The Bride of Habaek (2017)

 “Believing what you want to believe is your truth. Because that’s easier and less tiring.”

It is my first time writing here so I am not sure if I'm doing it right. Apologies! Since we're on the subject, let me also apologize for my english in advance ?.
So here are my thoughts on "The bride of Habaek" ✨?
(No spoilers)
As someone who does not like the fantasy genre I've really loved this drama! It made me think, laugh and cry. The romance and the chemistry of the two leads was perfect and very sweet. The idea of a love that goes beyond time and space is showed very well and it is not cheesy at all. However, what I liked the most in this drama is that each one of the characters are interesting and growing throught the drama, sharing with us their lessons and their stories. Not to mention the osts of this drama! Wow! There is one entirely in english too: glass bridge. ❤

“Isn’t it merely that you are the only one who is unaware of which direction your heart is trying to fall in?
If you keep trying to force yourself to steer in the other direction you’ll fall over and fall ill.” - Habaek.

The actress Shin Se Kyung (Yoon So Ah) portrayed a very interesting and human character and I personally could see myself in her actions and thoughts many times.
Not to mention her beauty and her talent. I've seen her only in "the girl who sees scents" before and back then she didn't leave a strong impression on me as much as she did in this drama.
The role of a psychiatrist who struggles every day both in her work and in her private life without apparently giving show of her true personality, emotions and weaknesses is somehow relatable and impressive. When someone call her a kind person she denies it, and yet when she is called mean she says she was justified to act in that way. Her weaknesses make her beautiful while she is strong to endure it all, she still wants to escape the "reality" she believes to live in.
Until she meets someone who catches her attention in many ways. He devotes tender attention to her, he "keeps her busy" and he makes her think. He tells her he is a god and she considers him to be another one of his patients.

“I learned that the one who has more should naturally help the one who has less from my father. It’s also natural for the strong to protect the weak. That’s how the world should be. Just because someone has more than you, doesn’t mean that person is stronger than you.” – Yoon So Ah

It was my first time seeing actor Nam joo Hyuk (Habaek) after "Who are you: school 2015" and I couldn't recognize him until I saw his name and clicked on it to see his past roles ?. Stupid me!
Anyway his looks are really the ones of a deity! ?
Habaek is himself growing as a character: he is convinced to be superior and yet find himself confused in a new world where nobody respects him as a god.
He is a god but does not know the meaning to protect someone and forgive, having failed to do so in the past. He himself has yet to understand his true self just like Yoon So Ah.
His character too is relatable and fascinating. Besides his looks, it is really difficult not to love his personality more and more as the drama goes on. The emotions he starts to express in his face as the drama goes on are strong and genuine and something we could not really expect from his character in the first episodes. The fact that he start to express emotions is sweet and moving itself.

In this drama it is really difficult to hate someone from the 1st episode to the last one non-stop. CEO Shin, Moo Ra and Bi-Ryeom and even the side characters (secretary Min, the chairman Shin and his nephew, Yoon so Ah's colleague etc.) are all worth our attention and their stories are again relatable and interesting.

I will definitely miss Yoon So Ah and Habaek. but I will also miss all the characters in the show (not even one excluded) since they've made me think and reflect on various experiences life gives us.
I really needed this drama and if I had watched it last year it could have benefited me even more than it has now.
Let me conclude saying that I really hope to see the two leads together again in the future ?.

Lots of love from Italy, stay strong and healthy! ???

PS: I just want to share a review on the drama which is really good and emotional. Since it is a nice article and since the author has bravely shared with everyone her story, I think the least I can do is to share it with you all too. Here is the link:
https://www.mashitafandia.com/2018/10/the-bride-of-water-god.html?m=1

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being a huge fan of the manga, i was really excited to see a modern take on the show, but sadly it all went to shit.

story 4/10

i really disliked the plot of this new drama, and how they kept emphasizing on yoon so ah's lack of money, the first few episodes seemed like a pity party for her. the story was really interesting for about 7 episodes, but the writers screwed up the ending so bad, i couldn't even watch the last episode.

cast 6/10

honestly i think shin se kyung did an okay job at so ah, but there was literally no chemistry between her and habaek. nam joo hyuk was eh? i feel like his stiff acting was to portray the cold god that habaek is but he literally has 3 expressions in the entire show. i ended up watching the show solely for moora and biryeom, which both krystal and gong myung portrayed very well. as for the im joo hwan, i thought his acting was great, but he felt very out of place in the story. he seems to complicate the story and relationship more than necessary.

music 5.5/10

songs were okay but felt too repetitive after awhile.


just don't watch the drama, it's really not worth it at all.

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All the potential for a great drama is there, but it still fails

I started watching this series not having high expectations, since I'd already read a lot of bad reviews. Still I thought I could get through it to see for myself if it actually is that bad, very naively so. I have to say that it was one of the very few times that I struggled so hard to watch a drama 'till the end and many times I wanted to relieve myself and give up halfway.
I have so many critiques for this drama that I could probably stay up all night still ranting about it. My main problem, however, with it is that it started off with all the potential to be a great show: a very interesting plot, a grand budget, a great cast with amazing skills and visuals and the list goes on. So how did it manage to fail? The scenario was just plain bad.
The story doesn't flow naturally at all, from the very beginning until the very end. The main plot feels like it just kind of lands there, much like Ha Baek himself, and then wanders around with no true purpose. The main romance, which I thought could be one of the saving virtues of the drama, started off noone-actually-knows how, so of course if it doesn't have strong foundations it can never be believable. As the episodes pass, the story gets even more confusing and the subplots feel like they're patched together in a very obvious and rough manner. Also, I found it very hard to bring myself to like most of the characters. The gods and goddesses that are supposed to be virtuous beings of higher intellect seem completely immature and sometimes fail to understand the simplest of notions. The main female lead is always making wrong choices and also acts like she's a child sometimes. I couldn't help myself from thinking that her being a psychiatrist apparently is doing more harm than good to anyone, as well. So many characters felt completely unnecessary, especially secretary Min and Ja Ya and even the more "important" ones for the plot like Namsuri or Jin Geon. The only actually complex role with a tragic backstory that was facing real problems and even at some points had the potential of becoming a villain was CEO Shin and he is actually the only character I managed to like and also thought he deserved so much better.
All in all my experience with watching this drama was not enjoyable. I would have given an even smaller rating number, but didn't for the sake of the production, which is actually really good, the acting and the character of Shin Hoo Ye.

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It was out of pure stubbornness (and stupidity) that I finished this drama and I highly recommend viewers spend their time more wisely on other dramas out there.
This was a very boring and hard to maintain interest in drama.
I usually love both Shin Se Kyung and Nam Joo Hyuk's acting, but their chemistry was missing throughout this drama, Ha Baek is very forced and awkward in character, and Soo Ah seems to have all the luck, even if she's deemed unlucky. Half the time you couldn't tell what would happen next with them because of the lack of continuity and growth. They jump a lot of steps in the relationship, and their god/servant status truly made it hard for me to accept Ha Baek's love for her. One minute he's happy to do anything for her, the next he's back to patriarchal ruling and "woman"/derogatory sentences that made me question how Soo Ah could be so mindless and love him.
I had more interest in the other main characters, though even they had very dry and unnecessary moments that made this drama hard to continue. Moo Ra's constant emotional mood swing changes were enough to give anyone a headache, you would want to like her, then not. Bi Ryum jumps around from playful, to scorned in 2.5 seconds, and whilst half the time it actually compliments his nature, the constant snippets to his past and how wicked he could be took away from building him more consistently. Some of the lesser deities were interesting, but fell through the cracks too easily to maintain their storyline. Other people were just so unneeded and wasted precious time that could have been given to progress the storyline with more interest and emotion.
The only character I found worthy was Shin Hoo Ye, and had hoped they would give him more than the drama managed to deliver on his part in the story. They left him very 2 dimensional at times, as a troubled soul, yet lost valuable time to build on his demeanour and just left him either angry or miserable.
Often the delivery of this drama felt rushed and out of sync, or slow and meaningless. Ha Baek's constant lack of powers grows tiresome, especially when they build it up that he can use them for Soo Ah at times... even this gets forgotten about and it becomes a battle over who should have the human, who should do as they are told, and who is acting blind to love.
I can't really say more than this without giving away major plot details that truly irritated me and bored me completely, but I advise to skip out on this one, even though Gong Myung was highly attractive throughout.
4.5/10.

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Watched it for Habaek and So Ah's Love Story and was satisfied with what I got

Even though it was released back in 2017, I somehow had managed to avoid it so didn't know how it was going to end. I'm not familiar with its source material either so I just enjoyed the drama on its own merit. And it was enjoyable! Saw a number of reviews that wasn't favorable to the plot or to the leads' relationship/chemistry, and I'm glad that I don't really agree with them and that the reviews didn't manage to decrease the enjoyment of the drama for me.

With the drama titled the way it is, for me going in, So Ah and Habaek's love story was the main point for me, and since I like both leads, that wasn't going to be a problem, and anything else would be secondary. And with the way it was set up, I was so scared that it was just going to end in heartbreak and pain and was bracing myself for it. I just saw the beginning of one review that said it was going to have a happy ending and trusted that even when there were moments in the end that created some doubts if that was true. So pleasantly surprise and content that it was a happy ending!

LollyPip's recap & review on dramabeans raised a good point that I really agree with, that Habaek and So Ah made each other better versions of themselves, but didn't fundamentally change who they were at the core. That's why I like their relationship and root for their love.

Habaek was still the haughty, arrogant Water God, destined King of all the Gods at the end of the drama, but whereas he was so apathetic when we first meet him in the Gods Realm at the beginning, he had softened during his time with So Ah. He was able to be vulnerable with her, showed how much he loved her, showed how much he appreciate everything that Nam Soo Ri, his servant, did for him, showed an understanding and care for humans that maybe he'd buried after the betrayal of his first human love interest.

Similarly, So Ah, with Habaek's influence in her life, also became more vulnerable or more willing to show her vulnerability. She had been so prickly and tried to be mean-spirited so she wouldn't get hurt at the start, so unwilling to show that she cared for people because of how tied her association of compassion was with her resentment for father, who to everyone else had seemed so compassionate but to her had seemed so uncaring. So Ah had been very much "I can do everything myself and I don't need anyone," but then Habaek showed up and forced himself into her life. Suddenly, there was someone there who saw when she was scared and tired, even when she was so very good at hiding herself behind a mask of indifference. Someone who promised to protect her and make sure she's not harmed, and then fulfilled that promise over and over. Someone who offered out a hand for her to take and lean on, who cooked for her, who spent a Saturday deep cleaning her house with her, who waited for her and walked with her home after work, who worked his first lowly human job for money to buy her a gift (and be so adorably proud of it after), who made sure he came back with a driver license not because he felt like he needed one to drive but because it would make her feel more comfortable to know that he was driving with a license, who reminded her that she can be vulnerable and show her emotions.

Habaek and So Ah both learned to be more human because they were in each other lives, and I'm all for it. Sure, there were elements that I wished were explored more, but overall, it was a satisfying drama that I'm glad I found.

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Uh... why is everyone giving this drama less than 6 stars?? The most helpful comment gave it 4 stars!! I’m truly shocked. Why did I like it this much when so many people hated it??

Well, I’ll try to write a coherent review that will explain why I really liked this drama despise its evident flaws (I am confused myself hahaha).

So, let’s start with the plot. Hm... how can I put this... there was SO MUCH MORE they could have done with it. A whole world was created and it felt like it was completely wasted. There were some plot holes that I noticed -and I usually don’t mind these things A LOT because I don’t really analyze every single plot line but I noticed them this time and it kind of bothered me. I wish we had more explanations like why did Habaek have access to his powers when Soah was in danger??
Although most people say the show was boring but I can’t completely agree. It was tremendously wasted, that’s for sure. But the occasional humor really made me laugh out loud. Being chased by a wild pig (ok I don’t now what it’s called), the drivers license scene, Habaek asking for money....... there were a lot of funny scenes, which I think not a lot of people have mentioned.
The ending was bittersweet because SooAh is going to die anyways and he will live forever as the king of the gods... I think the ending could have been a thousand times more interesting than that. The final scene didn’t even feel like the last scene because of how underwhelming it was. She could have ended up with the CEO for example! Or no one at all! Or Habaek could have really disappeared (even if I would have cried my eyes out for three hours and I would have never forgiven the writer).

Now it’s time for the characters! Let me get this out of my chest: my favorite character was the CEO. There, I said it. I always like the “good” characters and the fact that he went through all of that and still tried his best at being a human... The only times I cried were whenever his past was mentioned.
I didn’t like Moora’s character. Nor Bi Ryeom’s most of the time. Nor Ja Ya’s.
The acting was overall satisfactory but the main leads were somewhat disappointing. I do think they acted according to their characters but sometimes it really felt like they were acting. The smiling and the kissing were really good though!
I also think some of the secondary characters weren’t needed but oh well.

The music was great. It really fit the whole vibe of the show. Glass Bridge is a work of art. The whole OST is a masterpiece, to be honest.

Would I make myself go through the pain of rewatching a show whose plot is severely lacking? Yes, yes I would.

I decided to add this drama to my to watch list because of Nam JooHyuk but the rating and all the negative reviews made me not want to watch it without some mental preparation. One year later I finally picked it up and I was once again surprised by how much I enjoy unpopular dramas. I know I mentioned a lot of flaws and you may be wondering why the hell I gave this show 9 stars. Well, because I wanted to. I just feel like giving it 9 stars. I really like shows that are full of fantasy, I’ve noticed. I loved Goblin, and every show with similar traits pleases me (although this one is way inferior to Goblin, in my opinion). I really like the feeling it leaves me with when I finish it. It’s hard to describe but the feeling that there’s something more than what we see and know, that there is an ending to the suffering. So yeah, 9 stars it is!!

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I've always known about this drama because of my love for Nam Joo Hyuk, but I finally decided to finally give it a go because Netflix decided it wanted to add it and recommend it to me. I've always been curious to see him in another drama and I don't think my heart could take watching him in "The Light in Your Eyes" yet.

What did I think? That's hard to answer. I knew what I was getting myself into when little clips popped up on my instagram of Habaek saving Yoon So Ah from being pushed off a building. I knew that the CGI would be very rough, but sometimes you just need to accept this is what you are going to get if you want to watch a drama about nature Gods using their powers. I also read the comments and other reviews before writing this, and saw many negative reviews. But honestly, it was very meh to me. I didn't hate it, but I also wasn't in love with it.

One thing I loved about it was the costumes whenever we got to see "flashbacks" of Habaek's world. It did seem a little "low budget" but taking it for what it was, I loved the make up. Plus Habaek had some hair goals with this perfect blue ash ombre that I only wish my hairdresser could give me that wouldn't last only the first couple of days of getting it done. I loved the relationships that Yoon So Ah built with other people such as her relationship with CEO Shin Hoo Ye. Even though there was this weird plot with them, I felt like they had the most emotional relationship out of anyone in this drama. Given, I wasn't a fan of Yoon So Ah and it made it hard for me to root for her in any kind of way, she was always there for Hoo Ye and never believed in other people's prejudices of him . That being said, I think Hoo Ye was my favorite character in this drama. I liked how his fate was that he had good and evil in him and how based on his actions, he could choose which direction he wanted to go. He had to go through a lot of hardships because of who he was and was never accepted anywhere. He was always trying to make himself the perfect person, thinking that people would love him based on his actions and not what he wasn't able to control from his past. From the moment we met him, I knew that he would be the "antagonist" because we were told that all Gods were good and their enemies were our enemies, but I liked how the more Hahaek was with So Ah, the more he stopped acting on impulse like the other Gods, and actually took a step back to think about what he truly thought. I liked how he only really didn't like Hoo Ye because he was trying to win So Ah's love, and not because of the prejudices that other people had labeled him as.

Now going off all of that, I mainly did not like his drama because of the characters. Yes, we get the whole drama troupe with the main characters being these unlikable characters, but when they meet and start to realize how their actions effect other people, they start to change. But in this case, I feel like not a lot of characters went through that change. We have So Ah who's job it is the help people with their struggles, but we find out that because of So Ah's past that she hides her compassion for other people with anger because she basically has daddy issues. She believes in hard work will pay the bills, but she also thinks her misfortune isn't her fault. She is a good psychiatrist, which we see in her scenes with Hoo Ye, but for some reason she decides on performing just ok with her patients because she doesn't want to come off compassionate. It's weird. I don't understand it. She was a VERY wish washy person and had no idea why everyone was so in love with her. Yes, she was sassy which made her funny, but homegirl could not make up her mind to save her life. Or when she finally was able to make up her mind, she would do the opposite and then we would go through another, "what should I do?" moment. It was very repetitive and got boring real quick.
Habaek was alright - he was born with a silver spoon in his mouth and didn't know anything outside his world and powers so it was a given he would be entitled and sassy and bossy. And he was a little irritating in the beginning, but he always wore his heart on his sleeve, even though he always had a bored look on his face, just staring into your soul. I felt bad for him, and he is probs my second favorite character in this whole drama. I didn't agree with most of his actions and his jealousy was NOT NEEDED because he took it to another level, but he was always honest and always fought for what he wanted. Plus, I liked how he didn't have prejudices against anyone and based his feelings toward someone based on their actions.
I think the REAL antagonists in this drama were the God of Sky and the Goddess of Water; Ahn Bin and Mura. Given that Ahn Bin was the god of mischief, we knew he was going to create some chaos, but it was still weird seeing how these two and Habaek grew up together, yet, they all turned out to be completely different people how they handled situations. Ahn Bin loved to create chaos and had zero limit to what he would do to get revenge. Mura is the same way, but she is very by the book and would take her revenge by finding loopholes. Both would act solely on emotions and created unneeded chaos for other people. Given, when we find out why Ahn Bin is terrorizing Hoo Ye, it starts to make sense, but he refuses to tell no one why he was doing what he was doing, and it honestly made himself look like the villain. I liked Ahn Bin in the beginning because he was fun and playful and added a element of excitement in the boring lifes of So Ah and Habaek, but he honestly was kind of this terrible person (both him and Mura) who got away with everything and I cared zero about their love story. He would have been the sole reason why Hoo Ye would have chosen the path of evil. Then there were a lot of oddly unnecessary side characters such as Shin Ja Ya who should have just gotten a few scenes in the beginning of the drama to introduce the audience to So Ah's past and insecurities, and then should have been cut.

This drama seemed to never really be building up to the huge climax - there were many mini climaxes in which we thought were going to be the big turning points, but weren't. For example, Hoo Yee's fate of becoming good or evil and coming off as the drama's antagonist, seemed like it was going to be this huge thing, with possibly this huge final battle where So Ahn would swoop in and tell him to take the path of good and not evil and then it would be the end of the drama and everyone lives happily ever after. That was not the case. That whole thing got resolved somewhere in the middle. The big climax, that wasn't really big at all, seemed to happen all at once in the final episode, which I will give props for being extremely emotional. Way more emotional that the rest of the drama. The ending was good though, very generic happily ever after that made me happy for So Ahn and Habaek, but also a little sad for Habaek as well. I just don't understand why they couldn't just give everyone immortality, but I guess it is a lot to ask for.

Final thoughts, I think this drama is worth the watch if you have some time to kill and want to watch something different and you love Nam Joo Hyuk. If you can get past the CGI, the drama is totally fine. The ONE thing I will say though is the writing or maybe it was the Netflix translation, was so odd. Whenever the main characters had heart to heart arguments, which was often, I never really understood what they were talking about or trying to say. They would jump to 50 different points and talk about 50 reasons why something wasn't possible with situations that never applied...but you just assume they were breaking up because she had daddy issues? There were so many times I had to backtrack and rewatch scenes to figure out if I am just a slow reader and missed something, or if the translation just didn't make sense.

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I went into this drama reading all the negative reviews and was expecting to like the 2nd couple better. I found myself enjoying the Main leads, they made my heart swoon and there is some funny moments. Habaek and his servant navigation in the world was lol.  I've have re-watched their scenes.  Yong Yong....he named her. He bought her a new cup from his PT -Job awww...He rem. her saying that a broken cup is bad luck and he got her new ones. Sooo SWEET!!! He tried to order the water back in the toilet for the bidet hahaha...One of my fav. scenes of is when he came back from the god world with his servants w/the ID's OMG I was on the flr dead.

You can't judge how you'll enjoy a drama base on reviews, take it all with a grain of salt. I would say , Always try it out. It will either click or not. I watch a drama for the "feels" and don't go deep into it. It's my escape (fantasy).

Reply 1997 was highly recommended and I absolutely HATED it! It was soo annoying and the Noble sacrifices. The brother thinking because he likes her and do things for her in a sense she belongs to him.....blaaah...stupid love triangle. I FFW soo much and thinking I would like it because of the high rating it has to be good...nope...

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Despite everything, Bride of the Water God was a cute drama with an adorable couple. I am disappointed that it wasn't able to live up to expectations, but the drama has a bit of its own charm.

The story itself is a bit scattered. It may be that it was trying to accomplish too much at once and wasn't able to execute on anything very well. I had a very hard time keeping engaged with the story and the lore of the Immortal Realm in particular. The original work would certainly fall into the mellow drama category. This drama is more of a romantic comedy. The constant pull between mellow drama and comedy is very distracting to the overall telling of the story.

Unfortunately, casting Nam Joo Hyuk as the lead character Habaek turned out to be a poor decision. Nam Joo Hyuk proved to be much too green to pull off the 3000 year old Habaek. Though he is cute and charming in parts ... other moments seem down right cringeworthy. Even though Habaek is supposed to be a bit of a man child, the childish demeanor washes away most of the sex appeal of the original Water God. Out of all the things I've seen Nam Joo Hyuk in, this is probably easily his weakest performance. I feel like he never really gets used to acting the part of Habaek.

Actually the character story that I was most intrigued with was Shin Hoo Ye played by Im Joo Hwan. I feel like Im always is cast as deep, complex characters. I loved CEO Shin story arc. His backstory and character development was so compelling, it ultimately distracted from the lead couple. Still rooting for a Happy Ending for Hoo Ye!

Though this drama was far from perfect, there were some charmingly touching parts. I did enjoy watching it. I just probably won't be revisiting it anytime soon.

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I thought this drama was great, honestly. Yes, the first two episodes are kind of lack luster but once the drama picks up I think it's awesome.
Nam Joo Hyuk's acting is so good, his face is great at conveying emotion so it really tugs on the heartstrings. Gong Myeong was great, as was Krystal.
The OSTs could have been better, but I usually don't think about those.
I thought the ending was great as well. It takes a lot to get me to cry at dramas now that I've seen so many but this did a great job.
I believe that the people who are writing poor reviews are because they didn't really watch it at all.

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