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Heather Branson

Heather Branson

Remembrance of Things Past chinese drama review
Completed
Remembrance of Things Past
0 people found this review helpful
by Heather Branson
May 21, 2023
12 of 12 episodes seen
Completed
Overall 9.5
Story 10.0
Acting/Cast 9.0
Music 9.0
Rewatch Value 10.0

a not so simple slice of life drama that is well worth the watch

First I want to let people know that there should be a warning of some kind before you start the drama if you are depressed or suffer from SI, this is not a show you can probably safely watch. I think it could be very triggering for people if they have zero clue that there are multiple scenes dealing with those issues and not really any warning that it's going to happen before they start watching it. Literally the first scenes of the first episode starts and the final scene of the first episode ends with that issue.

This drama really was a small clip of a year in the life of these people, it made me feel like we were a part of their friend group by the end of the series. Very well done and I really felt connected with their lives, emotions, dreams, and pains.

Each episode is about an hour and 15 minutes long, but to me they sped past incredibly fast, so much that I needed to pause and take it all in instead of bingeing it rapidly like I normally do. There are only 12 episodes but there is so much story packed into each one that it feels like you've watched a movie and a half by the end of each episode.

There was only 2 things I felt could have been done differently. The first episode or two included some flashbacks that were a little confusing and I wondered it the whole show was going to be like that, jumping forward to the present and then a scene later jumping back. It wasn't like that, just they needed to fill in some of the background and that's what the writers chose to do, it did feel a little out of place at times but thankfully that feeling only lasted a brief time in the overall drama. The second thing was in episode 10 or 11, there was big fight between two different couples that was basically occuring at the same time. The director chose to jump from one scene to the other, one couple to the other. The two couples were fighting about different things, so it didn't make sense to me why they kept jumping so quickly back and forth. I had a hard time connecting emotionally with the feelings of the couples because I was trying so hard to figure out what was happening between each set. I think this probably didn't feel jarring or out of place for those who speak the language, but for those of us who have to read the subtitles and then look up at the character's faces to gauge the emotions ect, it felt there wasn't enough time to read and then look and then suddenly we were at the scene of the other couple. Maybe it was just me that had that problem but I did have to pause the big arguing scenes to break it down and figure out who was mad at who and why and if they were or weren't justified...that was a little bit that took me out of the drama and more focused on the editing choices.

Even with the heavy topic and the 2 editing decisions I might have chosen differently, I still have to give this a VERY high score and also highly recommend that you give it a try. It's worth the emotional investment in my opinion.

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