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It's Okay to Not Be Okay korean drama review
Completed
It's Okay to Not Be Okay
0 people found this review helpful
by crystalhydra
Aug 31, 2023
16 of 16 episodes seen
Completed
Overall 9.0
Story 8.5
Acting/Cast 10.0
Music 9.5
Rewatch Value 7.0
I admit it, watched it because of few edits that seemed interesting. But then I simply binged the show. The approach to shoot and tell the story in this show seems peculiar. Although you could say that it very much like other stories, we have a working place romance and they also come to her house at one point, with the difference that the working place is a mental hospital and her living place is a huge mansion where she plays a role of a princess in a high tower.

My first surprise came from two things, Mun Young's antisocial personality disorder and Sang Tae's autism. For America it must be pretty old news, I bet there people don't realize that in other countries mental health might either not be a thing or treated very differently. I'm not from the US, so I can relate a bit to Korea on the subject. After all mental disorders are rarely talked about there, mental health issues seem to be often swept under the rug, shunned or treated with scorn, maybe people don't even believe in it. Here we don't really shy away from mental health problems, but therapists themselves are not in favor (they all act as if they have problems themselves))). So seeing them putting such things on the screen felt like a step. More than that, Sang Tae's character wasn't glorified (imo). And also Mun Young wasn't your typical FL.. more like she was the opposite at first glance.

I consider this a healing drama and to me actually Sang Tae's character represented the process. No really, just for Oh Jung Se's acting I wouldn't give this show low rating, I found his acting and his character simply amazing. The acting of others also should be praised btw, everyone did a very good job. It's just that Oh Jung Se stood out for me.
And I'll be honest here, I had never had a chance to experience for myself what it's like to know a person with autism, everything I've seen was only in different TV series and some don't glorify the image. I found myself thinking when watching Kang Tae taking care of Sang Tae - damn, this is hard, it's as if you don't belong to yourself, but belong to the other person. It felt like a heavy boulder weighed on your shoulders when you simply can't even communicate properly and often times adapt to the other person. So changes by the end in Sang Tae were more obvious. It doesn't mean that he lost his autism, but things changed.
As for Kang Tae and Mun Young.. I must admit they chose a really handsome pair. Soo Hyun is really handsome and Yae Ji is the epitome of what the say about melon seed face in the description (don't ask, I read a ton of Chinese novels and they always describe small faces as such) and has tiniest waist. She was really loud, rude and capricious, but I still liked her. Also unlike other Fls I know they really dolled her up, she didn't wear clothes, she wore money.
In general no one from the trio was completely an okay person. But it's okay to not be okay. Gotch ya.

The main part of the storyline was actually the past that weighed down on all three. So getting some answers, coming to terms with ourselves, finding ourselves being changed thanks to the other person was part of the process.

When finishing it was obvious that this show might not be for others. I wasn't part of the hype, since I'm seeeing this show basically years later, so I have no idea if the show was heavily advertised, but I can say without people shoving something to you, I chose this drama for myself and enjoyed watching it.
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