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When the Phone Rings korean drama review
Completed
When the Phone Rings
8 people found this review helpful
by Heracin
4 days ago
12 of 12 episodes seen
Completed
Overall 4.5
Story 3.0
Acting/Cast 6.0
Music 7.5
Rewatch Value 1.0

Hot ML could not save writing crumbling apart and annoying/badly acted FL

What started at first as a hot thriller with an enemies-to-lovers married couple and some mystery, fell quickly apart as the writing crumbled with no proper characterization and a lot of plot armor for the characters.

Even if I cannot deny the fact that the male lead was very attractive despite (or thanks to) all his caveman manners and possessiveness, he got less interesting as his motivations and choices became more absurd with some noble idiocy move that I disliked a lot. The female lead was an even worse main protagonist, that had almost no character growth. She felt like a carpet for most of the series, being dragged by the events with very little agency, wanting to help but concretely being carried by others all along the drama.

Regarding casting, Yoo Yeon Seok delivered a solid and hot performance. Despite the cringy lines he had to say and the writing sinking deeper and deeper, his acting skills shined through the screen. I unfortunately cannot say the same for his counterpart Chae Soo Bin. I was super disappointed and even irked by her acting. She had a vacant / empty expression or a sad kicked puppy look for almost the total duration of the series. Her character is written as passive and quite timid, so maybe she is not the only one to be blame for it...But she did not manage to insufflate any life into her performance making it I feel even worse than what was written in the scenario.

The production value was quite good. Nothing extraordinary in terms of directing and making but good enough for the story to be told. In addition to some support characters that I wish we had seen more, the soundtrack was the saving grace of the drama, I enjoyed it a lot overall.

I would not recommend this to people as I feel there are better thrilling romance out there. Some of the more steamy scenes are good but all that surround them is clearly not worth it. At first it was entertaining but very quickly it fell apart because of the crazy writing and insipid heroine.
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