Wholesome Story, Excellent Acting, Great Pacing

Where do I even start? I came across this show serendipitously after watching Roy Chiu in Man in Love and boy do I not regret it.

The story follows the life of Qiu Dong Na who despite having grown up poor is aiming to become a certified accountant. We follow her ups and downs as she joins the corporate world as an intern after college, and hopes to make a name for herself.

First, let’s talk about the characters as a whole and then we’ll take a look at the two main characters, Qiu Dong Na and Gu Fei.

Before this one, I’d never seen such a humanistic take on characters in C-dramas. Every single character has very honest and realistic flaws. No character is shown as being perfect or as having it all together. No one is cancelled for making a mistake or for coming short. On the contrary, we are shown what it looks like to grow and to learn alongside people who are willing to support and love us despite our fallibilities.

This show doesn’t present this frail and incapable female character who relies on her boss in order to obtain what she wants. Instead, we are introduced to Qiu Dong Na who is nothing less of a brilliant, capable, creative, and hard-working genius. She is young, and yet she knows exactly what she wants, how she wants it to look like, and the lengths through which she will go through in order to achieve it. Qiu Dong Na is like a sponge, willing to absorb all the knowledge she can get from those who are more knowledgeable than her. She is strong and has a deep set of values that she is unwilling to trade for all the gold in the world. She is kind, introspective, curious, funny, helpful and immensely reliable. She’s deeply involved in all of her interpersonal relationships and doesn’t favour one relationship over the other. Qiu Dong Na is most definitely not the type of friend who will ditch you for a guy! She is a great friend, a great girlfriend, a great colleague, and even a great daughter.

This very well-written character could not have been brought to life without a great actress. Vicky Chen who I believe was only 17 when she filmed this drama is most definitely an actress to look out for. If this is what she’s able to do at 17, I cannot wait to see how her skills will evolve in 10 years!

As for our male lead, Gu Fei… Ah, what a good, and posh-looking man. I was swooning for this man during the entirety of this show. Gu Fei is obviously a genius, he’s kind, helpful, and witty with just the right amount of sassiness. Fei is a great mentor who knows when to get involved and when to let Dong Na learn for herself. He constantly pushes Dong Na to give her all and always knows how to encourage her. I love how assertive Fei is. He always says what he wants to say and there’s not a single word that he’s ever spoken to Dong Na that he hasn’t meant. He always shows up for Dong Na and truly is her biggest cheerleader. As much as he leads and teaches, he’s also open and willing to learn from Dong Na. I love that he doesn’t dim her light and that instead, he helps her shine brighter. He has never been inappropriate towards Dong Na as her mentor, and he has never used his position to take advantage of her. He respects her boundaries and also respects her pace.

I truly and honestly do not think that anyone could have done a better job at portraying Mr. Gu than Roy Chiu himself. He brings so much life to this character who could have been one-dimensional despite the great writing for his character. The emotions that constantly play behind his eyes… Man does it draw you in!

The last thing I’ll address is the reason I’m deducting 1 star, which is the age gap between the leads. I’ll speak solely about how it affected the show because the transition from friends/ mentor/mentee to lovers ended up being a bit lacklustre for me. The whole appeal behind Dong Na and Fei’s relationship before it evolved into a romantic one was the intimacy behind their banter, their serious talks, and even at the office. It was so clear that Fei had a soft spot for Dong Na. I was disappointed to see that that same level of intimacy and affection during their somewhat platonic days was unable to be carried into their romantic relationship. Obviously, Roy Chiu is an adult and Vicky Chen is not so that’s understandable. Yet, I felt like the casting folks compromised the romance aspect which is honestly not a huge deal since it’s such a small component of the drama itself.

Overall, this is the best C-drama I’ve watched. My Treasure will keep you engaged throughout all of the 35 episodes and will probably make you laugh, cry, swoon, and smile, but most definitely, it will remind you that the best thing in life is the people who love and support you during your best and worst hour.

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The potential to be great

Night in Paradise… Where do I start? The movie actually started out quite nicely. I absolutely loved the very cold colors. It incited a feeling of nostalgia and longing. I loved how we saw the main character, Tae Goo, interact with people he loves and cares for. The banter between himself and his sister, the interactions with his (unfairly adorable) niece, the way you see him pick up his sister’s medications and get information on how she’s doing.

These are aspects of Tae Goo that build on his humanity despite his line of work. We see him be devastated when his sister and his niece are brutally murdered during the car accident. We see him kill (or so we thought) Director Do and a few of his men in cold blood when he receives a tip from his boss that they were involved in the death of his family. Then, we see him escape to Jeju. Up until that point, things were going really good. Yes there was lots of blood until that point, but it felt justified.

And then we enter the second part where he meets Jae Yun. Let me start off by saying that there isn’t much at all to Jae Yun’s character. She’s absolutely dull and boring. The only interesting thing about her is that she’s going to die soon due to an illness (that isn’t even specified). We barely know anything about her except for the fact that she lost her family due to her uncle’s affiliation with a gang, that she resents him for it, and that she loves mulhoe (she’s also greatly talented with guns).

These aspects about Jae Yun could have set her up to be a solid character, but instead it creates this lack of empathy from the viewer’s point of view because we still don’t know her despite what we know about her. Instead of being shown how she feels, we are told how she feels. For example, when she explains to Tae Goo that she actually resented her uncle and that she wished it had been him who died instead of her parents and little sister. Based on her interactions with him, I would have never guessed. There was absolutely no tension with her uncle when they were together, no hint to allude to the fact that she might not like him much. In reality we barely even saw them interact.

Then, you pair up Jae Yun (a character I couldn’t care less about) with Tae Goo (a character I was starting to warm up to), give them useless dialogues, and try to make me believe that he would actually go back to save her. Without giving me the whys. Even the immensely talented cast of actors couldn’t save the nonsensical storyline for me. When Tae Goo died, I felt absolutely nothing. To be honest, I didn’t care at all. And I cared even less when Jae Yun went to the restaurant and shot everyone before going to the beach and shooting herself in the head.

Overall, my issue with this movie is that we didn’t get to know the characters in depth. There seemed to be so many layers to the characters, yet we were only shown the surface of what they were like. And that’s such a shame! I wanted to get attached to the characters. I wanted to feel devastated when Tae Goo died. I wanted to be marked by this movie. I wasn’t. All I could think of after watching the movie was “What a waste.”

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A Huge Skip For Me.

Okay so this movie was a waste of time, so I'll keep this review short and sweet (haha, get it?).

It started off okay. You see the FL's who's a nurse eventually start a relationship with one of her patient Lee Jang Hyuk, and to be honest that part was entertaining. I had my suspicions that she was cheating on him but once Jang Ki Young appeared on screen, I was simply convinced that the character Lee Jang Hyuk simply ended up losing weight to please Da-Eun as he insisted he would.

Then you enter what I would call the second half of the movie when Jang Hyuk interns at this new company. He and the other intern Bo-Young get at each other's throats and eventually end up pining for one another. First off can we talk about how terrible of a girlfriend Da-Eun is? Obviously, it's inevitable for long-distance relationships to struggle, especially during its early stages, but it's crazy to me how little Da-Eun was willing to sacrifice for Jang Hyuk. Despite the fact that Jang Hyuk would commute back to Incheon from Seoul for her, all Da-Eun could do was to complain. Never once did she offer to alleviate some of Jang Hyuk's burdens by commuting to Seoul in order to see him.

Then, we enter Bo-Young and Jang Hyuk. Sigh. Where do I start? No chemistry whatsoever. Don't understand why they became a thing. I didn't even realize Jang Hyuk was attracted to her until he mistakenly called Da-Eun Bo-Young and also lied that he was having dinner with his team when in reality he was having dinner with Bo-Young.

Overall, I just don't understand the need for this movie? Like what's its purpose? What were the writers trying to do? Seriously. I'd like an answer. Especially with such a great cast, I was expecting so much more. Even the ending plot twist could not save this wreck.

Okay, so quick question for anyone who knows, was it implied that Da-Eun ended up getting an abortion or did she just lose the baby? I was kind of puzzled as to what happened to the baby.

Also, huge shoutout to Lee Woo Je who kind of carried this movie on his back LMAO.

Anyhow, I guess my review ended up being a little sour AMIRITE?? Ok. I'll stop now.

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