OCTB is a 2018 Netflix Chinese Series Crime Drama from Hong Kong. It was created to celebrate 20 years of Hong Kong's return to China from Britain. In Hong Kong, it was streamed by Youku.
In the years before Hong Kong is returned to the Chinese Mainland by Britain, Pheonix (Jordan Chan), former undercover cop, joins the Organised Crime and Triad Bureau of the Hong Kong Police, and in doing so must contend with many familiar faces and new foes, as well as the rising stakes of the underground crime world.
This work contains example of:
- Big Bad: George.
- Conflicting Loyalties: Pheonix, after spending so long as an undercover agent, almost has difficulties responding to crime with the necessary force, and still thinks of a few of them, such as Big B and Blackie Junior, as friends.
- Distant Prologue: The first episode takes place two years before the rest of the series.
- Fallen-on-Hard-Times Job: Mr. Lard was once a big shot in the Hong Kong underworld, but in the present day of the series had been reduced to peddling porn.
- Honor Among Thieves: The Wong Hing Sing, the main organized crime group of the series, has a very complex system of honor, and are considered nicer than the lesser and younger crime groups around them.
- Hufflepuff House: The three contests for chairmanship are Fiery Shit, Bun Hon, and Big B. Big B, despite being nominated for it, drops out immediately because he doesn't want the extra danger and responsibility despite the extra money he will make.
- Macguffin: The list of all the Wong Hing Sing members and the Dragon Baton are the two most important items of the Wo Hing Sing, being passed from godfather to godfather throughout the generations. After Mr. Lard gets killed and Blackie Junior is forced to flee for his life, hey burn the List and the Dragon Baton is delivered to an unknown location, and locating and trying to obtain the Baton constructs the last third of the series.
- Obstructive Bureaucrat: The Special Branch is constantly meddling in the affairs of other Hong Kong police sections.
- Red Oni, Blue Oni: The two contestants for the Wong Hing Wing chairmanship, Fiery Shit and Bun Hon, form this dynamic, with Bun Hon being the more collected of the two, and Fiery Shit being the rasher one.
- Retirony: Old-Timer gets continuously left out of the action because the rest of the OCTB fear this will happen.
- Start of Darkness: The first episode of the series is Cocky Chiu's jumping off point to his insanity for the rest of the series.
- Starter Villain: Bun Hon is the first criminal Phoenix takes down, but Cocky Chiu is the first villain the OCTB takes down as a group.
- Title Drop: OCTB is the Organised Crime and Triad Bureau, a special division of the former Royal Hong Kong Police/current Hong Kong Police Force mandated to tackle cases involving triads for the most part.
- Undercover Cop Reveal: Pheonix does this at the end of episode one, both to Bun Hon and to the viewers. Notably, he waits to do this until Bun Hon has beaten Chiu nearly to death, and does so to save him.
- Wire Dilemma: Exploited. Cutting any wire would cause the bomb to explode. the bomb squad believed the red wire would defuse the bomb, and Cocky Chiu, the bomb planter, claimed the blue wire would defuse the bomb. There was no way to defuse the bomb at all. The actual bomb removal is considerably more complicated
