Lovely Runner (2024)

A whole lot of stupid decisions and a fantastic ML

There are elements of this show that are spellbinding - such as the male lead role and acting execution. Other elements are simply exasperating. Just when you think the main female character will stop making ridiculous decisions - she goes on to make yet another one. This never-ending cycle of irrational and frequently stupid decisions over apparently several attempted lifetime stories (...I'll stop taking his calls - that will stop him from trying to find me..) is what makes the show hard to get through. The chemistry is there and the top-line storyline is interesting but many elements just make this frequently aggravating and unpleasant to watch. The fact that this show has such hype on social media has left me somewhat bewildered.

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I Feel unsatisfied

The storyline started off great for the first 5 episodes. I was thinking "Wow this is great, I am invested in this" Then for some reason, it took a nose dive and I ended up fast-forwarding from episodes 8- 16.
Reasons:

1) I saw and felt ML love and obsession for FL. He was too into her if you ask me. Every time he saw her name, saw her, she called him or she seemed to be in trouble he would drop everything and go with her or stalk her.
Kind of weird how a cute/attractive teenager and adult never likes or has a crush on another woman in all that time.
Anyway, I felt his love for the FL. He portrayed the love, obsession, and angst very well.

2) The FL lead did not portray the love nor I don't think she said it ( as far as I can recall from all the fast-forwarding I did) that she loved the ML. She said she liked him a lot during the college time frame I believe and he said " I love you" but I never heard her say she loved him.
She treated him as if she was still just a fan, just like him as a fan, and wanted to, of course, save him from being killed. The FL portrayed the crying emotions, worry, teenage crush on that 2nd ML, and anxiousness to find the killer very well. But, to my eye and feeling she did not seem to portray the love it seems they were trying to portray she should feel even in the present time frame.
She did not show angst/yearning for ML when they could not be together or were apart. It was like they have cutesy moments, she gets distracted with a shiny ball/interest, and then she puts him out of her mind. It is the ML who is constantly making an effort to contact her to stay in her orbit.

3) Also why does she still seem like she has only the thoughts/experiences of a teenager when she went back in time as a late 20's/30 year old. I know she was in a wheelchair for a while etc.. but her hearing/seeing and experience of human experiences should not still be of a teenager. Romantic relationships yes, she did not have those experiences in the present time. I don't know. It frustrated me how they wrote the FL lead lines and how she acted it out. Did she put her " savior" ML on a pedestal as an adult when she was a fan and did not have romantic fantasies about him? I know she was in a wheelchair and did not think it was possible to date anyone, but most female fans still have romantic notions about male celebrities. That is where her " liking' him should have a head start in the feelings moving on to love when she goes back in time with all her memories and feelings intact.

4) Also are they trying to say that teenage FL and adult FL switch places in the same time frame when the adult version goes back to being a teenager? Like the same day? That is why she dated and still has a soft spot for 2ML? They could have kept that just as friendship and developed her feelings for ML even more. It just made it weird/icky that she kept hanging around ML, while dating 2ML and ML did not mind ( actually sought her out ) doing activities together knowing she was dating 2ML.

Anyway, it was okay, I don't get the hype. I am waiting for the ML to have a costar who complements him well as his partner and gives their all. Strong Girl Book Soon (or whatever it is called) and this one, did not have a good FL chemistry and or storyline.

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cansei :(

as viagens do tempo sem sentido, os flashbacks desnecessários, a falta de lógica e a construção rasa do vilão me cansaram e eu não consegui terminar :(

mas no início eu realmente me diverti muito com a história do casal principal e adorei cada personagem.

acho que como comédia romântica ele cumpre razoavelmente o papel porque a protagonista passa pelas situações mais constrangedoras possíveis e as cenas do casal são ótimas.

acho uma pena sabe, tinha potencial. se as viagens no tempo tivessem uma lógica, se o vilão fosse bem construído eu acredito que seria uns 8,5/10

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A show for a non imaginative viewer. Waste of good acting

Let me contribute to give this 9.2 show the rating it truly deserves. I gave it a 3. 2 stars for two amazing actors and 1 star for good OSTs.

This is literally my first review, I wouldnt mind to make one anywhere but I just had to considering it's just such an insult to mislead people to open MDL and see that this show is above 9.

16 episodes of one dimensional writing, unintelligent dialogue and literally zero character arc or development. This is not hating I swear. But I imagine that if you watch this show with your eyes open it might just be the best romcom ever then you suddently open your brain and start to see many missing components of a story. A short sighted story but the writer decided to confuse viewers that it's a long one. From the leads to the supporting characters we never know anything about the characters themselves because they dont share with other characters or the viewers atleast, their humane thoughts.

Kdramas really need to stop with their murder mystery as the conflict or else i'm gonna lose it. This drama did not even bother to give the villain a motivation nor any background. He's just labeled as psycopathic but it's literally just an excuse for lazy writing. Moving on.

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Overdid the time travel

To my surprise there wasn’t much to the story. It was quite plain. The writer didn’t overcomplicate the time travel theme which is good but it doesn’t mean there can’t be interesting factors in the plot. The writer didn’t think out of the box much Simply put I lost interest several times while watching the show.

I don’t care about how the time travel(the watch) worked. I liked the simplicity of it but story was too monotonous. There were no “wow” moments. Sol could time travel many times as she wanted so what’s the catch here? Time travel lost the charm simply by overdoing it and coming back with the same problems. Why drag the show for that long! It could’ve easily been a 12 episode drama. Too many filler episodes.

The 2nd lead guy didn’t had much relevance in the story or on sol’s choices same as many other characters !! The comedy had off timing. One moment something serious was happening and the next moment something totally lame. Sol herself wasn’t serious. As the main character she was lacking and wasn’t doing anything sensible that will make you support her.
Sunjae on the other hand was portraying a “boy in love” and we loved him. Mostly bcz he was unaware of what was going on. He was loveable character. But I can’t say that about Sol. Overall it was okay but bit boring.

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An amazing start, but...

1. Something about "fix me" stories as it relates to people with disabilities just doesn't sit right with me, I was hoping the part of the story about the FL being a wheelchair user would return, at the very least because it was wrapped very quickly, but instead it was mainly used to further the plot, with few moments focused on representation, which was disappointing.

2. The serial killer plot dragged on for sooooo long and it ended in such an anticlimactic way, it felt like in the end the writer didn't know what to do with the guy.

3. The constant timeline changes killed the momentum, especially the last one because I absolutely despise the amnesia trope, I find it usually useless because it puts a stop at the character/relationship development.

All of that means that if the drama was shorter, around 12 episodes, some of the issues with the storytelling could have been resolved, at least for me. All in all though, I did enjoy the lead couple immensely, no matter the little things I disliked, their chemistry always made up for it in the end.

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Plot is quite weak and repetitive it's an alright drama I don't know what is all the hype about it

Alright let me tell you there is already a lot of dramas with second chances time travelling and going back to save there loved ones but this one just gets on my nerves the plot just keep repeating they keep time traveling it's quite annoying it's like they keep serving us the same dish in different plates and I don't know I found the female character quite cringe trying to act cute not only that her character is quite dumb and she does everything without thinking I felt second hand embarrassment for her even in the last tae sung saved sun jae she just time travelled for nothing plus what was that truck driver motive for killing sun jae like writer just wanted to end the drama so bad she left so many plot holes and cliches and the only thing I can say is that the drama hype is all because of byeon woo seok just check insta and half of the edits of this drama is about him

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Still undeserving high rating. Show has a negative message

9.1 is crazy high. Show still needs a rating for what it truly deserves

This show being in the same position like some of the few 9 above rated shows in this site seems like an insult. Try checking the other 9 above rated ones here and I wouldnt complain. God, there's even lower rated dramas that deserved a 9 but didnt make it. I recently just rewatched Story of Yanxi Palace too ( best c-drama) and that show is stuck at 8.8 here. Then i'll just give my own opinion of what I've digested from this show as to feel validated for this trouble.

The Good:
OST, Attractive and talented main actors (BWS is the clickbait of the show), good editing. Thats it.
The Bad:
Storytelling, Characters, and Moral story.

Storytelling:
No need to talk about the good, let's start with the bad. The plot of lovely runner has been done many times and is simple as it gets, I was actually curious how they would execute it as long as it holds out. Story was solid, not unique but alright. It wasn't a standout time travel plot like taiwanese drama 'Someday but Oneday' but Lovely Runner need none of it since all they had to do was to be consistent in story telling, but thats the first disappointment. Storytelling of the show was dead and non cohesive. They introduced our depressed female lead had a disability, then our kpop idol male lead who had a mysterious regret. Great start but for some reason they abandoned this part to the point where everything later on is just shrugged off literally because everything becomes solved with our plot device called time travel.
Throughout episodes 2-16 the show literally forgot the story introduction and became a forced love till death do us apart story instead of like showing us how our main leads cope with their initial problem then later on learning how to love because it was instantly solved with the continuous time travel. She had a disability, well one time travel later it's fixed! and goes on to never ponder about it again. He had a troublesome regret, well one time travel later it's fixed! and never ponders about it again. Same goes to the side characters, they had a problem before, well one time travel later it's fixed! Sure. Genuinely theres nothing wrong with time travel and making it as a solution to the plot's conflict and LR isnt the only one doing it but LR is taking the wrong path and it's proven towards the end. Our main leads literally did not suffer consequential matters that were done by time travel cause it was fixed again and again. It's like LR is a water filled transparent vase that keeps on getting broken and the writer keeps on putting a patch to seal it. As to why this is problematic, I talk about it later down on the moral story of the show. Let's move on to the characters.

Characters:
One dimensional characters to the point where they were written to be perfect for each other. Too perfect perhaps. When they genuinely have interaction, we never get a gist of their human thoughts because it will be used as filler time to put fluff romance and unintelligent dialogue, same goes to the other characters. Like I said, the story itself wasn't difficult so the plot should've been the characters but they were just given dead and unrealistic characteristics. What goes on FL's mind besides the ML? and etc. Basically they were written to be fated and meant for each other 'cause they gave us the reason why but the show spare zero effort to give us a reason how.
Let's not even start with the villain. It already has the trope that is rampant in Kdramas, the mysterious killer. But the mysterious killer isn't so mysterious because he's literally a random with no background that was given an excuse to be psychopathic but turns out to just be lazy writing. Atleast other kdrama dared to give their mysterious serial killer to be mysterious and even given a acceptable motive.

Moral story:
Earlier I mentioned how time travel was used as a plot device for fixing the problems this show has and why it's bad. The main reason is because Lovely Runner's story and conclusion made us feel that way. Time travel dramas would give the viewers a message that going back in time would be consequential and morally give a message.
Last year, Twinkling Watermelon aired and also introduced time travel. There, the main leads get caught up to the past of their parents. This experience led them into their character development and eventually the conclusion of the show. The leads wanted to change the present but was lead to the inevitable. None of the things that happened in their time travel changed the literal present timeline but instead what ended up changing is our main characters and how they view themselves and their parents. This is how you leave positive a message for your story. Think again, why did China ban time travel dramas, they did it to not confuse the mass as they think it leaves a bad message. So recent C-drama time travel would come up with ways to make sure it doesn't conflict with the ban.
Lovely Runner's plot has an unhealthy message. The biggest no was when they bypassed through Im Sol's disability just like that using time travel and never to be explored ever again. The story couldve used this opportunity to simply give Im Sol the moment to cope and live on through this disability to leave out a positive message. It's such a negative outlook to such problems that if you're ill fated then all you need to basically change your fate is with a simple time travel and fix problems easily like that, no room for acceptance whatsoever.

Still Lovely Runner, without the criticism should still be a solid 7.5. Despite all, the fluff and romance is definitely the best in recent k-drama release. I just hope people carefully digest a show before easily handing out 10s in MDL.

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