Reviews

This is a very entertaining Chinese period drama about a lot of very beautiful people with anger management issues. The general treatment of women is pretty dreadful, although I assume it is more or less historically accurate. I love the strong and fierce heroine. Some people may not. When anybody, no matter how powerful, lies, cheats, and manipulates others to hurt her or those she loved, she, um, lies, cheats and manipulates to thwart them or exact revenge. There are two parallel love stories, both involving her. I liked the way one of them developed and was resolved. The other, well, let’s just say that repeatedly threatening to kill you is an interesting courtship technique. The costumes and sets are breathtaking and the music was well done.

I did have issues with a couple of things. In a drama full of great villains, the two biggest villains were too over the top for me. The only thing Consort Gao lacked was a mustache to twirl while hissing, “Curses, foiled again!,” and I got very very tired of the other major villain’s narrow-eyed plotting look, until he started overdoing the pop-eyed crazy look. I also thought that the way the teflon heroine keeps sliding free of consequences (even when others are on to her) sometimes stretches credulity. But I neverthless found myself cheering her on every time she won and had an adversary dragged away to be caned or executed. Because good people are shoved aside or die forlorn deaths in this drama, it's much better to be bad instead.

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A fun watch. The female lead could be frustrating at times (I agreed with everything her romantic rival said on the dorm rooftop) and some of the plotlines seemed implausible (e.g., the cause of the leads’ estrangement) but the strength of the female characters’ friendships and the way the drama depicted their maturation make up for that. I have to say, however, that the male characters suffered by comparison, often coming off as rigid, weak, or clueless. I think that Duncan Lai did a very good job -- you could see a real difference between his idealistic college student versus his rather cold 10-years-older businessman. I like the ending, which (slight spoiler) did not end with all of the women married off, even though the drama showed the women running all over the place in wedding dresses in the opening and closing credits for every episode!

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Yang Mi is always great but Xu Kai seemed to be sleepwalking through the drama. They had little charisma together. Or, rather, Yang Mi was giving everything she could but Xu Kai looked like he'd rather be playing video games. Relationships with big age gaps seem to work best when the younger partner is mature beyond his or her age, rather than when the older partner is immature for his or her age. I don't think Xu Kai quite pulled off the mature beyond his age role. And since this was all about the relationship, the drama fizzled. The remaining characters were not very likable either.

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Serenade of Peaceful Joy is an odd title for a drama that deals primarily with an emperor and the reforms he attempts during the Song dynasty. I like the emperor when he is governing but hate him when he’s dealing with his personal life, including the way he treats his empress and concubines. He’s not mean to them but he unintentionally hurts them because he’s basically clueless. It’s especially crushing to see the empress change from a cheerful, smart, opinionated girl trained in martial arts and swordfighting to a repressed, uptight, and infinitely sad woman. Not much joy there. Not very peaceful either. It should have been called Elegy of Endless Melancholy.

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First the positives: Shin Hye Sun is a great actor, many of the scenes were beautifully staged and shot, and the premise was interesting.

Unfortunately, my list of negatives is much longer. I felt that the promising premise was squandered by big gaps in the writing and poor execution. For example, I had trouble believing that the ML would fall as quickly as he did for a FL who stalked him and said very strange things, instead of scurrying away as fast as he could on those long legs of his. Ahn Bo Hyung did a good job when the drama required him to act emotionally frozen. Except that he pretty much did that thoughout. I thought that the child actors were very good but I struggled to believe that the leads had fallen deeply in love when children. I blame the writing for that. The whole car crash subplot fizzled, primarily because it required one to believe that characters would react in implausible ways. The ending had more gaps and, “Wait, how can that be … ?” than the average drama.

I think that the drama was ruined by poor writing.

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good core story but a bit dragged out

I wasn't sold on the title but PEB’s acting in recent projects(TKA & EAW) influenced me to start this. She is that good.

The plot was pretty original. At its core this is just a story about a girl with a dream and an unexpected friend who helps her achieve that dream. You could say some aspects were unrealistic but the whole “I survived on an island alone for 15 years” thing was done rather well imo. I felt that specifically the plot with Kiho’s dad and LRJ dragged out a bit longer than they should have. Ideally this show could've been 8 eps with far less filler but then it might've run the risk of having a rushed finale. The writer did her best to subvert expectations about which brother was Kiho but it was obvious early on. I did second guess myself a bit as I'm sure others did too.

The characters were good.

The acting was good from everyone. PEB really immerses herself into her characters. Shout out to those kid actors. They really set the emotional tone and brought so much weight to the story with their heavy performances. N surprised me with the few emotional scenes he got. He had a bit more to work with than in Mine. As much as I dislike their characters, the actors depicting Kiho and MH’s dads played their roles really well. I don't like how they ended Bong Wan’s arc. I get that he was never gonna be with his family but his last major actions felt like too much.

The finale was ok but I couldn't help but feel that the longer the show dragged down the worse it became. This was 12 eps and yet I felt even that was too long. I felt similar with Start up. Doesn't mean this wasn't good but waaaaay too much filler. I also didn't care for the progression of RJ’s character. At least at the end we got to see Mokha stand on stage and make it as a big star and that was a bit emotional. PEB did a phenomenal job with the singing. She's in her idol era here and I love to see it.

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I’m puzzled by this drama's popularity as well as the number of times it makes it on to people’s top ten lists. Perhaps because the body swapping incidences were pretty funny? But this is another one that I had trouble getting through, mostly because Kim Joo-Won was creepy and I hated the way that he didn’t respect Kil Ra-Im’s wish that he leave her alone. The message seems to be that it's swoony to show that your love is true by stalking that poor person no matter how many times they ask you to back off. That is not okay. That is not romantic. That is not what any drama should be promoting.

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What just happened. The story and acting were compelling but the ending just wiped out everything. Okay, I'll admit that the ending was more logical and realistic than the whole "one more chance to do over" storyline but...what? (sputters to oneself.)

Because the ending wiped out most of what happened before (ironic since the initial premise was to wipe out one's past mistakes and start over), it felt as if all of the emotions developed over the course of the story became empty. But I don't hate this drama because it completely fooled me and I have a grudging admiration for that. Plus the ride was fun while it lasted.

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Mixed Feelings on Yuri

I was really excited to start this season knowing that there was a new character and an ensuing overarching plotline with them, and it was really cool to read the theories about how Nanno and Yuri each represented the different types of karma. After watching it, I still really liked the throughline, especially seeing more of Nanno's past and character development, but Yuri's character did not work well at all for me, even though I loved the episode about her backstory.

My main issue is that every single episode's arc seemed to come to a screeching halt every time Yuri stepped in. Nanno's actions actually almost always make sense, and the plot device of Yuri coming in to mess things up actually gets extremely tiring once its used for multiple episodes, one because Nanno's subplots don't seem to provide the same satisfaction, and two because Yuri honestly isn't charismatic enough for me to enjoy her random presence.

It's also so difficult to paint a clear picture of Yuri's personality and punishment method when she's only depicted as a fly in Nanno's orbit the entire time. I genuinely think we should've gotten an episode where we start seeing karma happen, then we find out the instigator is Yuri and not Nanno, and then we see the episode play out per her karmic methodology — this way we'd get a clearer idea of her worldview before she started officially clashing with Nanno, and her character would also be able to stand by herself more.

Overall, I still enjoyed this and I actually liked the topics it covered too — there's a lot less girl-on-girl hate in this one which was good to see. My favorite episodes are Pregnant, SOTUS, and maybe Yuri. When Season 3 drops, I will definitely still be tuning in, and I hope the newer characters are given more chances to shine without diminishing Nanno's impact.

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I felt like this drama never became too predictable. I liked the fact that the villains were sympathetic (well, except for Hosung, whose pretty face I wanted to punch (haha) by the end). Yes, there were legal bloopers but they weren’t so distracting that I couldn’t shrug and get past them. Most of all, I liked the point counterpoint as everyone tried to manipulate and out-maneuver everyone else. I sometimes feel like I’m losing brain cells while watching some Korean romantic comedies. With Punch though, I think that I had a net gain in brain cells because I was also trying to figure out Jung Hwan’s next move.

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Our Beloved Summer is a nice, light, and sweet romance with opposite-attracts leads who show believable personal development throughout the drama. I like watching Choi Woo Shik's acting, which is always on point. And even though one can anticipate what is going to happen, the whole drama is so feel good that it doesn't seem to matter too much. Scenes are filmed in an ethereal light (outside) or cozy warmth (inside), which contributes to the fuzzy feelings.

I was not a fan of the manager/bar owner story line at all but the second leads and other assorted characters grew on me, especially NJ.

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Two things kept me watching this: (1) the fun tennis scenes, which make me want to grab a racquet and run out and practice and (2) Leo Wu’s (Wu Lei’s?) acting, which is completely different from his role in Love Like the Galaxy, but just as compelling. I’m impressed by how an actor who played Mr. Killing Machine Ling Bu Yi could be just as convincing in the role of goofy, immature Song Sang Chuan.

There were a couple of irritating characters, such as the sister. The romance between the main leads was okay but my favorite scenes were the ones between Song Sang Chuan and his stepfather.

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