L.U.C.A.: The Beginning (2021)

An honest review

Well honestly the actors are pretty good but why are all the kdrama writers making the male lead an idiot who uses their emotion rather than their brain to get what they want I know that they have these things call protagonist shield till the last episode but seeing from the perspective of Captain Choi who liked Yoo Na.
Our main lead due to his emotions killed her and because of that Captain now will go through some badass killing spree. AND WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH THE LATEST EP10. There are so many plotholes. I MEAN SERIOUSLY Zi O is saying he is a human but I would say he is a beast or an animal rather than a human. gu reum she is like a wild tigress on a last stand. So my point is this drama from my view should focus more on gu reum. Gu reum is trying to save her baby and herself to gain freedom while ZiO is trying to take their freedom. And then the villains come manipulating the main lead. Its like watching a nat geo strong preying on the weak and the babies getting eaten by adults. Thats what happening right now. I cheered all my way through ep8 because he hadnt done anything bad, even if he is being manipulated it shoudnt have been that bad. But you know how kdramas are like. Its a good one even though there are no psychological play. Would have been good if there was. and last DROPPING IT.

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Thought provoking

A very unsettling drama, as one can imagine that if something like this ever became possible, there would be power crazy dictatorships and wealthy countries happy to abuse and use engineered humans as weapons.
After all, with cloning, growing a human ear on a mouse and even working on growing human organs in pigs, this drama is not total fiction.
There are many very unlikable characters and the usual abuse of and arrogance towards, ordinary people, by those with power and money, is a key part of the story.
Ji Oh reminds me of Frankenstein's monster; lonely, naive and innocent. Sadly that also makes him vulnerable and easy to manipulate by those he mistakenly thinks know best. It's people's abuse and cruelty that leads to the monster emerging. Kim Rae-won was so good in portraying the role.
The character of Gu Reum was really well acted by Lee Da-hee; tough, principled, but ultimately, I found her to be fickle. Ji Oh never hurt her, but loved her and only ever wanted to protect her; yet, at crucial times she listens to those very people that cause all their problems and no end of pain.
To think that she could protect something precious alone and that Ji Oh would be OK with that, was crazy. There were so many things she could have said to him to compromise his mistaken beliefs, but she didn't even attempt it. There are ways around memory loss.
I found every episode gripping and the story well thought out, but the final one was bizarre. That Gu Reum would rather leave something hidden, risking it not surviving, than to tell Ji Oh where it was, I found unbelievable.
L.U.C.A. is the beginning of something altogether quite horrifying ~ not the super humans themselves, but what most likely would happen to them and ultimately, us.
Well worth watching and very thought provoking.

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In my opinion - Unexpected

The first few episodes of L.U.C.A was interesting because:
- certain topics highlighted was thought-provoking
- characters were interesting

I honestly thought this drama would end just as how it started. However, towards the end of the drama, the drama turned out to be uninteresting and stale. Despite all the action scenes that the drama painstakingly prepared, it was highly repetitive. The choices made by the characters towards the end were debatable. The ending was not something that I fully understood either, which ended up as a disappointment for me.

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Amazing story and OST

The OST was amazing. 10/10 music which was stuck in my head and wasn’t released until after the show ended. I think my favorite parts of the story were Gu reums and Zi O’s sad moments. The happy episode was great but I liked that more as a flashback. I would totally recommend if you want a kdrama with action, romance, and a great soundtrack. The acting was great as well; however, I’m not experienced enough to write a review for one’s acting skills. The acting and visuals that made this show were out of this world. I’m talking about the stuff that made me in my feels during the whole ride. The story is good but the villains were clearly portrayed as evil. Like some dramas have such a great storyline that the line between a villian and a victim become thin; however, in LUCA, they stay consistent in my mind. The only part I didn’t like was that Zi O had too much character development. I’m the dude that just wants Zi O and Gu Reum to have a happy ending or at least an ending were they end up together (I’m talking about an ending like “the smile has left your eyes”). Totally recommend watching

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Good potential but badly written FL

It had really good OST and great acting by the cast and but that was it.

I never wrote a review for a drama but I had to for this one as at the start i really enjoyed the show and thought it might become one of my favs but with how bad and irritating the FL was, it went downhill

So the story started off really good but slowly things got weird, is the FL a superhuman too? She's getting thrown around, fighting off a group of trained men and sometimes even when they had weapons and is ready fight again the next day. Things were good during the middle but In EP10 she was so heartless to her so called husband that she wanted him gone and never see his own daughter ever and even went as far as to say that they committed a sin by giving birth to their daughter because of his cured genes and she said all this based off what the people that were trying to kill them and threatened to kill her daughter and easily convinced the whole damm country that she's a murderer showed her and the story of black arm guy and red hair girl was much better than the ML and FL, they both wanted to protect each other while here at first the FL wanted to kill th ML then she married him then she wanted him gone and at the end she wanted him to come back like make up your goddamm mind. All he has done from when he met her is save her life again and again though she did took a bullet for him at the end when she wanted him to come back but it was too late.

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The only good thing going for this show is its CGI

I never really write reviews and I only watched the show for the FL. The first few episodes are pretty bearable and the acting is at most acceptable.
There may be very small spoilers ahead when I try to explain why I disliked this show.

1. The FL keeps getting thrown off her feet every other episode, like literally. And since the episodes show a continuous story, she manages to get up and fight the villain the very next episode. I mean, come on, make it believable, one or two hours in the hospital will solve multiple head traumas based on this logic.
2. The villain has zero depth.
3. The ML lacks both common sense and plot. Yolo he keeps blasting electric charges.

Though it's a new concept, it could have been better written by a racoon. Acting is borderline acceptable. ML seems a bit old for this role for me at least.

I would suggest not wasting 12 hrs on this show. Everything is put together hastily, the romance is kinda meaningless, comedy is sporadic, and action is basically the ML fighting the villain in the same fashion every episode.

If you plan to watch it, pay no attention to the story, watch it if you like the actors and blind action.
9/10 - for action scenes (I like the Hollywood like action scenes with the shaky cam effect)
10/10 - CGI

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Seriously underrated drama

You should only watch this if you can make sure you won’t be too emotionally invested in this because once you are in there is no out. I never thought the drama would turn out to be so good. The turning point is really at EP 8 that is the point you really can’t pull yourself out anymore. I feel so much empathy for Zio Guruem Lee Son and Yoona like seriously a happy ending for them is all I hope for now. They all deserve to live a good life. Even though Lee Son and Yoona are the bad guys in this drama, they are still the victims of the whole lab experiment thing. I never thought that an action thriller drama can make me laugh and cry. Normally I only feel tension. I think the main cast did a great job acting, the chemistry is off the chart! The OSTs was absolutely amazing, there wasn’t a drama where I liked all the OSTs before. Overall this is a must watch drama if you are looking for an emotional rollercoaster and action scenes

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Beauty and Beast

I have always been a fan of these "monster" theme stories which kdrama industry keeps inventing, be it Hello Monster, He is psychometric, Flower of Evil. Sometimes it is a behavioral flaw and sometimes it is a certain power. This time the concept was something so novel. Genetic Engineering. Genome editing. Human Experimentation. Religious Cult. Mad Scientist. Invincible Military man who keeps coming back from death. You name it, LUCA has them all.

There's the Beast, Z-0 who is constantly on run to survive from people he can't remember. And there's the beauty, (cough cough, with her messy hairdo) who is investigating about her missing parents. Initially, the beauty seems very strong, she can kick some ass, and in turn, gets kicked too because of over confidence. She turns out to be only dialogues and lacking in action. Like one of those moments of getting kicked in ass, she ends up meeting a truck of doom. Comes the beast, saves her, and she later tries to save him. Overestimates herself, only to be saved by him again. And this happens again and again. Meanwhile, falling in love with beast, well it felt like one rainy night mistake. When reality kicks in, she tries to kick some ass, overestimates herself, only to be saved by him again. And this happens again and again. Until, she finally saves the him. Frustrating, ain't it!?

Stories like "beauty and beast" revolve around the idea of highlighting the need of kindness in theory. But Luca turns out to be what would happen in reality. Conflict of interests turning the beast into ruthless monster. For a second, I got reminded of X-men Origins: Wolverine and that wailing. I didn't wail for bodies he piled up. His transformation and the ending is what I loved so much about the show.

But my love couldn't overlook the mess. What went wrong was the repetitive screenplay. And the FL's brain. (was it because of getting constantly hit in the head?) And the inconsistency with its characters. For instance, when Z-0 makes some plans to escape his enemies only to get outwitted but when he is with Ha Neul Ae Gu Reum he somehow succeeds.

Oh the action, I really loved the action scenes. Especially the elevator fight scene, lot better than the one in "K2". But then it too become so repetitive and mundane that I didn't miss anything by skipping them. The music, especially the end track was really good. I wasn't impressed with Kim Rae Won in Doctors but the way he portrayed Z-0 showing emotions of being on edge of constant fear, made me give a ten for acting.

LUCA: The Beginning, great in concept but mediocre in execution.

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MY OPINION :)

At first I was very confused or better said a little bit overwhelmed in the first episode but this was nothing bad and was explained and built excitingly . I liked the storyline at the beginning but it went downhill from about the 8th episode on. Not only the story but also the characters made decisions that were questionable.
The action scenes were kinda weird Hahahah I don't know how to explain it but how they were filmed was very weird? However, they got better and better as the episode went on. I kind of liked the elevator scene but also kind of disliked it
CGI was pretty good but not MY favorite.
OST was also good, have mostly fit very well. Would I download it and listen to it every day? Rather not, but then it is only MY taste.
CAST was AMAZING! There were a lot of actors I personally liked and new actors I haven’t seen yet but actingwise it was pretty good.
The show is hard to watch on some scenes, because many animals, children and adults were injured, because everything is shown and it got really bad at one point when Zi-O was tested on.I got dizzy lol. But is it the cruelest thing you have ever seen? NO. It’s definitely bearable.
I didn’t like the ending ! SPOILER!

Not only does ZiO become evil but many other characters died which I wouldn't have thought Ha Neul Ae Gu Reum, Choi Yoo Na, Choi Jin Hwan, Kim Cheol Soo(but I liked the way he died lol^^) etc. I hope for a sequel because otherwise nothing would make sense. In my opinion it was anokgood drama it had potential unfortunately this was not exploited. Would I watch it again? No. Would I recommend it to others? Not really as there are better ones out there e. g. B Flower of Evil.
Thanks for reading sorry for the mistakes and write me and we can talk about more drama!
:)
PS: you can also follow me on insta: kdq_24

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It took a wrong turn.

Initially I was so thrilled to watch this drama because it starts one of my favorite actor Kim Rae Won. The plot was promising not the usual drama it’s about science specifically cloning. It would have been better if the writer delve more on the evolution of the cloned human it’s emotion and relationship to other humans.
It took a wrong turn when everybody started dying and betraying one other.It came to an end with no clear resolution.It just proves that human are improper being that will do anything for greed, power and money.

However good the actors and the ost of the drama it would still fall short if the storyline is premature.

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Failed Ending

I came for Lee Dahee and you're darned right if you think I stayed for her.

This drama was wonky. The beginning and character development was really good, but I just feel like everything after episode 6 was rushed. The six episodes and Lee Dahee are the only things that earned 6.5/10 with my rating. If you haven't seen my episode 6 review, this is what it says: "Spoiler Alert!So of course there was sexual tension between the two main characters since the beginning but I did not expect them to go from semi-enemies to kissing, sleeping together, getting married and having a kid together in one frickin' episode. [...] There's also a lot of miscommunication between the leads this episode, which could lead to problems in the future." This needs a second season to wrap things up but I'm not sure I even want it cause that ending was just that bad. I feel like they could have just added four more episodes to keep it one season and finish the story, but then again there might have been airing time conflicts. Actually, I'm sure there will be a second season because the title of this drama is "the Beginning." It's really hard to have the story make sense when you have a character with unnatural powers, and I think that this drama is a perfect example of a fail in this genre.

As for the cast, they were good. I felt no unnatural acting except for the male lead, Kim Rae Won's, acting. I feel like he only looks good when he frowns or looks angry. As for his character, Z-O was incredibly reckless and clueless. After the baby came into the earth, I just feel like he no longer cared about GuReum except for the fact that she was his baby's mother. They had really good character development for GuReum, making the audience feel like she was a very smart and good detective. The miscommunication between every bleepin' character just makes my blood boil. Again, they also 'dumbified' every character.

Overall, I would NOT RECCOMEND. The only reason I watched this was because I was waiting for Penthouse 2 to air. This show was only semi-good when it was airing.

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There's Science Fiction and there's bad science

I didn't plan to watch this but couldn't resist the stellar cast. I'm especially fond of Kim Seong Oh, and he certainly delivered here. Overall, the acting was great, even Kim Rae Won, whom I haven't much liked since Gourmet.
The show started off strong, and I found myself very engaged. The science was asinine, but as my English teacher always said, fiction requires the willing suspension of disbelief. So, I suspended and went along for the ride.
It was a good ride until about halfway through, and it was downhill from there. With the rise of the cult sub-plot, The action got increasingly pointless, devolving into too many fights culminating with a blast of electricity from the electric eel man. (Like I said, bad science - even the creation of Spiderman made more sense.) The possibly very sweet love story between the princlpals also made little sense- one minute she's hating him for killing her parents, the next she's having his baby. There were places where the author was trying to write Frankenstein, but the whole cult bit ruined it all. The ending was not satisfying on any level. Where there could have been more development on the humanization of Zi O, it was just thrown away.
An Nae Sang was a marvelous mad scientist but his part petered out at the end - it seemed that the author got tired of writing for him and liked the cult leader better. By the 9th episode I was ready for it to end. Overall, it didn't live up to its promise.

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