Reviews

I didn't want to write a review because there are already so many for this drama. But I looked through them and I was a bit sad because most of them are either too exaggerated in praising it or a bit too cruel. I know everyone has their own preferences in what they look for in a drama and everyone has their own gusto. I just want to say that the drama is indeed good. Not fantastically, awesomely, breathtakingly good. There were flaws and not everyone's acting added up to the necessary emotions. But the overall story wasn't that bad either and many of the main cast did a fantastic job nonetheless.

The story had a slow start and I admit that I had thoughts of dropping it right away. The cast was unfamiliar to me and esp. in the beginning they didn't do much to persuade me. I don't know why I kept watching. Maybe it was the first serious encounter of the male lead with tragedy and his following performance which was rich of emotions. I think that was the key moment when I realized that the story could actually be worth a try. Now, reminiscing about it, I couldn't even fathom what cruel turn of events it actually had up its sleeve. I'm not into K-Pop, so I had no idea about the idol actors in this. Therefore I also didn't have any prejudices. But as you can see, Park Jin Young convinced me.

The slow unfolding of the main story kept reigning over the first half of the drama. Most of the time I wasn't bothered though. I enjoyed Park Jin Young's and Kim Kwon's interacting. They delivered a great performance of a really complicated relationship and I looked forward to every scene with them in it together.

I think the speciality of this drama is that you have a hero and a superpower which doesn't consequently mean that he's above everyone else and therefore a superior being. Quite the opposite. He can't control his power and therefore creates more problems rather than solving them. He has to learn how to do that, he wants to help but he's not the most ambitious guy out there and even tries to get to the final line by cheating. He's short-tempered and forgets to view things from all sides. Therefore he's not able to see the whole picture. The process of him learning step by step is wrought very smoothly. He's very human in his reactions to certain events.

Which leads me to the Shin Ye Eun and thus to the weak link. While I kept watching I started to wonder why I can't enjoy the drama as much as I wanted to, even though the story, the twists, the characters were interesting. Until I figured out that it was the female lead who bothered me. I know that others praise her but I don't think that she was the right choice for this kind of drama. Her performance was too weak and the actress is too inexperienced to actually convey the feelings and difficulties her character had to go through. I don't want to bash her acting, she definitely tried. I'm just saying that it wasn't enough and led to boring scenes with Park Jin Young which also includes the romance. A hundred per cent unnecessary feature in the story.

As much as I was disenchanted by the female lead, I reveled in the display of detective Eun Ji Soo. Kim Da Som did everything I missed in Shin Ye Eun's acting. And in the beginning I was even skeptical of her. She really grew on me throughout the story and I wouldn't want to miss her now. Next to the relationship of the two brothers, Eun Ji Soo had another very interesting connection to Kang Seung Mo. Instead of the main romance the writers should have focused more on that part because I think it's a bigger deal to have her influencing Seung Mo than Yoo Jae In and Lee An chasing each other in out-of-context-scenes.

Sometimes I started to compare the drama to "I remember You". Well, it's not quite the same. But if you look for a special and complicated bromance, then you're definitely right with this one. Does the plot have holes? Hard to tell, smalls flaws in my opinion. I also could have done without the corruption part since it was just a tool to make the investigation and the grounding for an already sturdy concept more complicated. But the main focus of the drama is worth a shot despite all that.

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A beautiful coming of age lgbtq movie

I knew this would be a good movie based on other people’s reviews, I just didn’t expect this level of acting and cinematography. The story of Jia Han and Birdy wasn’t a perfect one, but a realistic one and a story that needed to be told. This film dealt with real issues such as homophobia, society norms and conflicting emotions aswell as the church. The emotional elements the soundtrack brought made every scene even more beautiful/emotional. Jia Han and Birdys story may feel like fiction but represent real life people (based on true events) and every person affected by homophobia in the 80s. The movie perfectly captured teenage friendship, feelings and confusion. Although the ending was ambiguous it was also beautiful and in my opinion and peaceful ending for both men- at peace with their sexuality and together, wether it be as friends or something more. The last scene with them walking together and the flashback of them playing with the guitar and ball was amazing and this was even more accentuated by the song which included the title “your name engraved herein”. I would go as far to say this was one of the best films of the past decade and I couldn’t recommend it more, at times you’ll be laughing at their friendship and the story but at others cry at how raw and real the scenes are. This isn’t a BL but don’t let that deter you from watching, everyone should watch this film.

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My favorite JBL so far!

Honestly, I really liked this show. Every time I watched it, I had a smile on my face for at least most of the episode, if not all. Aoki is refreshingly relatable to the me in high school. Ida is a little clueless but still tries his best. And together these two are the cutest ever.

I really enjoyed how in almost every episode, Aoki and Ida improved their communication and resolved any issues or misgivings they had. A misunderstanding never went past two episodes, which as an anxiety-ridden person I enjoyed immensely. And watching their relationship blossom just made my heart so happy.

As a fan of Cherry Magic, this one gave me very similar vibes, except this one takes place in high school. This show was innocent, cute, and funny. Friends, give it a watch. You won't regret it.

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The best Anti-Samurai film to be ever made...

Unemployment has always been a tragic consequence of change and modernisation. What if this situation occurred at a time when there was no pension, no unemployment benefits and the moral code was not able to keep up with the times?

To me Harakiri had elements of a job interview gone horribly wrong. Considering the past two pandemic years where a lot of people became jobless, this movie hits close to home and makes me feel really thankful that we live in different times.

Story:
The time is 1630 - Japan. We have a ronin (wandering unemployed samurai) Tsugumo, who goes to a clan house and requests permission to kill himself i.e commit Harakiri. The clan elder Saito tells him a story designed to discourage this but the tables are turned when Tsugumo skilfully humiliates the leader in front of his retainers.

This is an anti-establishment film that portrays the flawed bushido code hiding behind a facade of honour and morality. It depicts the tragic circumstances surrounding ritual suicide and provides a potent message which I think is relevant as long as authoritarian regimes exist in this world. We are all born into a system that influences our thinking and behaviour. Be it cultural or political, the system defines our actions and when we are faced with an ethical dilemma it can challenge what we think to be right or wrong. A similar situation forces Tsugumo to give up his ideals and deal with it in the only way he knows - sepukku/ harakiri.

The story is poignant and the thought evoking screenplay by acclaimed screenwriter Shinobu Hashimoto is brought to life by Kobayashi in an extremely mesmerising narrative structure with some beautiful stills and graceful cinematography by Yoshio Miyajima.

Acting:
Tatsuya Nakadai as Tsugumo delivers a flawless performance. His calm demeanour in the initial sequence really brings in the sombre mood of the film.
Mikuni Rentaro does a splendid job as Saito. The acting in this film overall is superb but the direction by Kobayashi elevates this film to brilliance.

Overall:
There are a lot of symbolic shots during the opening and closing sequences that reflect the tarnished glory of feudal Japan. History is written by the victors and the ending shot of the samurai armour sears it into the minds of us viewers as it brings forth the hypocrisy of feudal Japan.

With a brilliant screenplay, an amazing director and the wonderful acting of every cast member, this is undoubtedly one of the most thought provoking samurai film to be ever made!
A solid 10 from me.

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''Live like you deserve to live.''

''Unnatural'' managed to touch my heart many times and this is why I love and appreciate it so much. Hidden gem, truly. Dramas like this one should be more popular.

Honestly I loved everything about it. The story was well-paced, the script was brilliantly written, the characters were endearing (except for the bad ones, they were disgusting as they should be), the cast did their job perfectly and the music was on point and made me cry a lot of times. Each case was very interesting but my favourite ones are the one with the suffocation and the school bullies (episode 6&7 I think?). They made me cry the most. I think the first two cases weren't that fascinating, but from episode 3 everything got better and I started enjoying it completely.

I adore everyone from UDI Lab. They were all amazing! Misumi Mikoto was a strong female lead and I appreciated her braveness and her way of thinking. Ishihara Satomi did a brilliant job here! Nakado had a cold appearance but with the time I was able to understand him and his pain. Kube was the cuuuuutest! Kubota stole my heart once again, he is adorable! And here comes my favourite character - Shouji Yuko! She was funny, strong, lovable and I love the intreactions between her and Misumi. What a great team the UDI lab workers were!

Honestly I don't even know what more to say. I highly recommend this to everyone. But prepare your tissues, ''Unnatural'' will play with your emotions, it hits quite hard at times.

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Healthy

With the first look, this series is not anything special and they have a really common plot in Thai (bl) dramas (but I never understood the rival between engineering and architecture in Thailand. I am an architecture senior and let me tell all my classmates was dating engineering guys...). But OK, this is not important at all.

The important thing is the relationship of Pat and Pran. They are two realistic young people trying to understand themselves and the others. They have the expectations of their family in their shoulders, they want to fit in with their friends. They have their backs and forths like every teenager/young adult out there. And this reflects in their relationship which is actually healthy and completely realistic.

I would like to give a big applause to the creative team of this series, from production to actors/acresses. They actually made a drama with a healthy relationship and environment. We have seen a lot of romance dramas, especially bl, with problematic tropes and representation of lgbtq+ people (I spoke more about this in the review of History4: Close to you, which is the worst, most problematic BL ever). They didn't use abusive attitudes like unwanted kisses or staff like that, they didn't fetishise lgbtq+ people, they didn't use the homophobic "You are the only man I like" (like it is some fashion to be queer), they didn't use the BL stereotype with the seme and uke (the manliest and the most feminine/weaker) , they didn't use the crazy, evil girlfriend/female admirer trope.

Instead, they made a comforting rom-com with real people and a healthy relationship in which they are equal, they are joking about both their female and male admirers, there are some really well written, strong, independent female characters (I have a crush on Ink, who can blame me?). I really, really enjoyed it. And I really hope this can be a start of a change in opinions for the better and better, healthier represantation of relationship without misogyny and homophobia. Because a lot of production of the romance genre (not only BL) has problematic relationships, see for example the boys over flowers franchise...

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I started to watch it without any expectations. I'm surprised it turns out to be this good.
The CGI for the tiger not really look realistic. But it was good enough and doesn't really ruin the movie.
I don't really noticed any music except for the credit scene's song. As a cat lover, i noticed a lot of scenes with cats in it and i loved it

I love how Xiao Xue takes care of Nana, she doesn't treat her like a pet. But like her actual daughter (to the point that Nana thinks she's also a human)
The sismance was really good and Yang Guang's sidekicks did their job well too. The villain, ShenQi, i just can't sympathize with him, he's just weird.

Overall, it's a good movie to watch
The story was light, a little bit predictable and if you're a cat lover. You probably would like this.

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Unexpected

This is my first time writing a review. So this is based on my opinion.

The story was well-written, the acting was well-done. I can feel their feelings of hopelessness. At first I tought the men in black are the one responsible for the deadly game. before I knew who the "Admin" was, I make a lot of wild assumptions. I didn't expect that the students who were being bullied already died. I was thinking that he is probably the "Admin". At the end, I was surprised that the teacher was added to group. It is sad that only four out of 22 student that survive until the end. I didn't expect that the "Admin" was an Artificial Intelligence (AI) . It's crazy that the AI can kill a real person. BTW I'm still confused on how the "Admin" or the AI was able to kill them. I know that they will be killed if they don't follow the rules of the game. But they won't be killed as long as they were away from their phone. So, is the phone a murder weapon? And about the four "target" why are the bullies not included to the "target". The student wasted their friends because they thought the bullies are the target. Well, for me, this drama is worth watching. And I hope there will be more dramas like this.

Watching this Drama reminded me to Korean dramas such as Squid Game, Night Has Come, All Of Us Are Dead, and Duty After School. I really like survival type dramas.

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This was an amazing movie and I have rewatched it about 5 times already. The story touched my heart in so many ways, I can't even say.

For those of you who can't watch this because of Junki and how he acts in this, I pity you. This is the best I have ever seen him act and this is where his career took off. A great actor is one who can act all types of roles to perfection, and he can. I only wish I could be as good as him.

I will continue to watch this movie for as long as I live because it is that amazing. It has replaced all other movies at the top of my favorite list. I think I'm going to watch it right now, as a matter of fact.

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ABSOLUTELY SUPERB!

I could rattle on about this BL for hours - days - weeks even!!!

I won't bore you with lengthy descriptions of the beautiful scenery, the brilliant acting, the fabulous ORIGINAL storyline, how much I cried, that it had a fabulous ending and that I loved every damned minute of every damned episode.

It's NOT toxic, there's no bullying, it's thought provoking, and has a good message (or two).

It's not hot and steamy - but can you feel the love between them - just the way they look at each other is more than enough to know how they feel about each other.

JUST WATCH IT - YOU WILL LOVE IT!!!

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Let me start by saying that the female lead Holly was really a handsome stewardess, she rocked that hairstyle and the butch vibes, and I had such a big crush on her. ? Out of the other characters I liked Mei Ling, the fact that she did martial arts was very cool and I liked how both the women in the couple were sorta tomboyish and that the relationship wasn't heteronormative – nothing wrong with it, I just feel like straight directors and screenwriters tend to push the heteronormativity too much into BLs and GLs. But that wasn't this case since the creator of this series is a lesbian herself and I was very happy to find that out.

It was interesting to see the differences between Taiwan and Singapore, with one country being open minded towards LGBTQ+ persons and the other one not and how the contrast was shown in the drama and it was also nice to see an international couple. Another thing which I really liked was how they showed how the oversexualization of flight attendants' uniforms is making it hard to work for them and kudos to the creators for showing that women aren't the only one being abused and that it's a problem too.

The one thing I REALLY didn't like was how there were some really awful transphobic jokes about transgender people and drag queens as these two are completely different and nothing alike. Due to this I dropped the rating a bit but otherwise it was a really enjoyable series. Although the ending was open, I don't think we will be getting a second season though. ?

My final rating for Handsome Stewardess is 8/10.

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30% Eating, 70% Traveling, 85% Win Being An Immature Jerk (YouTube version)

Overall: this is yet another plot where a 1 minute conversation would have cleared up poor communication. It is especially infuriating because the two people involved have been lifelong best friends... Watched on YouTube (the re-edited by director Aof)

Content Warnings: off screen side character death in flashback, manhandling, punch/kick, non con touching (sleeping), non con? touch/kiss (using another body)

What I Liked
- the intro animation/sequence
- the cute moments
- the funny moments
- Korn did 1 smart thing regarding the water

Room For Improvement
- Win is a jerk and unfortunately did not have character growth. Grieving does not give you the right to scream at people and drag them around.
- the misogyny of constantly portraying Lin's body as weak (she can't even drive a car?!) If they had explained that she had a chronic illness then this would have been fine, but instead, her body is continually referred to as weak. Also, I didn't like how the pms was portrayed, it feeds into stereotypes that all women become very emotional when having their period (which apparently lasts 1 day lol). While some people do become more emotional, for many women you don't even know they are having their period... They could have just stuck with the painful cramps.
- the cliche miscommunication/lack of communication, and saying "you know how I feel" is NOT the same as actually saying how you feel
- non logical things (there is no one else on the farm that knows how to do that procedure??? The doctor couldn't find a short video on youtube and do that???)
- stupid decisions by several characters
- mom's instant forgiveness
- this truly awful line/sentiment "you have to listen to the older generation and when they are gone you can do what you want" (but younger generations have to live with the consequences of the older generations decisions, ugh)

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It’s not easy to give Rooftop Prince a final score because the drama is like three different series altogether. The first one, probably the one I enjoyed most, is very silly but it genuinely made laugh with its extravagances for daily life things. The second drags out a lot, becomes slow and fairly boring by repeating the same scenarios over and over. And the third and last turns up the drama until it almost gets out of hand—although, fortunately, not to the very end.

The drama itself ends up a bit disorganised, so I’ll try to make my review tidy in exchange.

PROS (some):

- Park Yoo Chun.
I was saddened to read that this amiable actor had been expelled from the industry. I thought him quite stiff for his role in Sungkyunkwan Scandal, but stiffness was partly what that role was about, and here he shows a lot more of what he can do. He brings a sort of sincere warmth (grumpy as the character may be) to the screen, so I would’ve liked to see more of his work.

- Songs.
Rooftop Prince has a fun soundtrack that was characteristic enough for me to want to listen to it later. Quite goofy most of the time, and the dramatic parts were REALLY repetitive (they also added a sort of hilarious effect to the serious scenes), but then its two main songs are beautiful. Quite a highlight to remember the series by.

- All-in-one plot.
If you think about it, this plot probably has a bit of most things you’d think of. Romance, family melodrama, impersonation, murder, time travel, reincarnation… And then royalty, working people, rich businesspeople…


CONS (all):

- Again, all-in-one plot.
The series starts off really enjoyable from the moderately simple time travel comedy premise, but all the different genres it keeps on adding disfigure it until it’s hard to recognise . This could’ve not been necessarily bad, but its pace becomes constantly uneven, and some characters are affected too. For instance, for some reason the second Bak-Ha, who let her hair loose, seemed to act like a different person than pigtail Bak-Ha (I definitely preferred the feistiness of the initial Bak-Ha. The follow-up was kind of mild).

- The “evil” characters.
Probably because Rooftop Prince has little moderation and lets its dramatic events run loose, the “bad characters” (permanent enemies of the “good characters”) are so bad that it gets ridiculous. Every time you think they've done their worst, they go further. Se-Na spits out lies like a printer prints, and it’s exasperating how anyone still believes her. And Tae-Mu is just dead-set on revenge to the point of absurdity. There's nothing else to his character; certainly no credibility, and the the actor didn't help. The way the plot dragged on into unnecessary complications simply because these two did was often weary.

- It brings out the negative sides to dramas.
For the two points above, this drama tried my patience. A LOT. Eventually, it began to show a lot of the negative traits that I would’ve expected from bad Asian dramas, and which kept me from watching them altogether. Because I’ve seen mostly very good ones I had evaded them until now, but a good deal of this drama had that clinginess or cheap-looking feeling in the conflict scenes, and enough dumb confusions in the happier ones to muddle the plot further.


CONCLUSION (also TL;DR):

The drama drags a lot in the middle and it also grows a little tasteless when it switches comedy for drama. The misunderstandings, revenges, etc. pile up with far too much repetition and, what’s worse, come distressingly close to a soap opera.
But although most I’ve written sounds negative, that applies to a section of the drama only, and I eventually did not regret watching Rooftop Prince. Most of the parts focused on the four-coloured tracksuit Joseonites were great to watch, and the drama is so long you eventually feel pretty close to the main characters. Some are quite endearing.
Through some episodes it was so slow and repetitive that it exhausted my patience, but usually a better scene came up in-between to revive my interest. The underlying mystery that is present in the story from beginning to end was usually an aid in this, as the hints come up (very) gradually and build on slowly towards a very satisfactory ending, difficult as delivering one seemed.

Endings tend to be very personal so it might not work so positively for everyone, but this one redeemed a lot of the series for me. The last episode sorted out all the continued problems better than I thought it'd be able to, and on top of that it left me feeling good towards the series as a whole. It’s the endearing sensation that only series that have been worth watching can pull off.

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What in the tarnation did I just watch?

**Lots of spoilers**
Of the 427 dramas I've watched before I started this show I can easily say this was the worst. It was the crap icing on a poop cake. It starts off as a trainwreck and quickly spirals into insanity. The plot was so choppy and disjointed that I literally asked myself if I was high while I was watching it. Alas, I was not, but the sensation of "WTF am I watching? I must be high" persisted for all 20 episodes. There are bad guys, bad guys with bats, bad guys with knives, stabbings, jealous friends, jealous siblings, jealous classmates, plots to drug and rape someone, plots to kill someone, plots to overthrow a company chairman, plots to overthrow a grandpa, plots to overthrow a father, plots to overthrow a brother, plots to overthrow a sister, slaps, more slaps, even more slaps, fake disability, literal insanity, pregnancy, and bombs. All within 20 episodes clocking in at less than 10 minutes each.

The Acting: TERRIBLE
The Plot: RIDICULOUS
The Ending: THE WORST I'VE EVER SEEN

Do yourself a favour and give this one a skip. I suffered so that you don't have to. Trust me. That's time I'll never get back... but yet I finished it.

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