Not Kim Young Dae's best work
I'm a fan of the ML but while it seemed the story wanted to showcase that he could portray playful/silly and then serious and angsty--but you get way more moody angst from him that it just gets too tiring to watch, and FL killed it in Taxi Driver and even in Our Blooming Days in support roles but seems likes she's overacting in this lead role--and the makeup does not take advantage of her beauty.Watch Forbidden Marriage to see ML at his best--and for a far happier story. This one just stretches out so much sadness, angst, and tragedy for all of the roles that the little we see of happiness is not enough to make this a balanced work.
The premise of the story is intriguing and the only reason why I watched it to the end.
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Burgeoning romance
Ichika and Amane show great character development as each has to step out of their comfort zone to make this arranged marriage work.At this time in Japan the role of females was very prescribed and Ichika has to overcome her upbringing, lack of confidence and the constant reminders by her Aunt and others that she is not worthy to be the head chef. Amane, being younger, has more modern thinking and his ideas are the catalyst for the ryoten restaurant and Ichika to solve the dwindling financial situation.
I liked the scenes where the couple work together to solve problems;
the American delegation not wanting Japanese prepared food
the US Japan women's group charmed with the bento boxes and making sushi rolls
the wedding reception on a budget
the competition to save the inn
The couple show a lot of consideration and respect and we can get glimpses of their feelings slowly changing to romance. They do not declare love at the end, however, they step closer and make a pact to continue together.
The manga is ongoing so it would be nice to get another season.
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This review may contain spoilers
over-rated drama
Just finished all 40 episodes of this drama and must say that I am surprised to see all of the 10/10 and 9/10 ratings it has received.The drama started off strongly, I really liked the first 15-20 episodes or so. The plot moved along well with a great story line, liked the actors, also some good comedic scenes helped make the first 1/2 of this drama a decent watch.
Then somewhere around episode 25 this drama goes off the rails and just gets worse and worse until the awful ending. The last 15 episodes or so were terrible. Every episode seemed to have a 4-5 minute scene with the male/female leads being all lovey-dovey, sweet-talking each other with the obligatory love song playing in the back-ground. This got tiresome and repetitive. Every character seemed to experience a near death scene and then the other characters help them miraculously pull through. This got tiresome and repetitive. Each episode seemed to have 3 or 4 song interludes, starting to think the producers were either getting royalties or really trying to push the soundtrack. This got tiresome and repetitive. Each time a character died, there would be 7-8 minute montage of flashback scenes with that character, of course, with some song playing in the background. This got repetitive and tiresome as well. In addition, the drama had the worst ending of any C-drama that I have personally watched. It was like the script writers gave up and just wrote some nonsense to get this drama over with.
Gave this drama an overall rating of 2.0 solely based on the 1/2 half of the drama. Re-watch value should be 0 but apparently 1.0 is the minimum value I can assign. It was painful watching this drama once, can't imagine that anyone would go back and re-watch this a second time. This drama won't be showing up on any top 10 best drama lists, but wouldn't be surprised at all to see this drama on a number of top 10 worst drama lists though. Starting to think that the producers must have paid an army of people to give glowing reviews.
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What I like most about this drama is the romance between the main leads. They really have the undying chemistry all throughout watching this and I felt butterflies in my stomach. On the plot, I would say since it is a "makjang" drama it is indeed unbelievable and it's really exhausting to watch. For the fact that it's too long, the angst and the anxiety watching this is there so it's pretty heavy on me as a watcher who is not familiar with this type of dramas. Overall, I would still recommend this to those who like "makjang" dramas and have the time to watch this.
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Just something enjoyable to watch
My favourite part about this drama is the ML, hes a well rounded character and i love how the actor portrays him. They did well with the casting and I admire that he had to put on a lot of weight for the role. The rest of the cast are pretty good too.As for the storyline, I think it's maybe a little weak but it's definitely enjoyable to watch each week and I look forward to seeing how it develops. I also kinda think its intriguing to learn about traditional sports rather than just the usual drama sports like tennis.
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Married to a Jerk
This story doesn't start off any crueler, the female lead is surrounded by pathological narcissists whose lack of empathy and self serving nature leaves you sick to your stomach. She's meek, trusting, and tries to persevere despite circumstances placed on her by her husband who is cheating on her with her best friend. Of course to add more fuel to the fire of sadness and tragedy, she has cancer with a poor prognosis. With circumstances related to her continued medical treatment that leads her to find out her best friend's betrayal; it is a catalyst for her reincarnation for a do-over and revenge.I appreciate its storyline so far and its portrayal of narcissism at its cruelest coupled with the manipulative gaslighting of a spouse and best friend who executes their extreme cruelty on the person closest to them. Unfortunately, reality sometimes isn't too far from fiction. More light needs to be shone on pathological narcissistic partners, friends, family, and coworkers and their mask needs to be revealed.
I hope this drama will continue to give hope to anyone out there that has been abused, belittled, gaslighted, and told they were worthless. The tables can be turned and one can move on before they swiftly give their abusers a kick in the rear end.
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This review may contain spoilers
Quite enjoyable but I need to rant
The AUDACITY Ki Joon has to be upset that Yoo Jin was dating and living with Shi Woo before him as if he wasn't about to get married and in a 10 YEAR relationship. Why was that such a big deal???? Ki Joon couldn't let it go but both of them were cheaters and liars????Both Ki Joon and Yoo Jin are scummy cheaters who have no business being upset or angry or involved in the lives of Shi Woo and Ha Kyung. They have the NERVE to act the way they do when they cheated and abandoned their exes...they needed to be ostracized a bit more. Like how are YOU mad that both Shi Woo and Ha Kyung are working there when it is all your fault. Also, Ki Joon wanting to go half on the apartment to provide for Yoo Jin, Ki Joon having Ha Kyung write for him, him spying on them, the continuous lying between both cheaters, and the fact that they were never sorry and blamed their exes for their poor behavior. My mouth is on the floor.
You can't have your cake and eat it too!! like be so for real.
Aside from this, I am fond of the other main/supporting characters on team 2, the show being about weather is awesome, and I'm still enjoying watching it overall. I just don't like when cheaters act so entitled or their behavior is minimized so they eventually get redeemed.
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I think the lead actors ruined it for me :-\
This is my first time watching a drama with either of these actors and only my second contemporary CDrama. I've been trying to figure out why I didn't like the drama much, because I feel like I should have liked it. the first 20 or so episodes were awesome (solid 9) but then it dropped to a 3 on the enjoyment scale and I found myself reaching for the fast forward button often. I ultimately concluded that the two lead actors were the problem.Allow me to explain.
1. The ML did a phenomenal job with sad, longing, romantic, and/or flirty scenes. But for the technical scenes as an engineer in particular, or where he was supposed to be cool and aloof, he came across as not at all authentic. It's like he couldn't pull it off. There's a difference between aloof and flat. Likewise, there's a difference between stiff and intelligent. His aloof scenes came across as flat and his scenes where he was supposed to be demonstrating how brilliant he was just made him look stiff/robotic. This character was supposed to be passionate about systems engineering and the actor brought no passion to this part of his role (so, basically the basis of his central conflict and the core of his character).
2. The FL was really, really fun to watch, absolutely fantastic, until the two leads got together in the 22nd episode or so. After that point, she started randomly behaving in this really irritating infantile way that got worse with each episode. Her voice got higher and higher until she was using a baby-voice by episode 30. I was so sad because I really enjoyed her character up to this point.
Anyway. I'm willing to give these actors another try, but this drama was ultimately just average for me despite the story and direction being solid.
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