This review may contain spoilers
An underrated gem of a show!
I watched this a couple of years ago, and I loved it. Then recently Netflix started advertising it to me, so I re-looked it up on MyDramaList and was surprised to see that it has a relatively low overall rating (8.0/10 stars currently). I wondered if it was really as good as I remembered, so I decided to re-watch it. I'm happy to say that I loved it just as much this second time, but I can see why it might not be everyone's cup of tea. For one, I think "drama" might be too strong of a word for this little show, which is much more of a slow burn slice of life. There is definitely some drama, particularly in the first few episodes, but after that it mellows to typical teen daily "drama" (romance, friendship, school stress, parent pressure, etc.). In my opinion, this show explores teen drama particularly well, never condescending but instead presenting the teens' emotions as real and valid. Your heart breaks for these poor kids as they fumble to figure out what it means to grow up when they can't follow the examples of the grown-ups in their lives. I'm also probably biased toward these types of dramas since I teach high school. I can identify with Teacher Oh so strongly!One thing I did want to clarify was what happened with Jun Woo's friend Jung Hoo because I was confused about that the first time I watched the show. It could be that it got lost in translation or that the explanation happens so fast that I just missed it, but I thought that Hwi Young and Gi Tae had paid the bullies to beat up Jung Hoo, and they had beaten him so badly that he died. Actually what happened was that he quit school and moved away to avoid being bullied, and on his way to his new job, he was in a car accident. So Hwi Young and Gi Tae were still involved in the chain of events that led to Jung Hoo's death, but not as directly as I'd originally thought, which explains why Jun Woo didn't seem as bothered by it after the original surprise as I thought he should be or why Hwi Young was never directly punished for it in the end.
Finally, I was so impressed with Ong Seong Wu's acting in this drama, and I loved the soundtrack so much. In my opinion, this is an underappreciated show that should get more love!
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It was a beautiful story to watch unfold with a very realistic ending as well. The drama leaves you with a few tears and a soft smile at last. This was the main male lead's first main role drama and I must say he did a brilliant job of staying quiet yet acting..played the introvert to perfection !! I read some reviews here that said they were not happy with the story and there were some plot holes they could not let go off. But for me nothing was wrong with this drama. In fact they touched upon interesting issues in the drama from bullying, study pressure, school transfers, interfering parents, friendships, dating, career path, loneliness, homosexuality and the confusion that comes with it ! I enjoyed all the characters from the teens to their overbearing parents and the adults who save the day ! I must also commend Kang Ki for his role as the bumbling yet caring homeroom teacher. He deserved the excellence award he received for this role at 2019 Korea Drama Awards.
Oh and I quite enjoyed the OSTs of this drama. Moments by Christopher and 'Our Story' by One Seong (main lead) were hauntingly beautiful.
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This review may contain spoilers
emotional and really intriguing at first. but the storyline dragged in the middle and everything was all rushed in the end. i hated how so many storylines were introduced and never got a proper conclusion. so many things were just left open-ended, but i guess that's life. it became a youth romance drama quickly with so many characters that they obviously wanted the audience to care for, but i never did. i don't mind the romance but everything had to take a backseat because of it, when there should've been a balance since a lot of stuff was going on with joon woo's character. i was honestly hoping for something more, especially since it was so good in the beginning and some of the scenes actually made me cry. anyways, it's not bad. the performances were good, and i loved the cinematography. i couldn't remember any ost's so they didn't really stand out (that's not a good thing), but to be fair i really don't know what type of vibe they were looking for as a whole so maybe that factored into the ambiguous music. safe to say i don't plan on rewatching, but i would still recommend this if someone's looking for something to over a weekend. Was this review helpful to you?
When i first saw the reviews of this drama,they were very very low ,no one gave review above 9.0 , so i thought its waste of watching this drama but once when i started to watch this drama i felt very good .if you are bored with action and thrillers genres this is the best drama of coming age. it is not at all boring . OST , STORY, ACTING everything are excellent ,this is one of the best school drama
the cast is quite great. their acting was amazing , All the supporting actors justified their roles
drama was realistic , personally i felt this drama is too short ,they could've extended few episodes and add the story of choi jun woo development.
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Slow Paced Teen Rom-Com
LIKES:Colour palate, cinematography, lighting all good.
Music for the most part was appropriate and added to the scene, especially since the ML Jun-u didn't talk much, even when he should. The music filled in those parts, what he didn't say.
Acting was great for all the teenagers and their teachers, the parents were okay for the adult actor/actresses. The cast was well chosen.
DISLIKES:
Writing:
How anti-climatic and badly written the whole show was. There's one part near the beginning that they had Jun-u get over WAY TOO FAST, that it was laughable and ridiculous. They should've concluded the supporting characters that they built up throughout the show too. Also character growth seemed limited to just Jun-u and it was minimal at best. Since they stretched it out to 16 episodes they could've shown us everyone two or five years in the future, to conclude everything properly.
Bulling, cheating, early motherhood, peer and parental pressure, were just some of the topics covered, but none of them were well developed or handled.
Directing:
Often Jun-u and other character reactions were way too slow. They are in high school and kiss like they are in middle school, not like they are eighteen as the title suggested.
Production:
Zooming in way too close, I hate seeing up people's noses and how the makeup hides their acne or whatever. Also hate when faces are cut out of the screen.
Pacing issues, made the drama drag on in some ways and the ending became rushed.
FX:
The scars for Jun-u and Hwi-yeong, disappeared too fast or they forgot to do the makeup for it. Jun-u's black eye never changed from the pink makeup to a darker tone. If they didn't want the black eye anymore, they could've written that Su-bin used concealer to cover it, to help hide his fighting. And for Su-bin her lipstick often was not even, having half the upper lip missing the lipstick. That's just sloppy.
OVERALL:
Sloppy writing and pacing issues, really gave this drama a low score, only due to the great acting by the students, is why it got 4.5/10. For a drama made in 2019 it should've been better, especially since this theme is from a saturated genre in S. Korea. I would recommend it to anyone just starting out in the student rom-com category of dramas. I won't rewatch and there are no parts that I would want to see again or that truly resonated with me.
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"We're only 18." - 16 Episodes of Love, Peace, and Consolation
I will be honest and say that I first started this drama mainly for Moonbin (I love ASTRO), because I was very excited to see him acting in a drama and I had also heard his character was not straight which piqued my interest even more. However, I can say that right from the beginning, the main plot of the drama, along with the full cast of characters made me stay and wholly fall in love with this show.First, regarding the story, I found it was very close to perfect, touching on some very important topics related to the age of 18 and the struggles of high-schoolers approaching entry into university. I loved how parental pressure and its impact on teens' mental health was deeply explored through both Soo-bin's and the second male lead, Hwi-young's character. Moreover, a very beautiful and consoling aspect of the story related to the topic of academic pressure was the idea that it's okay to not know exactly where you're going at 18 or to not have the most amazing grades. The message was that youth is a time of exploration and of finding oneself, so while every little failure might seem like the end of the world to an 18-year-old, it may just become a trivial aspect of their life when looking back later on, so people should just focus on loving themselves and enjoying their lives. No one's life is 'ruined' if something doesn't go as planned, as Joon-woo himself said in a very poignant scene. Furthermore, this drama's messaging greatly emphasized acceptance, which was very touching for me. This can be seen as related to the blooming love between Soo-bin and Joon-woo and *minor spoiler* her mother's judgmental attitude towards him, seeing him through the lenses of his reputation and his lack of means, things that gave her a completely distorted view of him, making her completely disregard his inherently kind and mature nature *end of minor spoiler*. I could go on and on about why this story touched me and kept me entertained throughout the 16 episodes (wish there were more!), but I will stop here so this doesn't get too long.
Next, the characters/acting/cast: 10/10, I found both the characterization and the choice of actors to be simply perfect. Something that really stood out to me was how the characters look exactly like real-life teenagers instead of the, more commonly seen in dramas, picture-perfect 'teenagers' that look like adults. By this, I am in no way saying the actors are not good looking, they very much are, but what I mean is that their appearance was made to match the real-life look of Korean teenagers, through their hairstyles, their simple and normal-looking clothes/uniforms, and the absence of (obvious) makeup.
One character in particular that I would like to talk about (for the sake of conciseness, I will not touch too much on the rest of the characters) is Oh-je (Moonbin's character). *Oh-je spoilers ahead* I was so impressed with Oh-je's characterization, going from at first seeming just like the cliché handsome guy that all the girls probably have a crush on, to coming into his own through his caring and beautiful friendship with Joon-woo and mostly, his failed relationship with Soo-bin's friend, Da-heen. Throughout their relationship, one can observe how Oh-je seems very uncomfortable around Da-heen, mainly when she emphasizes the romantic aspect of their relationship. However, as time goes on, he starts caring for her very much, but only as a friend, which ends up leading him to break up with her. Still, he cares for her so much that when he sees how depressed she becomes after their breakup, he suddenly comes out to her and reveals his crush on Hwi-young and his confusion regarding his sexuality. Moreover, I really love how, after rumours start spreading about his crush on Hwi-young and after seeing Hwi-young's cold and insulting reaction to them, Oh-je seems to not have a crush on him anymore, showing his level of self-respect and self-love by not wasting his feelings on someone who doesn't even seem to care for him or respect him. Later on, he seems to just focus on his friendship with Joon-woo and Da-heen while being at peace with himself. This type of representation of different sexualities and of the fluidity of sexuality (Oh-je never overtly states that he is gay, he is confused about his romatic attraction) is very healthy and welcomed, as it strays from the common depiction of non-straight people being the victims of society by showing Oh-je be at peace with himself even when rumours about his were circulating at school. *Oh-je spoilers end* What can I say, I LOVED Oh-je's character and Moonbin's depiction of him!
As for the music, it fits perfectly with all the moods of the drama, having an array of sentimental, sad, comforting, and happy songs. I will definitely be listening to the OST of this drama for a while!
Finally, for the rewatch value, it is 10/10, as even now I feel like I could go back and watch it again. I already miss these beautiful characters!
Overall, this drama is a 9.5/10 for me, very close to perfect, so I 100% recommend it! Go watch it if you haven't already!
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The initial plot was really good
So, the plot was really good. I mean, the plot about bullying, lies, manipulation and so on was really captivating... But in this drama as well as many others, the screenwriters add too much romance. They also focused on the girl's life too much in the middle of the drama. I think the drama could be really better without all of the useless scenes of romance ; but if you're really found of romance, I guess this drama is a really good one for you. But they also rushed the end and it was not as good as expected.But I really liked this drama for the development of the main character, the development of his relationships and of his self-confidence and self-esteem. He was so cute and the actor was breathtaking. The Homeroom teacher was too nice and it should be awesome having a teacher like him. I really liked his role.
I put a 9 for acting/cast cuz I find the main girl was too much, I didn't really was found of her acting. But I find that the acting was really good overall and the actors were really into their character, it was really captivating to watch - just didn't like this girl...
The OST were pretty good and accurate with each moments.
I put the rewatch value at 5 cuz I guess if I have to rewatch it for some reasons, I will like the same points (but also dislikes the too-much romance huhu).
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The characters were great, I like the class and the teacher - they remind me of my school ♥
My hopes for season 2 are low because even though I want more, I don't think there will be more.
Still, I enjoyed this drama a lot. One of the main reasons is that I watched it with my parents and they liked it (like my dad said that if I want to watch something he will watch it with me so I was a little worried at first because he never watched any Asian drama, only a few Pinku-eiga movies I watched and I saw the romance and love triangle tags so I thought it might not be for him, but it went well and my mom joined too so I think it was a win-win situation), so I guess their journey to dramaland is beginning and I will be more than happy to guide them hehe ^^
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A nice melodrama coming of age
The drama is kinda well-writtenI'm astonished by the directing. And I look foward to her next projects.
Tho the pace might seems slow, it has captured beautiful moments of these teenagers , so raw and realistic
Every character has their own flaws, but they're still kids and I enjoyed watching them grow throughout the show
The cast's acting was really good, beyond my expectation
The future for Shin and Ong are bright, I love all the supporting characters especially Kang Kiyoung Han Sungmin, Yoo Insoo and Kim Sunyoung.
The romance part of Junwoo and Soobin was draggy, but they felt really natural. Hope these two can have another project together
As for watching value, because of its pace I have to skip some part still this is one of the most beautiful high school drama that South Korea ever had.
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This drama began and ended very beautifully. There is no complexity in this drama yet the emotions brought out by simply watching this drama was intense. I loved the sweet, adorable first loves spewing around all the characters in the drama. And the sheer innocence which leads them to take the boldest decisions of their lives.
The drama had showcased almost every possible situation which could take place in the lives of normal high schoolers. Such as being gay, loathed by everyone due to circumstances. And it is not only the students but even the parents and the teachers who are either highly corrupted or extremely supportive respectively.
Anyways, I shed all the tears of my life during the last episodes of this drama (around 12th - 16th). So I believe this drama had hit me hard and I really loved it and would suggest each and everyone I know to definitely watch it!!!
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