B-list acting and story cringe-fest. But apparently it "hits new high". What a joke :))))
I don't remember the exact numbers but you can find the article on MDL. "New highs"= 6%. Comparatively, "Perfect Crown" had 11% or something like that. But hey, the clickbait works. And most viewers think "highest means good, right?" anyway :))
So, this is going to be a very short review. Finally.
Visuals. Everything's on low settings. Colour palette, cinematography, vfx. Everything. And no, the "hand-drawn cute vfx" while ED, it doesn't count. It literally takes you (at most) 2 minutes to select the necessary brush, to draw, to mask, to apply the custom effect, to hit save, per image.
** Honorable mention. The character takes a bath, wants to send a message by smartphone. Usually we get different methods like compositing, overlayer etc of messages or phone display over the original image. You know, half screen is the phone, half the character typing. Or bubbles with text. Stuff like that. Well, this drama did something fking brilliant, just for that one scene. Because of the hot water and the steamy room, they could make the message appear looking like an invisible finger draws the letters on a fogged window. The fact that the message was very short also helped. But the idea was awesome. The second nice thing visually, the music box looked amazing.**
Audio. Poor sound design. From OP to the normal tracks. Sometimes it worked, but most of the scenes were lousy, so... Also, this sound design is used mostly like a way of manipulating the audience as to what the scene is about. Bad comedy? Just add some quirky track and make it seem like something high-quality funny is actually on. Heavy track = tension. And so on and so forth. It doesn't matter if the things on screen will make you feel/think certain way, the tracks will give you a queue as to how you MUST feel. Another mention: the ED theme was decent. Or not bad.
Sht writing. Sht directing. Nothing makes sense, everything is a plot device and plot contrivance. "It just so happened that....". Thats all there is to it. Especially when its about the "bad guy". Its like any bad guy was like a child compared to him. The amount of domino pieces falling as intended is staggering. Oh, should I also mention her "6th sense" schtick that they make a big deal about (with lots of examples) and thats used as a plot device in the first few episodes but then completely discarded later? More so when a couple of "something big" happen in the later episodes, and those things should've activated her "sense" at full power. But then the script would've been screwed and we can't have that. Amazing writing quality, isn't it? *sigh*
About the script, every dialogue is an out loud monologue, sometimes even an expository one. Sometimes it doesn't even make sense as "words on paper". It just wants to sound... , I don't know, grand, or smart, or something. To give it gravitas? But only sometimes, because most of the times is just sht writing.
The so-called acting is reduced to "act like a Jack Sparrow. No, more leaning. More. Thats it. Now you surely seem a noblewoman". Yes, again, there are a few good scenes of good acting from some very few actors, but thats because of the actors itself, not the director or the script. Tiny mannerisms and such. It gets a little bit better towards the end, but just a tiny bit, so it doesn't really matter. And also it raises other questions. Like, Was the bad acting intentional because of the directing, or what? How? Anyway.
Plus, lots and lots of plots and subplots that go nowhere. And we still have no idea what all that was about until the end. Oh, I'll put it here, because it doesn't matter: it got worse as time went by, sure, with the last 4 being horrible,and the last 2 in special were horrendous. Besides the fact that I knew it was the last week of torture, it felt boring and horrendous because magic bullsht was the writer's answer to everything. I'm not joking. Magic/spiritism/whatever you wanna call it. Suddenly it can grant wishes to end a shtshow (I wish). *sigh*
** Some examples. "The Writer: how can we create nonsensical drama? Oh, I know, lets make her "get lost" on a well lit road. Hmm, yes, lets make her go off-road for no fkin logical reason". Thats the kind of writing we have here. The writer's only solution is to make the character ret***ed every time there's need for drama. That same scene has even more idiotic stuff happening. Lost, but she is saved and leaves by herself in a random direction (I've checked, its not the one he came from). So, lost but not really. All that drama was for nothing.... Or a scene happens. We get "his" and our pov, later we get "hers". But they actually were two very different filming. It is supposed to be some sort of manipulative editing, but its on the level of Glass Onion. As in, it never happened, we can clearly see what happens the first time, later, all that sht that supposedly its what really happened is invented. And then, one minute later, he has a flashback, remembering what? The first version, the one that we saw the first time.... This level of idiocy is mind-boggling. Like I said: sht writing, directing, acting.**
Most of its comedy is cringe. That low iq comedy you find in this kind of drama. Yeah, there were also a few, very few, good jokes there too. But mostly, the usual slop of low comedy. "See? Because different time, she doesn't know the modern things and the way she acts. See? Its funny. Pls laugh".
Same for romance. No chemistry, no matter who we're talking about. Poor script (again). The main's pair is reduced to: "We can't, who do you think you are? Ok, fine, I'll accept and go with the flow. We can't. Ok, fine, I'll accept it. We can't. Ok, fine...." *sigh* Basically, you start the episode with "don't wanna see you", then it gets to "why weren't you here, near me?", the second half is "I must leave anyway", then it ends with "I thought I could but I can't...". Do you understand? All in just one episode... Unfortunately, the whole season does not contain just one episode... *double sigh* To be fair, the whole episode might've covered one week or one month, we don't know....
No character development, no world building. Sht pacing. As in stuff just happens, for the sake of happening. At one point, apparently two weeks passed and I had no idea. Luckily the ML told us. So, something might happen, no one talks or does anything about it for any time they want, everyone else also forget about that fact, "suddenly" it is 2 weeks later, and "suddenly" everyone remembers and starts reacting.... Now imagine the rest of the show, when we're NOT told abut time lapses, but it does happen. And so on and so forth. Yes, later we find that 3 months has passed, but my previous point still stands.
You get the gist. So, a rating of 3. Not recommended, no rewatch value. No nothing. If someone said or gave it a rating higher than 6 (this was never mid-quality, but lets pretend), they are trolling you. Or they have mental issues. If you like someone from the cast, just watch/rewatch some of their other works.
Btw, I'm talking about quality, not enjoyment. All reviews should be about quality, and yes, you can even like bad media, there's nothing wrong with that (aka "my guilty pleasure").
Don't just "Omg, I loved the actors. I loved every second of this kdrama". Maybe you enjoy this media, but you also enjoy hitting puppies. We don't know what kind of person you are. So a review should be about its quality, not just your opinions...
Have a lovely evening.
So, this is going to be a very short review. Finally.
Visuals. Everything's on low settings. Colour palette, cinematography, vfx. Everything. And no, the "hand-drawn cute vfx" while ED, it doesn't count. It literally takes you (at most) 2 minutes to select the necessary brush, to draw, to mask, to apply the custom effect, to hit save, per image.
** Honorable mention. The character takes a bath, wants to send a message by smartphone. Usually we get different methods like compositing, overlayer etc of messages or phone display over the original image. You know, half screen is the phone, half the character typing. Or bubbles with text. Stuff like that. Well, this drama did something fking brilliant, just for that one scene. Because of the hot water and the steamy room, they could make the message appear looking like an invisible finger draws the letters on a fogged window. The fact that the message was very short also helped. But the idea was awesome. The second nice thing visually, the music box looked amazing.**
Audio. Poor sound design. From OP to the normal tracks. Sometimes it worked, but most of the scenes were lousy, so... Also, this sound design is used mostly like a way of manipulating the audience as to what the scene is about. Bad comedy? Just add some quirky track and make it seem like something high-quality funny is actually on. Heavy track = tension. And so on and so forth. It doesn't matter if the things on screen will make you feel/think certain way, the tracks will give you a queue as to how you MUST feel. Another mention: the ED theme was decent. Or not bad.
Sht writing. Sht directing. Nothing makes sense, everything is a plot device and plot contrivance. "It just so happened that....". Thats all there is to it. Especially when its about the "bad guy". Its like any bad guy was like a child compared to him. The amount of domino pieces falling as intended is staggering. Oh, should I also mention her "6th sense" schtick that they make a big deal about (with lots of examples) and thats used as a plot device in the first few episodes but then completely discarded later? More so when a couple of "something big" happen in the later episodes, and those things should've activated her "sense" at full power. But then the script would've been screwed and we can't have that. Amazing writing quality, isn't it? *sigh*
About the script, every dialogue is an out loud monologue, sometimes even an expository one. Sometimes it doesn't even make sense as "words on paper". It just wants to sound... , I don't know, grand, or smart, or something. To give it gravitas? But only sometimes, because most of the times is just sht writing.
The so-called acting is reduced to "act like a Jack Sparrow. No, more leaning. More. Thats it. Now you surely seem a noblewoman". Yes, again, there are a few good scenes of good acting from some very few actors, but thats because of the actors itself, not the director or the script. Tiny mannerisms and such. It gets a little bit better towards the end, but just a tiny bit, so it doesn't really matter. And also it raises other questions. Like, Was the bad acting intentional because of the directing, or what? How? Anyway.
Plus, lots and lots of plots and subplots that go nowhere. And we still have no idea what all that was about until the end. Oh, I'll put it here, because it doesn't matter: it got worse as time went by, sure, with the last 4 being horrible,and the last 2 in special were horrendous. Besides the fact that I knew it was the last week of torture, it felt boring and horrendous because magic bullsht was the writer's answer to everything. I'm not joking. Magic/spiritism/whatever you wanna call it. Suddenly it can grant wishes to end a shtshow (I wish). *sigh*
** Some examples. "The Writer: how can we create nonsensical drama? Oh, I know, lets make her "get lost" on a well lit road. Hmm, yes, lets make her go off-road for no fkin logical reason". Thats the kind of writing we have here. The writer's only solution is to make the character ret***ed every time there's need for drama. That same scene has even more idiotic stuff happening. Lost, but she is saved and leaves by herself in a random direction (I've checked, its not the one he came from). So, lost but not really. All that drama was for nothing.... Or a scene happens. We get "his" and our pov, later we get "hers". But they actually were two very different filming. It is supposed to be some sort of manipulative editing, but its on the level of Glass Onion. As in, it never happened, we can clearly see what happens the first time, later, all that sht that supposedly its what really happened is invented. And then, one minute later, he has a flashback, remembering what? The first version, the one that we saw the first time.... This level of idiocy is mind-boggling. Like I said: sht writing, directing, acting.**
Most of its comedy is cringe. That low iq comedy you find in this kind of drama. Yeah, there were also a few, very few, good jokes there too. But mostly, the usual slop of low comedy. "See? Because different time, she doesn't know the modern things and the way she acts. See? Its funny. Pls laugh".
Same for romance. No chemistry, no matter who we're talking about. Poor script (again). The main's pair is reduced to: "We can't, who do you think you are? Ok, fine, I'll accept and go with the flow. We can't. Ok, fine, I'll accept it. We can't. Ok, fine...." *sigh* Basically, you start the episode with "don't wanna see you", then it gets to "why weren't you here, near me?", the second half is "I must leave anyway", then it ends with "I thought I could but I can't...". Do you understand? All in just one episode... Unfortunately, the whole season does not contain just one episode... *double sigh* To be fair, the whole episode might've covered one week or one month, we don't know....
No character development, no world building. Sht pacing. As in stuff just happens, for the sake of happening. At one point, apparently two weeks passed and I had no idea. Luckily the ML told us. So, something might happen, no one talks or does anything about it for any time they want, everyone else also forget about that fact, "suddenly" it is 2 weeks later, and "suddenly" everyone remembers and starts reacting.... Now imagine the rest of the show, when we're NOT told abut time lapses, but it does happen. And so on and so forth. Yes, later we find that 3 months has passed, but my previous point still stands.
You get the gist. So, a rating of 3. Not recommended, no rewatch value. No nothing. If someone said or gave it a rating higher than 6 (this was never mid-quality, but lets pretend), they are trolling you. Or they have mental issues. If you like someone from the cast, just watch/rewatch some of their other works.
Btw, I'm talking about quality, not enjoyment. All reviews should be about quality, and yes, you can even like bad media, there's nothing wrong with that (aka "my guilty pleasure").
Don't just "Omg, I loved the actors. I loved every second of this kdrama". Maybe you enjoy this media, but you also enjoy hitting puppies. We don't know what kind of person you are. So a review should be about its quality, not just your opinions...
Have a lovely evening.
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