Vaishnavi
This review may contain spoilers
I started because I thought it'd be interesting and fun to watch a marriage agreement story. I had fun most of the time watching this drama. Both the actors had generally good chemistry and were great at playing their roles. The first half of the drama was especially engaging to me.However, I kind of got a bit turned off once some events occurred. I know lakorn generally include a lot of abusive/unethical/controlling or just generally bad behavior by male leads, which I was already somewhat prepared for. However, once one of the events happened which led to the female lead's pregnancy, I was really turned off. Even if I prefer there to be none in the first place, there is a limit to how much bad behavior by the male lead can be accepted or handled. I felt that this limit was crossed at a point. If that one part was not included, I would've had little problem with this show.
Getting her drunk and having sex with her because you don't want her to get a divorce - huh??? This is literally illegal, it is rape. She can't consent if she's drunk.. and they know this because they even mention it in the drama a few times. His mother tells him to not force her into marriage or sex before he does exactly that, and even the female protagonist says at one point that it was cruel of him to do what he did. No, they didn't show him physically forcing her to do anything and no she wasn't shown to be unconscious, but that doesn't make it any less wrong because she was drunk and consent was Not given. He clearly knew he was raping her as well, and she literally became pregnant due to this, so how are we supposed to skim over this?? This isn't just illegal, it's immoral and disgusting. And to top it all off, they played this off as him doing this for "love."
Honestly I was able to handle a lot of uncomfortable/borderline unethical things being shown, but once you show them having sex without her consent it was over for me. I couldn't really like the drama or take it seriously anymore.
I genuinely didn't understand or like how these characters would do unethical or pretty much illegal things in the name of "love" and all the wrong things they do are somehow justified or at least forgiven easily with little consequences. And of course the reactions to characters doing wrong things differs by gender too. If a women does something bad or even something the male lead doesn't like and receives some sort of backlash or consequence, it's all deserved, and it "makes sense" for the man to be angry at her, but if a man rapes a girl, it's all for love and he doesn't deserve to be punished.
I feel like this doesn't just give a really bad message, but it perpetuates the idea that a man can do even something illegal to a woman and still not be in the wrong for most.
I did like the last few episodes because the male lead changed his behavior and the chemistry was very nice, but there is no point in suddenly making the male lead so "nice" and sweet after they've already done all of the bad things they could. The effect on others of the male lead's bad behavior is already present, so what does "being nice" suddenly do?
The story overall seemed okay at best, and it could have flowed much smoother in many instances. Also, using rape as a way to further the storyline and the supposed love between the main characters was not very convincing to me.
The placement of and transition between the background music was not very smooth. Many times, in the same scene, the music would change from very tense to very playful. This makes it confusing for views to know how to interpret certain scenes.
Overall, this is a drama which shouldn't be taken too seriously and watched to kill time. There are a lot of fun and enjoyable instances. However, it has to be said that their portrayal of raping someone to be an act of "love" for someone is not only unnecessary but genuinely deplorable. How could you show him doing such a thing and still somehow gaining the love of the protagonist fairly easily without consequences? I feel that it's important for directors to think much much harder about what they're releasing to the public and what type of message they're giving. Normalizing or justifying rape is never acceptable, no matter what circumstance.
The only reason I didn't give this drama a lower score is only because of the good acting and more enjoyable first half. But I cannot like this drama because of the things portrayed shown in the later episodes.
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Watch for timepass only
The drama was okay overall.The actors were great. The romance was fine in general, and there was good comedy. The music was good too.
The story, however, was a bit uncomfortable to me. The main protagonist was constantly suffering, especially because of the main male lead, who had a horrible personality and bad character development. He seemingly didn't respect the protagonist and constantly looked down on her because he was richer and thought he was more intelligent. The chemistry just wasn't too great. The second lead actually respected her and showed her his feelings in a healthier way, while the main lead just acted like the protagonist was stupid and pushed her around. I just felt the transition they made from the main male lead being the "mean guy" to "lover boy" was just messy,, he just seemed like an asshole overall.
But personally it felt like both male leads were just imposing themselves on the protagonist the whole time. Either because of the direction or the acting, it seemed as if the protagonist was generally not having a good time. And in general, it just felt like the main protagonist had bad characterization. She was shallow and didn't think through her feelings-- basically they designed her to be the typical "stupid" female lead.
I guess a lot of problems I have with this drama have to do with it being a bit older, since a lot of these aspects seem to be more common in dramas released in that time, but I don't really recommend this unless you're looking for something fun to kill some time.
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You've just gotta know while going into it that this drama is like a shorter version of a classic KBS-type daily drama (eg. My Dear Cat, Cheer Up Mr. Kim ). It's not too much like a normal web series but more like a short drama.
The story is basic and filled with petty points + logic gaps. Also, it's lowkey slow, even for such a short series. Basically, it's just low quality.
The main two actors are good and also famous which is all that this drama has going for it lol. Most of the other acting was also pretty bad like the second-lead lmfaooo.
Overall, the drama is cute and quick enough to pass time. So if you're bored, go for it.
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