My 2013 Top 10 Films ~ No. 10 - No. 6

I know it's a bit late but, Happy New Year 2014!!! It is time once again to list my top 10 favourite movies of 2013. You would find a lot of lists from a lot of different people out there, so this is my list that you are about to read based on my own personal preference. I would split the list into two parts and for this first part, I've listed my favourite movies from number 10 to number 6. Let's begin.

10) 47 Ronin

There's no secret that this $175 million film is not doing well at the box office. It seems that it's not registering very well with the general audiences at the cinemas but personally I like 47 Ronin very much. It gives me fantasy, action and emotion with its telling of 47 ronin (it's what samurai without master is called) who seek their own version of justice after their master had been killed. Although I feel that the film would be much better in Japanese language, I am still very satisfied with the film; good plot, great overall performances by the film's cast and good visuals as well. It's a shame the film is considered a commercial failure because I personally think the film is good in so many ways.

9) Star Trek: Into Darkness

I would say that I'm not a Star Trek fan before which franchise consists of TV series, a string of films, novels, comics and many more. I didn't even watch the reboot movie, Star Trek, which was released in 2009. But I did watch Star Trek: Into Darkness, the sequel to the 2009 reboot film, and I love it. I always love science fiction movies but I wasn't into Star Trek before because I felt I was too left behind with the series. Luckily Star Trek: Into Darkness wasn't too confusing and new fans like me can still understand it even if we do not have any idea what the series was about before. It's a fun movie that anybody can enjoy which is a great factor to bring in new audiences. The film performed very well at the box office and managed to gross more than $460 million worlwide. I hope a sequel is in plan as I am excited to find out where would their space exploration mission would take the crew next.

K-pop Girl groups ~ My Top 20 Songs for 2013 (No. 6 - No. 1)

This is the final part for my 2013 favourite K-pop songs from female groups in which you will finally find out the Top 6 songs in the chart. If you missed the first part where I listed number 20 until number 14, you can click here. For part 2 (number 13 until number 7), please click here. Ready to find out which song hold the top spot?

6) Nine Muses ~ Wild

To be honest, I'm not really interested in this group before. The group which currently consists of 9 members; Hyuna, Minha, Lee Sem, Sera, Kyungri, Hyemi, Sungah, Eunji and Euaerin; finally caught my attention with the release of Wild, a fast-paced and energetic song about love and sexual desires. I love Wild, I think the vocal performance was good and overall I really like the song especially the rap parts. The group is very active with several other songs released in 2013. I'm a new fan of the group and I hope they will gain more recognition in the future as I feel they are a very talented bunch.

Wild MV

5) Jewelry ~ Hot & Cold

Despite currently being the longest running Korean girl group with more than two members ever, I'm still unfamiliar with the group's past songs. I think I did heard some of them before but I'm totally clueless or didn't noticed the rest of them. However, Hot & Cold managed to surprise me with its great tune and great vocal performance by the current members; Eunjung, Baby J, Semi and Yewon. I like its funny music video too which featured label mate Hyung Sik, one of the member from ZE:A. I think I should pay more attention to Jewelry after this.

Hot & Cold MV

4) Sistar19 ~ Gone Not Around Any Longer

Sistar19 is a sub-unit of Sistar with members Hyolyn and Bora headlining the group. Gone Not Around Any Longer was released early in 2013 but I must say, the song is still fresh in my mind. It is a well-written song with strong melody and powerful vocal performance and just absolutely a great song. The voice of Hyolyn in the song blew my mind away. How come I didn't noticed her powerful voice before? But I bet a lot of people already know this since I always read comments praising her voice before. I have to admit though that this song sounded more like a Hyolyn song rather than a Sistar19 song. I feel Bora should be more involed in the song as well since this is a sub-group of two and not a solo project.

Gone Not Around Any Longer MV

K-pop Girl groups ~ My Top 20 Songs for 2013 (No. 13 - No. 7)

Welcome to part two of my K-pop chart featuring my 2013 top 20 songs from K-pop girl groups. In part one, I've already listed out songs from number 20 until 14. If you missed it, you can find it by clicking here. For this second part, I have listed the songs from number 13 until number 7. What songs would they be? Scroll down to find out. Hope you enjoy it!

13) AOA Black ~ Moya

As I mentioned in my first part for the chart, AOA has an idol division and a band division. At number 13 is the song Moya from the band division, AOA Black. Comprised of Choa, Jimin, Yuna, Mina and Youkyoung, the group performed the song while playing musical instruments. Although Moya doesn't have catchy lyrics or addictive beat that usually associated with K-pop music, I still like it very much as I found it simple and unique, and I'm also impressed with the vocal performance from the group, especially from the member Choa. It's very rare for K-pop female groups to have their members playing musical instuments and performed as a band rather than a normal dance group, that is why I'm impressed with the concept that the company is doing for this group. Vey impressive indeed.

Moya MV

12) 4Minute ~ What's Your Name?

4Minute, which consists of Jihyun, Gayoon, Jiyoon, Hyuna and Sohyun, has lots of great, ear-pleasing hits under their belt. "Muzik", "HuH", "I My Me Mine" and "Volume Up" are all great songs from the group. And for 2013, What's Your Name? would definitely be added to the list as one of the group's best effort. Topping various music charts when it was released, the hip hop influenced song became one of the most well-received song for the group. The music would definitely makes you want to dance to the tune, and I also love the fact that the song suited the fun and funky image of the group as well. Bravo 4Minute!

What's Your Name? MV

11) T-ara N4 ~ Jeon Won Diary

T-ara N4 is a sub-unit for T-ara with Eunjung, Hyomin, Jiyeon and Areum as the members (Areum had officially left the group and a new member, Dani, will replaced her but only in the sub-unit T-ara N4 and not for T-ara). Jeon Won Diary is such an energetic and fun song but judging from the lyrics, it seems that the song was the group's response to haters regarding the controversies that had been clouded T-ara since 2012. Although I think there is no statement to back that up and it might all be just a coincidence, when you study the lyrics it does seems possible that the song is their response to all that had happened to them. Controversy aside, I still think Jeon Won Diary is a great song and no one can argue that T-ara continuously delivers when it comes to great music.

Jeon Won Diary MV

K-pop Girl groups ~ My Top 20 Songs for 2013 (No. 20 - No. 14)

This end of the year would be all about K-pop music (or Korean pop music for those who are unfamiliar with the term) as I would count down my favourite K-pop songs from female group for 2013. I started this K-pop chart last year when I listed down my favourite K-pop female group for 2012 based on the songs they had released.  But for this year, I would do the chart a little bit different as I would list down my top 20 favourite K-pop songs from female groups instead of counting down the groups themselves. Originally I only want to do Top 13 (as I thought Top 13 of 2013 sounds cool) but there are so many songs that I like that I feel I need to do Top 20 instead. The chart would be separated in 3 parts and for this first part, let's start with number 20 until number 14. Let's begin!

20) AOA ~ Confused

This group which debuted in 2012 is kind of unique because 7 of the members (Choa, Jimin, Yuna, Mina, Hyejeong, Seolhyun and Chanmi) are in the idol group while at the same time 4 of them (Choa, Jimin, Yuna and Mina) including one additional member (Youkyoung) also formed the band division (there are all 8 members altogether). The song Confused are performed by the idol division and was released back in October 2013. I like the song's tune especially the chorus which was quite catchy. The music video has a sexy concept and seductive feel to it and eventhough I don't have any problem with the music video, I feel that it might not be too good for the younger viewers.

Confused MV

19) Tahiti ~ Love Sick

Another group who debuted in 2012 is the six-member group Tahiti, which consists of members Jungbin, Minjae, Miso, Jisoo, Ari and Jin. For the song Love Sick though, Jin was taken out from promotioning the song as the concept for this album was deemed unfit for her age. Love Sick is a good song, however it sounds too similar to Potential Breakup Song from Aly and AJ which makes me guessing that their company purchased the copyright for the song and made a cover version of it. I'm not sure about it since I didn't find anything that state this but considering they hadn't had any trouble like so many Korean artists in the past who were accused of plagiarism before, so I guess they did made the copyright purchased after all. Anyway, it's still a great song and I'm looking forward for more music from the group.

Love Sick MV

18) BESTie ~ Love Options

Eventhough the four-member group BESTie debuted in 2013, three of its members were originally from the group EXID, so it's safe to say that the group are not entirely new to the industry. Consists of UJi, Hyeyeon, Haeryung and Dahye, Love Options was only their second single. It's an energetic song with upbeat tempo and great vocals which hooked me immediately after my first time hearing the song. Although Love Options is a pop commercial song, it does showcased the group's strong vocals and presence (in the music video) which I feel will help them garnered more fans.

Love Options MV

17) Tiny-G ~ Minimanimo

I had post about this group before which you can find it here. I'm such in love with this song that it got stuck in my head for weeks. Released in the beginning of the year, Minimanimo is a cute and catchy song which I think would catch people's attention even without seeing the cheerful and coulourful music video that comes with it. Members J.Min, Mint, Do Hee and Myeong Ji definitely have strong stage presence even being physically small. I feel Tiny-G is one of the new group which has such a huge potential to be big and hopefully that's where they are heading.

Minimanimo MV

Masterchef Malaysia All Stars ~ 1st impression

Tonight is the premiere of Masterchef Malaysia All Stars on Astro Ria (ASTRO Malaysia Channel 104) and here's what I think about the TV show after watching its 1st episode.

Basically this All Stars season of Masterchef Malaysia gathers back some of the memorable contestants from Masterchef Malaysia season 1 and 2, and also Masterchef Selebriti Malaysia season 1 and 2. So it means some contestants from the original version of the show will compete alongside their celebrity counterpart from the celebrity edition of the show. Although some celebrity contestants can be larger-than-life in terms of their personality, but I think the contestants from the original version of the show should not have a problem competing with them as this is a cooking competition (not a popularity contest!) and they have their own talents as well when it comes to cooking. This is not to say that the celebrities have no talent in cooking as these crop of contestants had proved themselves before that they can definitely cook and be a tough competitor.

Some of my favourite contestants that had come back for this All Stars season are Brian, Imelda, Zamil, Celina Khor, Ary Malik and Sharifah Shahora. Although I'm a fan of the TV show, but I must admit that I didn't really watch season 2 and Celebrity season 1 of the show hence I am not really familiar with some of the contestants. But I am looking forward to watch the rest of this season as it seems that they have an interesting batch of contestants here.

For this first episode, the contestants had to prepare the same dish that got them eliminated in their previous season. It was an interesting twist as we can see how the contestants had to improvise their dish and make it a better dish than before. Raja Azmi won this round and was excluded from taking part in the next round which is the Invention Test. She were given a chance to pick two other contestants to sit out from the Invention Test and she chose Ah Hong and Karl Shafek. In the Invention Test, the remaining had to cook any type of dish but only using six ingredients. Shahriah and Celina Khor had been declared winners for this round with their dishes while six contestants will have to face Elimination Round in the next episode.

Overall, it was a fun episode and definitely got me interested to continue watching the show. And the crop of interesting contestants with their funny comments also add flavours to the show and make it even more exciting. As this is an All Stars season, I expect the challenges would be far more difficult compared to previous seasons with a few interesting twist along the way. Hopefully this will be another fantastic season for the popular cooking competition.

Image from Masterchef Malaysia website.