I gave "Athena" 8.5 stars due to the glorious cinematography (the N. Italy mountain region was awe-inspiring/a magnificent location) and because once again Cha Seung-won's performance is mesmerizing. He's an outstanding physical Bad*ss and his voice... dark seduction. The action was good (not of John Woo's caliber of course, but acceptable) The so-called love story, no chemistry between Soo Ae and JWS, wasn't remotely believable and annoyingly boring. Like I wrote earlier, I watched it for CSW, and rarely am I disappointed in his performances.
Was this review helpful to you?
Story/Love plot - A forbidden love between two warring organizations? I have to say that this was a great idea. Although this was different from Iris, it made the drama extremely interesting. Whenever there were collisions from the opposing sides, the love story would blossom during the most intense parts of the drama. Well done from the directors part for portraying it as such and the writers for coming up with this idea. Now, the actual drama, pretty good. An easy to follow story line but still throws in twists and turns to keep viewers interested.
Acting/Cast - Not as good as Iris, but the actors/actresses did their part. It was enough to keep viewers interested, but bringing in Kim So Yeon as a guest role showed that there was some wavering for the drama and needed a small help from the cast of Iris(Kim SoYeon was phenomenal in IRIS, but I digress)
Music - Kim TaeYeon sings one of the OST's, what more is there? Hah, I kid, the music was alright honestly.
Rewatch Value - Ehhh... The story drops off during the middle of the drama and it becomes a bit troublesome watching the episodes.
Overall - Yeah, it was ok, nothing great.
Circumstances - due to someone getting injured, production of the last two episodes were stopped for about 2 months, so I have not had the chance to see the last two episodes but I did read the summary, with a relatively predictable ending.
Was this review helpful to you?
The primary strengths of this drama rest in fabulous action sequences and beautiful location shooting. Scenes filmed in Italy are truly remarkable; the episodes spent there are some of the best. However, after the events that brought us to Europe conclude, writing mistakes and muddy character motivations start to bog down key elements of the story line. Thanks to a fast pace and simple plot, some of this can be forgiven and there's no chance of the viewer getting lost.
Performances in Athena were a mixed bag. Strong actors worked with the weak and certain characters drowned in script issues. Villains were more compelling than the heroes for instance. Cha Seung Won is particularly wonderful, playing intense and sympathetic though his purposes are dark. I also found myself very invested in the fate of his strangely lovable minion/companion Andy, as portrayed by the adorable Sean Richard. As for the heroes, you have a talented Jung Woo Sung working with clipped wings. He tries to make something out of Lee Jung Woo, but the script affords him little more than saving the day and being struck silly with attraction for his female lead. Speaking of her, my first encounter with Soo Ae found her wanting. She felt limited in ability despite having a role with written potential; most of her scenes were spent gaping or wide-eyed. The love line between the two was poor as well; Woo Sung had more chemistry with a certain SM Entertainment megastar in her two episode cameo.
Athena: Goddess of War is for those viewers hankering for a modern action series. It's light and fast, though not worth subsequent viewings. Those that love SM artists might enjoy it too, since many are highly promoted both in the cast and in the soundtrack. I'd recommend it without taking the plot too seriously; this show has its fun moments.
Was this review helpful to you?
Athena is a good drama, has a nice plot though if you kind of miss something then you might get lost and not be able to tell what's going on, maybe it's because of the terms, sometimes you get to miss the smallest details as to what a character is doing in a place at that moment.
Of course like people say "There's nothing better than the first one" or well in this case, the spin-off can't be better than the original series, Iris in this case. Iris has no flaws in my opinion, while Athena..it's not about flaws, it's more about the pace of the events, you get a really dynamic story at the start, at a really fast pace that hooks you, thenit drags for around 5 or 6 eps then it gets good for two or three, then it drags and it only gets good in the three or four last episodes, especially when Athena makes its formal entry.
Cha Seung Won does a formidable job as the main villain, and Jung Woo Sung as the hero, well he's cool, sometimes funny (I dunno why but I sometimes found him funny)though he's not as awesome as Lee Byung Hun in his role as Kim Hyun Jun, but well, two stories, two heroes.
It's nice to see some of the characters of Iris here, I really am so much into the main cast of Iris that I really wanted to appear more often.
You will sometimes find yourself frustrated with the pace of the events, but the acting makes up for it when you see the action scenes. So if you have the patience to put up with some filler episodes and have the patience to wait for things to pick up again and are up for some good action then eah, stick to Athena until the very end.
It has its own story to tell, its own characters and well, its own pace to tell events but in the end, it is a nice watch, just have a little patience and well try to pick up as much info as you can so you don't get lost with all of the nuclear terms being mentioned.
Acting is flawless, my only issue as I've mentioned is the pace of the events. Music, I choose a 9 for my review when it comes to music because I seriously loved the tracks that were being played, from the ballads, to the music in the credits, to the orchestral score which name I don't know but you could clearly hear that they were saying something about Athena, that score is a masterpiece.
My rewatch value is 6 because I wouldn't rewatch it right now, but probably in a few years..two or three, when I feel the need to hear the sound of bullets and bombs
Was this review helpful to you?
Was this review helpful to you?
There's a story but it's not well done because it focuses on action in a good way but suddenly a romance stuff get in between which is badly done ruins every thing.
Can't explain exactly why but this drama made me disconnected many times.
Action scenes are so good...it's sad that the scenario was bad.
If you watched IRIS and wanted something like it Athena is not comparable IRIS is way better.
Was this review helpful to you?
Aww.. I decided to watch it, because I was thinking what Siwon did in the drama... He is always perfect. Then I saw that many sigers played there. Even Choe Gang Chang Min had a small role!
I'm glad I'd watched IRIS earlier, because there were some connections, especialy at the beginning. It was ok! Though I wonder how they could destroy Athena so much.. It was sad. Sorry, but IRIS and Athena are on compeletely different levels, even there aren't the comparison!
Was this review helpful to you?
Was this review helpful to you?
This review may contain spoilers
This went absolutely nowhere, and while I don't regret watching it, because it really was kind of fun, I just remember all the times I had felt SO FRUSTRATED because of so many unnecessary bits of plot and lines thrown in the drama. You expect spy action thrillers to be fast-paced, everybody filled with some sort of urgency (including the audience), but everyone took their sweet time. It was one of my pet peeves in this drama - every action, line had to have some sort of prompt WHEN IT COULD'VE KEPT GOING without the unnecessary interventions.The romance felt so forced, especially since I felt Hae-in didn't have any personality in the beginning. I guess she does start to gain one later on, but by then I felt like it was too Mary Sue-ish for me. Jung-woo's smitten puppy dog behavior around Hae-in also grated on my nerves because all I could think of was WHY???
I ended up rooting for the bad guys early on, to be honest. NTS' agents had too many feelings (and too many romantic entanglements) for it to be as effective as it needed to be. Kim Min Jong's character was one of the reasons why I decided to continue watching since his story was one I found quite interesting, even though I didn't quite get why he got so involved until the end. Kim So Yeon's cameo was so great as well.
Watch if you like action - feel free to skip the romance scenes, you won't miss anything. My favorite scenes are from the Italy sequence early in the drama, the standout one being the one where Haein cuts the throat of a dude with a cord while holding eye contact with Jungwoo.
Was this review helpful to you?
Was this review helpful to you?
I enjoyed the first episodes especially the ones in Italy and Action scenes were perfect.
But after first half everything got worse. After that I finished every 1 hour episode in 40 minutes. A lot of boring scnce forced me to do that.
I hate politicos genre! This genre is important than action genre in this drama. I didnt expect this.
Was this review helpful to you?
This review may contain spoilers
Террористическая группа, известная как "Афина" и возглавляемая злым гением Сон Хёком, угрожает Корее и всему миру. Теперь всё зависит от агента Ли Чжон У из Агентства Национальной Безопасности. Сможет ли он раскрыть замыслы террористической группировки? Чо Су Ён, дочь президента Южной Кореи, похищена и спрятана в Италии. Чжон У и его команде дана задача найти её и вернуть обратно.Про дочку сюжет на пару серий, остальное время доблестно сражались друг с другом. Корейские террористы такие затейники, но главная их фишка - ракета, ракета большая и страшная и обязательна должна взорвать Сеул к едрене фене.
По героям все было укомплектовано, даже к-поп айдолы в наличии: Шивон и БоА (линию с последней абсолютно не поняла, похоже продюсеры отбивали деньги) но и тот и другая вполне справились с задачей и Шивончик был хорош с пистолетом и без него.
И еще была куча второстепенного стаффа причем известные актеры корейского кино.
От первого Айриса присутствовали главный северный котрразведчик и в конце, внезапно, появилась Сон Хва, явно с прицелом на второй Айрис. Но то что с ней сделали - бесчеловечно.
По главным героям никто особо не зацепил, хотя главный положительный к концу стал нравится.
Героини были не симпатичны, потому что не знаю по какой причине в кадре держали каменное лицо - "мы такие крутые стервы и убийцы, к нам не подходи".
А главный злодей, которого играет Cha Seung Won к концу стал полным психом, строил рожи и вообще ждала, что скажет "му хаха" Ну, если серьезно актер мне просто не нравится, особенно в его "козлиной бородке" последних 5 лет.
Was this review helpful to you?
