Bite Sisters (2021)

Stylish, short, okay.

“Bite Sisters” is about three hot vampire ladies who are not sisters. Two of them run an expensive designer fashion boutique and the third is a workaholic who works at a design/art company.

❝At some moment, when even the unique temperament that flows deeply inside comes out, it eventually makes them have no choice but to bite.❞

In terms of story, Bite Sisters was boring and predictable but mostly just boring. It starts out with the fabulous vampires in 1921 Korea and transitions smoothly into present day Seoul. While there are three of them, the episodes concentrate on Han Yi Na played by Kang Han Na. The other two sisters feature in all episodes but are side characters for the most of it.

Han Yi Na is shown to be a person who cannot stand injustice as shown in the opening. The latter half of the show concentrates on how she steps in to protect a child and her mother from an abusive father. Don’t expect too much depth from this part of the story though cause you won't find it. To be honest I probably wouldn't even have noticed that Han Yi Na is a champion of justice unless it was mentioned in the synopsis itself. The story was all over the place and while grappling with the romance plot, Han Yi Na’s character arc didn’t get much focus.

❝I don’t want to put you through my death.❞

Now, the romance. It was sweet and sad. The main lead is as dumb as Bella Swan in Twilight but the romance was better here (obviously). It didn't get much time to develop but as viewers, we get all the essentials of it. How Sungmin was struck by Han Yi Na’s beauty when he first saw her 100 years ago and how he is drawn to her again in his second life. A really well done take on the romance between a mortal and an immortal.

The best part about this show were the production values. Since MDL doesn't have that parameter, I'd like to establish that this show deserves a 8.5/10 in terms of production values. The red aesthetic was super pretty. The scenes from 1921 melded with how Han Hi Na’s first romance ended. Overall Bite Sisters was gorgeous with really high visual quality.

Even the acting was great. Kang Han Na is like super gorgeous. The only thing dragging this show for me was the storyline.

Overall a 7/10. The episodes are all completely up on YouTube and it's good as a short vampire fantasy drama.

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Strong cast stuck with scattershot storytelling

Need an actor to silently glare sideways at the camera and incinerate everything in sight? Kang Han Na should be the first choice. Maybe the second and third and even the fourth too. She’s a talent as an actor in general, but at this specific thing, she’s unrivaled. That “Bite Sisters” asks her to do this on a frequent basis shows a keen sense of self-awareness, to both good and bad purposes.

The cast is a legion of stardom for a web drama. Credits of the top four billed actors include a string of recent hit shows like “Crash Landing on You”, “Start-Up”, “My Roommate is a Gumiho”, “River Where the Moon Rises”, “Be Melodramatic” and “Mystic Pop-Up Bar”. The production most takes place them in a fashion boutique giving the wardrobe crew license to deck the cast in some of the most fashionable threads the screen (web or otherwise) has seen this year. Now make the three female actors vampires to add a little supernatural twist and this well-known cast that looks amazing should be a slam dunk.

A full length drama with sixteen hour long episodes can struggle weaving more than a single storyline and their supporting characters together coherently. In a web drama with only ten episodes averaging around ten minutes, it’s madness. “Bite Sisters” has a backstory, an arc where Yi Na (the main character played by Kang Han Na) blows up as an influencer on social media, there’s the youngest of the three vampires Ji Yeon who has multiple issues at her job outside the boutique, Yi Na’s old flame has been reincarnated, a cheating boyfriend of a customer, a young girl with a terrible father and even a neighbor lady that’s trying to feed a street cat. It’s a stew of undercooked, overused themes that don’t really get any fresh treatment. Instead of a show about all of these things, it’s much closer to a show about nothing because none of the narratives end up with a fraction of the depth necessary to engage a viewer.

Give it a good silent sideways glare because “Bite Sisters” is terrific eye candy. But it’s just a shiny veneer without any substance beneath the surface.

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