User Reviews

With a tight plot and great characters, this TV series is epic.

I cried serval times, very thoughtful. All things occurred in this drama which happened in real world, but this time I got different point of view, and feel sad what I've done when that happen.

Every single episodes can make me cry more than 5 times. It makes people start thinking about many social issues. Such as Death penalty issue,the abuses of Media fourth right in Taiwan, the influences of the victim's and perpetrator's families. Especially the influences of perpetrator's family, it is rare to see a TV series in Taiwan characterize this subject.

"The World Between Us" is very thoughtful,heart breaking but not too dramatic. I think this is the BEST TV series in Taiwan!!!!

Starting from a mass shooting in a movie theater, the series plowed into several controversial social issues that surround all of us. Brilliant script, excellent directing and outstanding casts make the series a must-see drama of 2019, at least in Taiwan.

The best Taiwanese drama ever. It reflects the reality. We always ask why, but not everything has an answer. When things happened without a reason, this drama brings up the most important message, let it go, forgive others is to give yourself a chance to breathe again.

The drama truly reflects the contradiction of society issues that we may have to face in our life. The point that the drama is aim to tell us is how to prevent the problem, not just finish the problem. And the influence of media(news manufacture) is big part of it.

Reflect the news via different perspectives, very compelling.

The story start with a defending attorney of a killer who shoot 9 people and take away their lifes. Same as most people reaction, I question why he defend such a monster ? The new media coverage nowadays many are twisted, partially true and we live in a society like give labeling to others. In the drama, one of the actor suffered from early psychosis but he is finger point as did something devil in his previous life. You may think of how come those people can say such a mean thing? But think of yourself, have you ever never doing bad things to others and never give label to whom around you? The society is full of sickness. Committed a crime is equal to devil and unforgivable. Did we ever think of the reason behind? Mental illness patients might be less if we venture more care and love to whom around us. From this drama, it dawned on me and change my perspective on many things in life. Not only the meaning behind, the drama is very moving and great act for those actor/ress. My eye dried out after each episode. It is one of the best TV drama I have ever watched.

Where is the bondary bewteen justice and morality?

This TV drama has not only a great plot and casts but a good heart.

It is not an easy topic to approach, and no matter wealthy and poor, we see mental illness tragedies happen sometimes in every country and culture. How could those living handle the aftermath? How could we do a little help to this issue instead of conclude it with "the society is sick blah blah blah..."

I sincerely wish producers around the world remake this drama at your local country. Hopefully little by little, we can all bring something good to the world.

P.S. If there is one thing I will wish it could be better, I wish they could have brought in more talented actors so that every cast isn't such closely related. It is a bit weird for news channel head's sister happens to be a social worker, and then her husband happens to be a psychiatrist, and then they all related to all of the cases.

As a person who grew up in a unhappy Taiwanese home around workaholic journalists and with similar problems (though not to such degree), I think this series depicted everything so accurately that it was almost triggering to me. There were scenes where I can almost see my family members in. I probably personally know a real life representation of every single character shown in this series. Their stories are seldom told in such a wholistic way. I applaud the production team for doing such a fantastic job.

There are some acting in the series that were not 100%, but the overall execution is still top notch.

I don't know how people would say this is unrealistic... it was too real to me.

This series carries the story line out pretty well despite the topics are very sensitive and heavy. However, I couldn't help to notice two things throughout the whole show: the camera was shaking all the time, and there was lack of transition from one scene to another.

Do not believe that abnormally high rating for this show. The first episode focused on the totally unbelievable-and poorly acted-defense lawyer for the murderer. First we see him interviewed live and getting a bucket of feces thrown at him. When he goes home to his wife, we are supposed to believe that she knows nothing about it and fully accepts his story of having fallen into a cesspool. Then the clueless lawyer, showing no deference, goes to ask for help from a reporter whose son was a victim of the mass murderer. Meanwhile, the camera never stays still, and I was getting dizzy and headachy from the constant movement. I had seen no reason to continue watching, so I cut my losses and bailed after a half hour.

Very touching and realistic stories happening around us. Show us a different perspective on how we look at things in our daily life. We need more of this kind of TV shows that bring warmth and positivity to our society.

A show that tells how to believe and how to move forward as a better person

a show that tells you conversation is way beyond one way punishment

a show that gives us a new scale to justify between what sinful and sinless is

a show you must watch

This Taiwanese series is ten episodes of roughly an hour each, and deals with such weighty topics as mental illness, trauma, ethics (or lack thereof) in journalism, social media, parenting, marriage, and the workaholic lifestyle. One of the major plot lines deals with the aftermath of an adolescent having shot and killed a number of people inside a movie theater, exploring the emotions of the families of the victims, those of the perpetrator's family, and how a defense attorney and mental health professionals fight to do what's right in this and other cases. I'm not sure why the English translation ended up as it did, when the original Chinese translates to The Distance Between Us and Evil, and was much more fitting.

There is great emotional power in the scenes of parents trying to cope with the senseless murder of their child, and on the flipside, the parents of the murderer trying to cope with guilt and grief of their own. It's heartbreaking to see everyone connected wondering if they had just done something different whether things would have turned out better. Equally good are the scenes of the defense attorney's impassioned arguments with his father-in-law about why he should defend murderers. This is a show clearly trying to make points about how these things are treated by society, and even if it's didactic, what a fantastic thing it is when a psychiatrist says "The media places too much emphasis on the mental health status of criminals. So much so that everyone forgets unemployment, poverty, and drug abuse are the main reasons for criminal behavior."

As a warning, the series is a bit on the melodramatic side, and full of convenient coincidences. One example is the sister of the mass murderer happening to find a job with the mother of one of the victims (a producer of TV journalism), and also happening to rent a room with the sister of another mentally disturbed man, one who then breaks into a kindergarten which happens to have as of its students the daughter of the murderer's defense attorney. Is your head spinning? On the other hand, many stories are contrived and artificially compressed to some degree, and this one does so probably to deal with its themes with a manageable number of characters.

Relative to the depiction of mental illness, I'm no expert, but it was certainly empathetic. It confronts some of the traditional cultural prejudices, including a rather horrifying story from the family's past of a schizophrenic aunt chained up in the backyard buck naked and screaming. The way a schizophrenic hears voices in his distorted mind was well represented, most importantly because it was in a way that helped me understand what the man was dealing with on a daily basis. The show argues for humanistic treatment, against involuntary admission, and more understanding to help prevent violence.

Along those same lines, kindness, communication, and reconciliation are shown again and again as important to a better understanding, and the series shows just difficult this can be in the face of grief and heated emotions, impacting marriages and family relationships. The idealistic attorney who works tirelessly to provide a defense for those reviled by society has a bucket of crap tossed on him in the very first scene, and soon finds that his own wife questions him. The TV producer's marriage is being torn apart by her responding to trauma by drinking and throwing everything she can into her work. The sister of the schizophrenic has to exert incredible patience and make sacrifices to house him when he's released, and is soon arguing with her fiancé.

Journalism is critiqued along the way, in particular, its slide from the days of verifying the truth in reporting and attempting to ensure it was unbiased, to getting it on the air as soon as possible, and as splashy as possible. We see the press behaving like jackals around innocent people they hurl questions at like weapons. Indeed, more than once they are rebuked that they "kill with words instead of bullets."

While the arc of the show bends towards healing and redemption, the path to get there isn't romanticized (at least too much) - one killer says he would do it again if he had a chance, the schizophrenic who is sent home with his sister is dangerous after he stops taking his medication (although my understanding is that this is uncommon), and the victim's families find it very hard to forgive the perpetrator's families, even if rationally they understand they were victims themselves. I liked how the show illustrated how great courage and patience are required in life, professionally and personally, to help get through difficulty. Overall, worth seeing.

That is everyone knows in our society but no one really do something to change it ! Real crime activity in Taiwan, it also happen the same all around the world! Everyone should be notice then our world might be better

If a psychopath hurt someone you love deeply, what would you think is the fairest way to do to this psychopath? What if you were not the victim, but a family member of him or her? Is it fair that we simply put a psychopath in jail or sentence him or her to death as long as they committed a crime? What's the point of doing this to a person who has difficulty understanding what's real and what's not? To prevent them from hurting us? All men are created equal. Most of us are healthy with right mind, and have more ability to help those who are suffering from psychosis. However, would it be better if we send a psychopath to jail after he got cured? Last but not the least, how do you define good people and bad people? Is there any "right" answer?

Everyone should watch this epic tv series And you won't regret it

This TV drama challenges the public's views on social issues.Murders cases, legal systems, media ethics, family relationships, and mental health issue, we explored different perspectives and thinking.

Not only to make you cry every episodes, it's a drama to change your life, to make you think deeper about what's happening in this world.

Watched this to study chinese, it is incredible and sets the bar high for whatever show i watch next. Really great acting and writing. So well made, one of the best shows ive seen.

Before you watch the drama, just take a minute or two to imagine: that you are the decisive head of the News department of a Network, but underneath your strong cover, you are actually a hurt and sensitive mom who has been suffering from losing your son because of a brutal gunshot incident that you constantly blame yourself on. Life goes on and you permanently keep yourself busy so that you wouldn't have time for sorrow. But accidentally, you get to know that one of the staff that you trust is a family of the murderer of your son. What would you deal with this? Well, this is what happens in The World Between Us, a delicate realism-themed drama poking into the current status quo of the news industry and the handling of the sociopath and psychopath criminals as well.

This is a must watch drama, a letter to our generation and to the world. No matter who u r and where u from, even if u dun speak Mandarin, just turn on subtitles and go, go watch this one, it's epic. I consider myself a movie nerd and I've seen a lot yet this is the one that first made me wanna post my comment! Just go!

A touching, human series about the aftermath of a mass shooting. It also deals with the issues of schizophrenia, guilt, vengeance, repentance. It is not the usual Taiwanese serial.