Members of the DNRA discuss Yip Ching's chances of winning. The majority of them dismiss her chances, but Song Man San (Liu Kai-chi) points out that Wai Man Hin had managed to double his polling numbers within half a year in the last election. It is revealed that Wai used to be a member of the DNRA.
Yip Ching (Angelica Lee) introduces her campaign team to the media. Reporters ask Cheung Kwai Lung (Gregory Wong) why he suddenly switched camps. He says that he felt he was going against his conscious helping the good-for-nothing Luk Wai To (Savio Tsang). He truly believes that Yip Ching would be the one that can change society for the better.
Luk is preparing for an interview when he receives a message containing a photo of him in bed with his assistant, whom he had previously claimed to have no relationship with. He is distracted throughout the interview and puts up a terrible performance.
Yip Ching's team conducts a vetting of her past to discover any potentially scandalous material and ask her many sensitive questions. Cheung says that the most powerful weapon in an election is a candidate's scandalous material. Yip Ching remarks that being a politician is worst than being a prostitute, as a prostitute only need to reveal themselves in front of clients, but a politician must expose themselves to everyone.
The next big issue for Yip Ching's campaign is fundraising. The team figures they need a minimum of $13 million, but they do not have the backing of any political party or wealthy donors. Yip Ching says they can try to find previous supporters of her husband. However, at a meeting with one of them, she is told that the DNRA have made a deal with most businessmen to not give her any funding.
Yip Ching receives a call from Ho Chun Pak (Samuel Kwok), the chairman of the Democratic and Liberal Party (DALP). He urges her to drop out of the race and back his bid to be the DALP's candidate for Chief Executive instead. He promises that if she supported him this time, he would help her win the next election in five years.
The DALP refers to the Democratic Party of Hong Kong, a prominent party on the pro-democracy side. Ho Chun Pak is based on Albert Ho, former chairman of the Democratic Party and the pro-democracy candidate in the 2012 elections.
Luk is fretting over the bed photos and begs Song to help him. Song says he will deal with the matter and goes to meet the person who had sent the photos. However, he is actually meeting with a prostitute, whom he uses to trick Luk into believing that he had obtained the photos from her. Luk promptly shreds the photos. Back at his office, Song shreds a second set of the photos.
The part where Luk offers Song political positions in return for his help is reminiscent of businessman Lew Mong-hung, who was a big supporter of CY Leung during the 2012 elections. However, he later exposed that he had been offered certain political positions by CY Leung.
Meanwhile, Cheung tries to blackmail some businessmen into donating money to Yip Ching's campaign, but they refuse. However, later on, one of the businessmen, Cheuk Tin Fan (Felix Lok), brings $8 million in cash to Cheung, saying that it is to return a favour that Wai Man Hin had done for him before. The only condition is that his name is not to be associated with their campaign in any way whatsoever.
Cheung meets with Song secretly. Song gives him an envelope and tells him he wants the contents of the envelope exposed to the media by tomorrow morning. In exchange, Cheung obtains a list of 500 names to use as fake donors for the $8 million. That night, Cheung is seen putting back together the shredded bed photos of Luk Wai To while listening to a wiretap of Yip Ching's phone conversations.
The next morning, Song is eating breakfast with his wife and subtly shows her a magazine with Luk's bed photos on the cover. Cheung shows Yip Ching their accounts which has $9 million in it. Just then, a reporter comes to their office to ask about allegations that her husband Wai Man Hin once revealed government secrets in exchange for benefits....
Election countdown: 112 days
As much as I hate politics, I actually find this series gripping so far. The script is well written and the acting -- well, let's just say that I haven't seen a series with such all around great acting from pretty much the entire cast in like, a decade (ok, realistically probably less than that, but you get my drift...). Even though I may not necessarily understand all the political nuances in the first 2 episodes, that hasn't prevented me from enjoying this series immensely so far.
ReplyDeleteSo far, I'm still of the sentiment that overseas audiences who are used to watching high quality series will appreciate HKTV's series more than HK audiences (who are used to TVB's more soap opera-like series) ever will. Indeed, watching The Election (and even Borderline) makes me feel like I'm watching an American series....
Thanks for doing a recap as I couldn't read the Chinese text at the start of each episode
ReplyDeleteMm sorta bummed that there's no English subs yet, but oh well! Will wait for Incredible Mama. I think that one won't be too hard to understand :)) & Thanks for the recap!
ReplyDeleteI honestly thought there would be English subs out by now, but hope my recaps can at least help a little.
DeleteHi, can u please provide the link to hktv dramas? TQ
ReplyDeleteTry icdrama
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