Lyson
This review may contain spoilers
It gets there, slowly. The payoff is not bad.
In a word, I'd say this show is [entertaining].
I don't usually bother to watch Asian romance dramas because they're a dime-a-dozen imo. There's always a pretty standard cutout/copy/paste idea for female leads in Asian dramas because of the intent to keep the women portrayed as 'pure' or 'likeable' so the ML's will inevitably fall for them, which makes the genre fall flat for me. There's nothing interesting or original about basic mould characters like that. Ngl, this show did have many of those same issues, but it also managed to avoid some, which made it less frustrating to sit through.
But let's begin with;
THE GOOD;
- The ML (Ji-Sung)'s acting is an entertaining, visual and physically expressive pleasure to watch from start to finish. He took his roles and really went for it in each one. You can tell he was enjoying the challenge and he met it head on and aced it.
- While the FL didn't win me over in any major way, she wasn't aggravating and by the end, I was supportive of the ML and FL getting together, which is usually the whole point of a romance drama, right? So they achieved that.
- ML and FL lead chemistry seemed fine too, wasn't weird or forced. More on the sweet awkward side.
- The ML's secondary love interest was not that bad, they didn't make her totally shit. I actually kind of liked her.
- The acting of the whole cast passes muster for sure.
- The plot was actually convoluted and confusing, but not in a bad way. I actually had to rethink a few things, which I wasn't expecting.
- The show has a nice visual aesthetic, very easy on the eyes. The scenes and sets are modern and clean but not too unnatural and not too bright, with a good wardrobe department outfitting everyone suitably and the make up on the men and women isn't overdone either.
- Even though the crux of this show seems to be a cheesy childhood love turned adult romance, there was plenty else going on that it didn't make it eye rolling.
- It's funny. I always appreciate any show that can deliver some humor.
- The personalities are all quite interesting and are mostly well fleshed out.
THE BAD
- As Yo Na says, the FL is LOUD (loud, loud). Randomly and often unnecessarily. Also, the way she cries is very, uh, for lack of a better word, I'd say, unnattractive. It's like how a kid cries when they can't get their way, so they'll just burst into tears and stand or sit and openly, loudly cry and sniff and cry and scrunch their face up. That's how she cries. Maybe they cast her to cry like that because they thought it was cute? It's not cute. This made it very hard to feel bad for her in those moments.
- The music is not bad to listen to, except when it's played six times in an hour long episode and very loudly for very long during every single 'moment' the characters are having. Whether it's good or bad, the music just plays and plays and plays and NO. Editor, please pick your moments. 9 out of 10 emotional scenes were stifled by the music playing. Again, it made it hard for me to feel bad for the ML and FL during their emotional struggles and successes.
- The show has way too many episodes and a lot (I MEAN A LOT) of time is taken up by drawn out looks, exaggerated lean ins and flashback after flashback after flashback and more flashbacks. Again, editors, pick your moments. Shoving a flashback scene of a sad moment in my face ten times in each episodes means by the time you actually bring the plot home, that scene is an eyesore and I'm itching to SKIP chunks of the never ending musical flashback montage.
- In contrast, the last two episodes feel too rushed.
- Honestly, Ri On falling fall Ri Jin makes more sense than Shin Se Gi falling for her. Ri On spent almost everyday of his life with her knowing they weren't related and developing feelings all the way into adulthood, while Shin Se Gi spent a few months playing with her as kids and never got over it. I'm not a fan of 'childhood love' in general, it's weird and feels dumb, and that particular angle in this show was no exception. But at least they made up for this by making Cha Do Hyun grow to like and then love her at a more gradual pace.
- Cha Do Hyun's father not being weak and emaciated after being in a coma for 21 years was a total fail.
THE UGLY
- Episode 18 had the dumbest most nonsensical scene I've seen in a long time. The scene where Shin Se Gi drives with Ri Jin to the warehouse to see Alex and then not only does he accept her saying she'll go in, but the fact that she offers such a stupid thing is just ridiculous. The writers were obviously trying too hard to set up another 'Shin Se Gi is a badass but also a lovesick simp/Ri Jin has the power to call Do Hyun out on command' moment, which, fine, whatever, but it was too forced and unnatural in this scene to do something so plainly stupid. It would have made more sense for her to 'command' Shin Se Gi to stay put WITH HER while they both waited for Ahn to show up, then she could have gone in with Ahn if she wanted Shin Se Gi to stay outside, not go in by herself like what idiot girl would suggest such a stupid thing??? She's not a cop or trained to do something like that. Ugh. I was already 18 eps in though, or I swear, if it'd happened earlier I might have bailed. That's just bad form on the writers' part. Don't try so hard to create hardships bonding moments between your leads, there's a lot to be said for organically developed scenarios. That was not one of them. It was like Shin Se Gi lost his balls and brain in three seconds flat letting her go in there alone.
OVERALL
It's not a bad watch in the end. It's actually fun and entertaining if you have the patience for so many long eps in this genre. I won't ever watch it again though, because it's exhaustively long and I wasn't invested tbh. I didn't actually catch any feels for the characters even after so many episodes which is not a winning feature of a drama. So, you know, watch it once for the heck of it, or if you like long drawn out slow build cheesy romances that you know will have a happy ending, or if you really like Ji Sung.
HIGHLIGHTS:
- Shin Se Gi dramatically saying "If you won't have me, don't touch me." and pushing Ri Jin's hands off him like a diva. What a character! xD
- Ri On meeting an actual woman named Yo Na and being traumatized enough to run away .
- Cha Do Hyun's grandmother finally smiling at him.
- Shin Se Gi and Yo Na are very memorable characters throughout.
I don't usually bother to watch Asian romance dramas because they're a dime-a-dozen imo. There's always a pretty standard cutout/copy/paste idea for female leads in Asian dramas because of the intent to keep the women portrayed as 'pure' or 'likeable' so the ML's will inevitably fall for them, which makes the genre fall flat for me. There's nothing interesting or original about basic mould characters like that. Ngl, this show did have many of those same issues, but it also managed to avoid some, which made it less frustrating to sit through.
But let's begin with;
THE GOOD;
- The ML (Ji-Sung)'s acting is an entertaining, visual and physically expressive pleasure to watch from start to finish. He took his roles and really went for it in each one. You can tell he was enjoying the challenge and he met it head on and aced it.
- While the FL didn't win me over in any major way, she wasn't aggravating and by the end, I was supportive of the ML and FL getting together, which is usually the whole point of a romance drama, right? So they achieved that.
- ML and FL lead chemistry seemed fine too, wasn't weird or forced. More on the sweet awkward side.
- The ML's secondary love interest was not that bad, they didn't make her totally shit. I actually kind of liked her.
- The acting of the whole cast passes muster for sure.
- The plot was actually convoluted and confusing, but not in a bad way. I actually had to rethink a few things, which I wasn't expecting.
- The show has a nice visual aesthetic, very easy on the eyes. The scenes and sets are modern and clean but not too unnatural and not too bright, with a good wardrobe department outfitting everyone suitably and the make up on the men and women isn't overdone either.
- Even though the crux of this show seems to be a cheesy childhood love turned adult romance, there was plenty else going on that it didn't make it eye rolling.
- It's funny. I always appreciate any show that can deliver some humor.
- The personalities are all quite interesting and are mostly well fleshed out.
THE BAD
- As Yo Na says, the FL is LOUD (loud, loud). Randomly and often unnecessarily. Also, the way she cries is very, uh, for lack of a better word, I'd say, unnattractive. It's like how a kid cries when they can't get their way, so they'll just burst into tears and stand or sit and openly, loudly cry and sniff and cry and scrunch their face up. That's how she cries. Maybe they cast her to cry like that because they thought it was cute? It's not cute. This made it very hard to feel bad for her in those moments.
- The music is not bad to listen to, except when it's played six times in an hour long episode and very loudly for very long during every single 'moment' the characters are having. Whether it's good or bad, the music just plays and plays and plays and NO. Editor, please pick your moments. 9 out of 10 emotional scenes were stifled by the music playing. Again, it made it hard for me to feel bad for the ML and FL during their emotional struggles and successes.
- The show has way too many episodes and a lot (I MEAN A LOT) of time is taken up by drawn out looks, exaggerated lean ins and flashback after flashback after flashback and more flashbacks. Again, editors, pick your moments. Shoving a flashback scene of a sad moment in my face ten times in each episodes means by the time you actually bring the plot home, that scene is an eyesore and I'm itching to SKIP chunks of the never ending musical flashback montage.
- In contrast, the last two episodes feel too rushed.
- Honestly, Ri On falling fall Ri Jin makes more sense than Shin Se Gi falling for her. Ri On spent almost everyday of his life with her knowing they weren't related and developing feelings all the way into adulthood, while Shin Se Gi spent a few months playing with her as kids and never got over it. I'm not a fan of 'childhood love' in general, it's weird and feels dumb, and that particular angle in this show was no exception. But at least they made up for this by making Cha Do Hyun grow to like and then love her at a more gradual pace.
- Cha Do Hyun's father not being weak and emaciated after being in a coma for 21 years was a total fail.
THE UGLY
- Episode 18 had the dumbest most nonsensical scene I've seen in a long time. The scene where Shin Se Gi drives with Ri Jin to the warehouse to see Alex and then not only does he accept her saying she'll go in, but the fact that she offers such a stupid thing is just ridiculous. The writers were obviously trying too hard to set up another 'Shin Se Gi is a badass but also a lovesick simp/Ri Jin has the power to call Do Hyun out on command' moment, which, fine, whatever, but it was too forced and unnatural in this scene to do something so plainly stupid. It would have made more sense for her to 'command' Shin Se Gi to stay put WITH HER while they both waited for Ahn to show up, then she could have gone in with Ahn if she wanted Shin Se Gi to stay outside, not go in by herself like what idiot girl would suggest such a stupid thing??? She's not a cop or trained to do something like that. Ugh. I was already 18 eps in though, or I swear, if it'd happened earlier I might have bailed. That's just bad form on the writers' part. Don't try so hard to create hardships bonding moments between your leads, there's a lot to be said for organically developed scenarios. That was not one of them. It was like Shin Se Gi lost his balls and brain in three seconds flat letting her go in there alone.
OVERALL
It's not a bad watch in the end. It's actually fun and entertaining if you have the patience for so many long eps in this genre. I won't ever watch it again though, because it's exhaustively long and I wasn't invested tbh. I didn't actually catch any feels for the characters even after so many episodes which is not a winning feature of a drama. So, you know, watch it once for the heck of it, or if you like long drawn out slow build cheesy romances that you know will have a happy ending, or if you really like Ji Sung.
HIGHLIGHTS:
- Shin Se Gi dramatically saying "If you won't have me, don't touch me." and pushing Ri Jin's hands off him like a diva. What a character! xD
- Ri On meeting an actual woman named Yo Na and being traumatized enough to run away .
- Cha Do Hyun's grandmother finally smiling at him.
- Shin Se Gi and Yo Na are very memorable characters throughout.
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