Side dish: One of the dishes that Apple tried to pass off as her own was the stir-fried chicken with pumpkin. If you don’t have a Hong Kong housewife handy to ghost cook for you, follow the recipe for Chicken Pumpkin Stir-Fry at Smoky Wok.
Episode Recap
Housewife, Dan Dan (Mandy Wong) suspects that her husband is having an affair. She creates an excuse to visit his workplace in order to scope out the female employees for potential hussies. The young secretary becomes suspect number one after she spouts English, and her husband readily does her bidding.
Housewife/undercover cop, Apple (Priscilla Wong) just can’t seem to lose money playing the stock market. This success leaves her unable to execute her plan to ensnare Dan Dan into revealing her loan shark contacts. Apple and her partner, Tai Shu (Edwin Siu) taunt one another on their lack of progress in their respective undercover operation.
Meanwhile, Tai Shu’s father spots his son’s girlfriend having lunch with another man. He tries unsuccessfully to join in on their table, and ends up watching the business lunch worriedly from across the restaurant.
After following her husband, Dan Dan’s fears about the young secretary are put to rest. However, new suspicious arise when Dan Dan calls her husband, and catches him in a lie. Dan Dan spots him just as he is being hauled away by police after a raid on a porn internet café.
Unbeknownst to Dan Dan, it would appear that her husband was really looking for a place to use the internet on a regular basis. Dan Dan’s husband arrives home late, and has a multitude of excuses along with dessert. Dan Dan does not have the courage to confront him about the truth.
Beauty shop owner, Fung Nei’s (Kaki Leung) mother-in-law is in a pissy mood after learning that her son has been called back to work early in China. She attempts to convince her son to stay with claims of injury and illness, but is appeased when Fung Nei’s husband claims that the couple are working on the grandchild that she wants. Unfortunately, Fung Nei’s mother-in-law finds her birth control, and takes the couple’s decision to be responsible adults personally.
Fung Nei’s mother-in-law has a pity party by herself, listening to a recording from her days as a Chinese opera singer. She laments giving up her singing career for a son who has no use for her. Little does she know, her glory days are remembered by Apple’s mother who is looking for her to join in on a Chinese opera duet.
Apple is taken under the wing of the apartment estate housewives, who advise her that the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach. Under their tutelage, Apple attempts to prepare a hearty dinner for Tai Shu. However, he recognizes the dishes, and figures out that Apple had the housewives cook the food for her. Tai Shu reminds Apple that her main objective is to crack the loan shark case, and not to be a perfect housewife. Unfortunately, she is failing at her prime directive, because her stocks continue to rise in value.
At dim sum the next day, the housewives are all despondent. Dan Dan reveals her fears that her husband is cheating on her. The other women feed into the idea that her husband is tired of her, and emasculated by her dominance in the household. Apple ends up using her stock market earnings to treat the girls to a spa outing before getting makeovers, and having a night out.
At the bar, Dan Dan spots her husband having drinks with a foreign woman. Instead of confronting him, Dan Dan and her friends watch him ride away in a taxi with the unidentified woman.
Having decided that divorce is not an option, Dan Dan greets her husband at home wearing a wig and her makeover outfit. He asks if she has been pole dancing, and wonders why her voice is so breathy. It would seem that Dan Dan has failed to seduce her husband as he beats a hasty retreat, claiming he has a lot of work to do.
Comments
Okay, “Madam Cutie on Duty”, why are you focusing on things that don’t matter? There is no intrigue regarding Dan Dan’s husband’s possible philandering. It is so obvious that he is not, and there will be some innocent explanation for his sneaking around with a white woman. The entire side story of Fung Nei’s mother-in-law being a former Chinese opera singer, and Apple’s mother in search of her, feels shoehorned in. There was no reference to Chinese opera prior to this episode. Frankly, it seems like a distraction from the more interesting issue of an older woman who feels disconnected from her family.
The only parts of this episode that I found entertaining were the interactions between Tai Shu and Apple, and the makeover frenzy near the end. So, if this show is going to improve, it will need to return its focus to the lead couple, or have more makeover and shopping spree montages.
Madam Cutie on Duty (師奶MADAM)
Noonas Over Forks 