julwa

Overall, this drama was actually quite enjoyable to watch. Personally, I never found it boring (although I do think the evil spirit storyline was stretched out a little), and I found the plot itself interesting. However, there were some things that could have been handled a bit better. Certain aspects had some plot holes, and especially the side storylines were often introduced and then simply dropped instead of being developed further.

I’ll start with the main couple - Park Seong A & Bae Gyeon U. First of all, I have to mention that they both became my favorite characters. I absolutely loved how she was so open, crazy, and positive, while he was her complete opposite. My heart melted whenever I saw him start experiencing genuine happiness around her - happiness he truly deserved. One slight negative for me is that we didn’t get to see enough of them during their genuinely happy moments, but their relationship was definitely the most enjoyable part of the drama. On the surface, it was a sweet first love without unnecessary arguments, but they still faced difficulties where both of them genuinely wanted what was best for the other person and wanted them to be happy.

I also want to stay on the subject of Bae Gyeon U for a moment. I think his family storyline could have been developed much better. As far as I remember, there was one really powerful scene where the hatred was shown, but afterward I really missed seeing more of his relationship with his parents. On top of that, he was still attending high school and wasn’t an adult, so how exactly was he living alone after his grandmother died? His grandmother’s death absolutely broke my heart, and I basically jinxed it myself because at the beginning of episode two I said to myself that I was afraid she was going to die - well, I made it to the end of episode two. And then there’s the character of Choi Hui-Na. Her storyline runs throughout the entire drama and honestly had a lot of potential. You know, something along the lines of: something terrible happened to her because of him, so now he puts up with her harassment and doesn’t want to allow himself to be happy. But the final resolution felt absurd to me and turned Bae Gyeon U into a pathetic martyr. If she was the one who caused the fire back then, why did she hate him so much? Why did she wish the worst possible things upon him? Why did he listen to her and keep answering her calls? Was she really doing all of this just because he took the blame for her? How does that make any sense?

Naturally, I have to move on to the Bong-su/Jang Yoon-boo storyline - the evil spirit. At first, I really liked him, and his scenes genuinely made me laugh. Over time, however, I started having mixed feelings about him, and I became increasingly annoyed whenever he wanted to take over Bae Gyeon U’s life. That irritation only became stronger once he actually did it. In the end, I think they stretched this storyline out a little too much and it could have been resolved sooner. Besides that, the storyline itself started losing its logic over time. How did he suddenly move from Bae Gyeon U’s body into Park Seong A’s body and then back into Bae Gyeon U’s body? The second time was supposedly in a dream, but couldn’t we have gotten some deeper explanation for how that worked? Also, if it was really that easy, they could have simply given him someone else’s body and let him live or sacrifice himself. Everyone would have been happy. On top of that, I found his romantic feelings toward Park Seong A slightly disturbing when I remembered that his soul was basically 13 years old.

I also want to stop for a moment and talk about the whole storyline involving spirits, shamanism, etc. I’ll admit that I know absolutely nothing about this subject, and this was the first drama I’ve watched with a plot like this. Personally, I really enjoyed it. Obviously, most of it was presented in a more comedic than dramatic way, but I had a genuinely great time watching it. I also want to give a special mention to Do Ryeong / “Flower Master,” because I absolutely loved his personality.

Pyo Ji Ho is a character who gave me some of the most mixed feelings I’ve had in a long time. On one hand, I liked him. He often brought a lot of humor to the drama and was generally a positive character. Especially when he became Bae Gyeon U’s amulet - I swear, that was one of my favorite moments in the entire drama. But on the other hand, he also had his irritating side: the attention-seeking, pick-me guy who desperately fought for the affection of a girl who had been showing him from the very beginning that she didn’t have feelings for him. Eventually, it just became exhausting (props to the evil spirit, who was literally the only one willing to say it out loud). I was hoping Ji Ho would eventually develop a romantic relationship with Cho Hye Ri, but unfortunately, he was written as a desperate guy until the very end.

Still on the subject of the students, I also have to say that I absolutely loved the Kim Jin Ung and Koo Do Yeon storyline. I’m still disappointed that it wasn’t developed further and that they didn’t get more screen time, because I found it absolutely hilarious how the delinquent started chasing after her because he thought she was the ghost of his dog (although I’m glad they ended up together). Kim Jin Ung himself also had a storyline that was introduced and then never developed - his family. What happened to his father and mother afterward? I know this storyline wasn’t important to the main plot, but if you’re going to introduce something like that, it would be nice to actually develop it later. They did something similar with Mo Beom’s bullying storyline. Why were those guys bullying him? And did they stop after the fight with the others? We have no idea.

The last character I’ll discuss is Yeom Hwa. She isn’t the typical villain that you simply hate. She has enough depth to her character that I often felt sorry for her - even though she pi*sed me off later :D. At the same time, I still think her character could have been developed much more. I would have loved to learn more about her past and, more importantly, what exactly she wanted to gain from the evil spirit. Did she want to bring her child back to life? Did she simply want to see her again? What exactly was her motivation and what was she trying to achieve? Because that actually matters.