Completed
chenchenchen
1 people found this review helpful
Jul 24, 2022
20 of 20 episodes seen
Completed 0
Overall 7.0
Story 10
Acting/Cast 7.5
Music 7.5
Rewatch Value 5.0
I must say that this drama is also good and cute! Joe Cheng and Ariel Lin have the best chemistry. I love the storyline of this. It's not a typical Taiwanese drama, that have those corny effects at all. I remember watching this many times when I was in High School, very timely. I also keep laughing on some episodes while watching this. I think Ariel Lin have improved her acting skills and Joe Cheng is quite handsome on this show.

Anyway, I do recommend this drama. I think you guys will enjoy this too. :)
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Completed
Bubbly
1 people found this review helpful
Feb 12, 2017
20 of 20 episodes seen
Completed 0
Overall 10
Story 10
Acting/Cast 10
Music 10
Rewatch Value 10
"It Started with a Kiss" (ISWAK) was the first Asian drama I watched 10 years ago and it's still my favorite Taiwanese drama to date! (My favorite drama of all time goes to Kdrama "Legend of the Blue Sea" & "You Who Came from the Stars" -- also highly recommended :P).

There are multiple remakes with the same story line, but ISWAK is by far the best. (Please completely skip over the Korean one -- "Playful Kiss", it's really awful.) Unlike the Korean version, the casting/acting here is excellent. Ariel Lin does a really great job of being the silly but still likeable main female lead, Yuan Xian Qin, and is perfect with Joe Cheng, who plays the cold-hearted/genius male lead, Zhang Zhi Shu. The second male lead, Ah Jin, is also extremely funny and played by the awesome actor Jiro Wang!

Plus, the OST is also amazing, especially the main theme, "Practical Joke". There also are a bunch of other background songs that fit perfectly, like "Hear" and "The Whole World Knows".

If you can't tell, I would highly highly recommend this drama! ^__^ It's happy and funny and filled with memorable characters!

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Completed
Arianya6
1 people found this review helpful
Jun 25, 2011
20 of 20 episodes seen
Completed 0
Overall 10
Story 10
Acting/Cast 10
Music 8.0
Rewatch Value 10
One of the first TDramas I ever watched and still my absolute favorite having bought the DVD for myself so i can rewatch it again and again. I don't know why I like it so much, I should dislike Zhi Zhu for his complete lack of personality and Xiang Xing for her cluelessness, but I love them both. Perhaps it is because the only time you see a glimmer of emotion in Zhi Zhu is when he looks at her and because Xiang Xing is sweetly delighted by every little morsel of affection she can get out of him.

I loved the family in this drama the supporting cast being superb the mother provided some excellent comedy moments, all helped, I think by not having the ususal authoritative grandfather/father character to hinder their relationship; they do that themselves anyway.

All in all a sweet, cheerful, romantic comedy that in my humble opinion is one of the best TDramas out there.

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Completed
raedesu
1 people found this review helpful
Feb 25, 2021
20 of 20 episodes seen
Completed 0
Overall 10
Story 10
Acting/Cast 10
Music 10
Rewatch Value 10

My favorite drama!

I love this drama, and yes, I am giving it 10/10 all across the board. I have seen every adaptation of this series, the anime, manga, taiwanese, korean and Japanese versions. I will continue to love it, and have seen it over 50 times. The story follows the manga pretty closely, the music is wonderful and catchy, and the actors are wonderful and have great chemistry.

The Taiwanese and Japanese versions are 100x better then the Korean version, I would suggest skipping it as it doesn't cover even half of the story.

Definitely one of the best series I've ever seen, and I'm a huge romcom fan!

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Completed
Melwill28
1 people found this review helpful
May 31, 2011
20 of 20 episodes seen
Completed 0
Overall 10
Story 10
Acting/Cast 10
Music 10
Rewatch Value 10
I love this story no matter where it is made. I would prolly never happen where I'm from b/c us chicks don't want to seem that desperate to follow a guy around for 5 yrs. Neway, love the story, love the actors, the music was good (had to look it up so I could dl it). I will watch this 1 again in the future b/c it's 1 of my fave stories. Know I laughed more watching this version than the Korean 1. This was like crack to me had to stay up all nite to finish it & then get my butt to work at 6am. Yeah voted as "crack-drama."



I had a hard time finding links that would play the drama but I looked everywhere & finished it. Glad I did too b/c the end was the bestest!

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Completed
iamyooinssi
1 people found this review helpful
Apr 17, 2020
20 of 20 episodes seen
Completed 0
Overall 9.5
Story 9.0
Acting/Cast 9.0
Music 10
Rewatch Value 9.0
For me,this is my 2nd best version after Itazura Na Kiss by Yuki Furukawa and Miki Honoka,although i watched this version first when I was in second year high school,I came to rewatch this again but as we grew up,we may view some things differently,like for example Xiao Qin's character for me back then was a very cute and adorable girl but as time passes,i realized her negative sides,(her life only revolves around a guy and if something happened she cannot function properly already,her stupidity was not realistic,as the story itself isn't realistic,it's impossible that a genius like Zhi Shu will like a girl like her,she was a stalker but i think if it's on Zhi Shu's point of view since he also like her,(he's just using his brain first before his emotion) it's forgivable.
Nevertheless,it's a very interesting story between a guy with high IQ and a girl with high EQ.

Enjoyment - 10 (Because of their contrast character,it's really enjoyable to watch)
Soundtracks- 10
Story- 9.5
Rewatch Value - The story is really interesting so I've already watched all 3 versions from Korea,Japan and Taiwan but if you'll ask me which version has the most rewatch value,i'll go for Itazura Na Kiss(Kotoko and Naoki)

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Completed
clandestine00
1 people found this review helpful
Oct 15, 2017
20 of 20 episodes seen
Completed 0
Overall 7.5
Story 9.0
Acting/Cast 8.0
Music 6.0
Rewatch Value 6.5
Loved the story because I have watched it previously from Playful Kiss (Korean version) and Itazura Na Kiss (Japanese version).
The acting of the cast was okay, the chemistry wasn't sizzling like the japanese version! However, I loved the second male lead a lot here. He wasn't annoying and did not over exaggerate his acting  like in the Japanese version (partially due to my bias for jiro wang keke). The male lead was also less cold than in the japanese version .
The music, well, I didn't pay much attention to the osts because they did not stand out. As for rewatch value, I think I would prefer rewatching the japanese version even though this couple was cute too.
Thought Itazura na kiss (Japanese version was better) but what I liked a lot about this version is that the female lead acknowledges the feelings of the second male lead.

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Completed
TLNard
1 people found this review helpful
Jul 5, 2019
20 of 20 episodes seen
Completed 0
Overall 10
Story 10
Acting/Cast 9.5
Music 7.5
Rewatch Value 10

Best Classic Modern Drama Ever

We Watch this Drama every few years because it has so many good parts and the characters are very endearing. I hope the actors are getting their royalties from this drama. I continue to watch it over and over again every few years. This drama is the first or second on top of my recommend list for friend to watch. Along with Go princes Go, and Faith. Good clean entertainment. I continue to watch it over and over again every few years. This drama is the in the first top five, on top of my recommend list for friend to start watching. Along with Go princes Go, and Faith. Good clean entertainment.

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Completed
Kyoko328
1 people found this review helpful
Nov 1, 2016
20 of 20 episodes seen
Completed 1
Overall 10
Story 10
Acting/Cast 10
Music 10
Rewatch Value 10
As i was reading some the reviews i saw a lot of negative ones and honestly i'm not really surprised. The acting was average, the music was average and some of the story line seemed a bit unrealistic. Now having said that. I have read the manga, watched the anime, watched the original Japanese drama and the newer Japanese drama and watched the Korean version. And this was by far my favourite one out of all of them.
Like i said the acting was average and came off cheesy in most scenes, but it was just one of those things that just for some reason or another captivated me and kept me thoroughly entertained. I guess you could say i in some ways or another related to the main character Xiang Qin. A unrequited love throughout high school not knowing how to call it quits even when the other party does not seem the slightest bit interested. Now i can't say that i ever have lived with one of my crushes before but that was one of the things i loved the most about the story. Was how funny and out there it was.
I guess one of the main reasons why i loved this version so much is because of how much detail they put in the story line. IF you watch season 1 and 2 they cover from their high school years all the way up to the point they are old enough to go out there and try to chase the their careers. I also loved how the portrayed Zhi Shu's character. I thought Cheng Joe did an amazing job portraying that character. At least out of all the other male leads in the different versions of this drama. He was cold, mean, nasty at times and yet could be gentle, kindhearted and loving and not even know it. I will admit for the first time i watched this i absolutely hated his character. I kept thinking is there really a reason to make him so dang nasty all the time. But there was. Out of all the characters in this story he grew the most. From the first episode to the very last you could see how much his character had changed. And yet even though he had changed his character didn't end being one of those wishy washy characters that you just find annoying at the end of the series. Another thing i will give credit was they didn't add in a lot of cheesy dialogue where you are thinking oh my goodness please just end it already. I thought it was rightly timed and executed. It is really hard as well when making a romance to not have cheesy lines, because to most people anything romance related is pretty cheesy. Now i know a lot of people will disagree with my rating of this drama but at the end of the day, at the end of each episode i finished it with a smile on my face and constantly going back in for more. Now if that's not what you want an audience to feel then how should one feel after watching a romantic comedy? But again this is all in my humble opinion.

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Completed
DeceptivelyBlonde
1 people found this review helpful
Jan 5, 2012
20 of 20 episodes seen
Completed 0
Overall 10
Story 10
Acting/Cast 10
Music 9.0
Rewatch Value 10
This was definitely my favorite romantic comedy, despite the fact that it was the first Taiwanese show I watched. I had already seen Playful Kiss (which was very well-done), but this version was even more amazingly written. Between this show and the sequel (They Kiss Again), the plotline was far more developed than it was with Playful Kiss. The main characters had more depth and emotion in their roles, and while the quality was not always as good, the story itself was far better. Because it is so long, the writers were able to add more though behind why certain characters act the way they do and to make the whole storyline a little less unbelievable. Plus the two leads always work excellently together. They make the romance seem beautiful and sweet all at the same time. I rewatch this show whenever I want to smile, laugh, or feel that glow inside that comes with knowing there are still sweet, naive, innocent, beautiful romantic stories in the world of film.

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Completed
Chaerin
1 people found this review helpful
Sep 23, 2012
20 of 20 episodes seen
Completed 0
Overall 7.0
Story 8.0
Acting/Cast 7.0
Music 7.0
Rewatch Value 7.0
I really enjoyed this drama. I haven't read the manga but i've seen the Korean version, and they're both similar enough that I figure they followed the manga pretty closely.

I do think Joe Cheng has some room to improve, acting wise. I know the character is supposed to be cold and taciturn, but sometimes when he was supposed to be cold & taciturn while still showing some other kind of emotion, he failed. You could tell that something was supposed to be there, but his face just wasn't expressing it well enough.

But apart from that, he did a good job. When he needed to be loving and cute and protective, he could do that fine. The rest of the main cast was mostly fine (Tiffany Hsu is beautiful, although maybe add her to the Needs Improvement list too), and I do find Ariel Lin impossibly adorable.

30 episodes is always a bit long for a TV series. As someone who watches far more Korean and Japanese dramas than Taiwanese, by the 30th episode, i'm generally pretty happy for it to be over, no matter how much I've enjoyed it. But with this, while I was still happy for it to end, I'm still looking forward to watching the sequel. I like these characters, and i want to see them through their marriage.

Definitely worth watching.

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Completed
jade
0 people found this review helpful
Aug 4, 2022
20 of 20 episodes seen
Completed 0
Overall 5.0
Story 5.5
Acting/Cast 8.0
Music 5.0
Rewatch Value 3.0
I'm just gonna come out and say I hated it. I finished it only because I kept hoping there might be more scenes of decent chemistry like the scene where they had to share a room/bed together. But nope, that was the highlight of the whole show. The FL was insufferable. By the time she started crying/whining about a puppy coming too close, I couldn't take her anymore.

The ML was too cold. It went beyond what was necessary for the trope. For example, FL kept finding herself being harassed by creeps, and ML would watch on, sometimes laughing with them. He also bullied her, which again was part of the trope, but the way the FL continued swooning and obsessing over him, even stalking him at times despite how cruel he was to her rubbed me the wrong way. She literally had no life outside of stalking this guy for years.

Pass


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It Started with a Kiss (2005) poster

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