! He finds a bottle suspended from the ceiling and realizes that this must be the secret weapon that Tony the Tiger was talking about. True to form, he removes the stopper and… lets the ancient demon out. Oops.
And this is why people hate Dachui.
Dumbass.

In the hero lair above, Murong Bai is at his desk pining over a sketch of Xiao Mei. Awwww... He lurves her. <3 Aside from the fact that Ma Tianyu makes my loins quiver, I felt bad for him. He has had a heavy burden placed upon him since birth, and the only reward he will get from it is dying young. He wants to be with Xiao Mei but he can’t even tell her because he won’t live long enough to make their relationship a reality. *sob*
Aw, baby. Never mind, come see me. I’ll get a nikahnama (Muslim marriage contract) ready.
My poor, sweet baby! Let me kiss it better.

He is startled out of his reverie by the sound of bells warning that the demon has escaped!
Oh crap!

And this brings our story full circle. Oh, we were in the past? Yep. All of this has been the events leading up to the scene at the beginning.

We are now at present time and the scene with the Tang Monk, Monkey, Piggy and Sea-Captain-Beard-Man briefly repeats. If you recall, Monkey tried to fight the demon but was vanquished and plummeted to Earth. Before he passed out, he managed to seal his friends in a transparent bell to keep them safe from the demon. Our handsome Murong Bai, however, just has to do a few simple hand gestures and traps the demon back in the bottle. He is devastatingly capable.
Swooonnn.
He is so good with his hands…

Monkey lands in the forest, and when he wakes up, he notices that he has lost his magical power. His crown falls off and he is elated because it means now nobody can control him! (I have no idea what this is all about but I’m sure it will be revealed later (the crown lets the monk control the Monkey King who is actually a rather powerful demon). Unfortunately for Monkey, he is knocked unconscious with a baseball bat wielded by two strangers. We don’t get to see the faces of Monkey or the strangers in this scene.

Murong Bai is back in his cave reading a book on how to seal a dark evil spirit. He suddenly coughs up blood and is reminded that he is running out of time. The blood spatters on the ancient tome and reveals the words, “The way to immortality: Reverse the circle.” The demon is tempting him! Noooo.. Not our baby!
That is tough on him. He’s in love, and he wants to live, and he is not hearing my calls to come see me.
Don’t do it sweet, hot man!

Dachui runs back out of the portal and into the woods, only to stumble upon the two strangers dragging the unconscious body of Monkey. Alright people… prepare yourself for the next bit. Sit down. Grab drink or a Slim Jim or some Funyuns. Or perhaps some Tylenol.
I’ve got tea and biscuits.
That might not be enough for this hot mess.

The people who have kidnapped Monkey are two famous demon Foodie cooks, Bieberbar and Scorpinova. Yes, Bieberbar. They use special chiropractic techniques to massage gay fresh meat to perfection, and by the looks of Monkey, they think he’s pretty gay and are chuffed about it.
Excuse me while I chortle.
Isn’t Scorpinova a Pokemon Character?

I was initially taken aback by this situation but it’s so ridiculously …ridiculous that I completely lost it. Chiropractic Foodie demons?? The male Foodie demon seems like he might be super hot if they removed his fangs. The girl demon is wearing stuffed reindeer antlers... bwahaha!

As they prepare to cut up Monkey to make a tasty dish, Dachui agonizes about how he can rescue him. It is revealed that Dachui has limited magical abilities. His real talent is making flowers, which is useless in this situation. Or, is it? He uses the color from smashed up flowers to make it look like someone has beaten him up and tells the Foodie demons that Murong Bai is coming for them next. They run off in a panic. Dachui’s overacting in this scene is hysterical!
That’s pretty clever!
Monkey introduces himself, but he is no longer Monkey! He is more like... Chinese Fabio? His name is Sun Wukong (so he IS Monkey, in human form). He has very white teeth, a head of magnificent curly hair, and a soul patch. He has swagger. He also has fried eggs on his nipples.
Ew.
He tells Dachui that he is the Monkey King and he is going to destroy the demon. Duchai isn’t impressed. Wukong wants to go fight Tony the Tiger because he thinks that the tiger demon stole his golden elixir (which I assume is what gives him magical Monkey powers). Xiao Mei shows up and insists upon joining them. Dachui hopes it is because she cares about him, but it’s because she thinks Tony the Tiger stole her wallet and she wants her money back.
I liked her thinking.I kept thinking, “I want my two dollars!” during this scene from the movie Better Off Dead.

Meanwhile, the Tang Monk, Piggy, and Sea-Captain-Beard-Man are stuck in the bell and can’t get out. Monkey has forgotten about them and they are certain that they will starve to death.
Wasn’t Tang Monk eating all the food?
Yep, Tang Monk secretly had sesame bread and various other food items stashed in his pants. He wouldn’t share.

Auntie Liu shows up, but she steals their luggage sitting outside of the bell instead of rescuing them. I love Auntie Lui and her Legendary Rainbow Tofu.
Seriously, this guy needs to visit the Brow-Bar at Ulta.

Wukong asks Dachui what sort of powers he has, and he demonstrates his amazing flower summoning ability. Wukong is angry as this won’t help them beat Tony the Tiger in a fight. Dachui then claims he can summon demons, and begins to cast a spell to bring forth an evil demon hell-dog. The sky grows dark, and the hell-dog appears:
He is so evil, when he gets crazy he even bites himself…
This movie is awesome. If it can joke, it will.

We are given another glimpse of Murong Bai sweating (!!!!) and meditating in his cave, and he is struggling with the temptation of the demon. The demon tells him that he can break the family curse, and that he doesn’t have to die just to protect the stupid villagers.
Oops, wrong Ma Tianyu sweating screencap. :)
I calmly accept.
Tbh, I think I just got pregnant with a beautiful Chinese-American baby looking at this picture.

Wukong decides to train Dachui and Xiao Mei in the arts of catching a demon. Many grueling days follow of Dachui getting whipped and Xiao Mei outdoing him on every test. He loses his confident spirit and accuses Xiao Mei of only caring about her money. She explains to him that her father left when she was a little girl, and he told her when she filled up her wallet with money, he would return. That’s why she wants her wallet back. Father of the Year Award, right there folks.
So, he not only abandoned his daughter, he had no faith in her abilities.
Dachui vows to help Xiao Mei and with renewed purpose, he gains his confidence back and continues his training. He quickly becomes a proficient demon fighter and he and Xiao Mei grow closer, exchanging ugly gifts and making googly eyes at each other.
But what about Murong Bai???
Harassed by an evil spirit, plagued by a death curse and now his girl might be running off with a dorky flower-making demon. That’s surely a shit sandwich, Murong Bai.

One night, sitting on a hill together, Xiao Mei says she’s in a bad mood. To cheer her up, he makes the field behind them blossom with bright twinkling flowers in a grand romantic gesture.
Awww...

Summary:

Although still somewhat clumsy and incompetent, Dachui is proving to also be brave and sweet. He doesn’t back down from a fight, and he truly loves Xiao Mei. Could we be seeing some character growth? Xiao Mei seems to be softening towards him as well. A romance could be blooming!
Oh well, that means more Murong/ MTY for me. Do you think MTY will roleplay if I tell him to?
Possibly. Let’s get him to roleplay someone who is very attracted to older American soccer moms who like McDonalds and speak Chinese poorly.
I prefer to get him to roleplay being attracted to nerdy Pakistani women who obsess over notebooks, Westies, ponies, and Jaehyo.
Murong Bai is in a bad position. If he dies from the family curse, the demon will eventually escape anyway, because Bai has no descendants to guard the seal and protect the village. If the demon will escape anyway, why should he die for nothing? The temptation may prove to be too much for him.

I know the temptation of him turning into a smouldering hot, sexy demon is proving to be too much for me!
I await his transformation anxiously!
One thing I really like about this movie is that, though the costumes and sets look low budget, the fight scenes are really well done, and when they use CGI, it is excellent. The jokes are silly, but there is a thread of a serious plot that winds through the movie. They are goofy and low budget because they want to be, not because they have to be. It’s all done very tongue-in-cheek and they make fun of every possible c-drama trope imaginable.