Really enjoyed this drama. Atmospheric and brooding, it presents the crime and the killer in a rather unique way. I loved each episode slowly uncovering different lives and how the man pops up as a natural part of their background but creates unease and dread in us. Striking cinematography and direction choices. Highly recommended to those who love dark thrillers.
Given the cast and the plot, I had expected an edge-of-the seat gripping drama but unfortunately the final experience was mixed. I found the first half entirely uninteresting with its endless gore and lack of tension. I may be in the minority but Lee Sung Min(who I usually think is amazing) failed to be a convincing timid scaredy-cat wuss. His affectations and acting felt put on so I couldn't just buy his character. It was made worse by he and Yoo Yoon Seok not having any on-screen chem as antagonist/protagonist when almost entire episodes had just them together
The drama for me picked up in the 5th episode when things finally got intriguing, and thereon I found it an enjoyable watch. Lee Sung Min's natural state is as a formidable, strong character, and that's why the 2nd half works. The ending was predictable but it is unnatural to expect Korean dramas to forgo kindly good-wins-over-evil endings.
Dare I say it - of the cast, it is Yoo Yoon Seok who knocked it out the park consistently . He was convincing as an smiley pleasant passenger and as well as a psychopath with murder in his eyes. Excellent excellent work.
This is my second most hated drama that I finished, being unable to drop for some reason.
Both the character of Ma Ri and Park Han Byul playing her were such an annoyance. I wish the actors were swapped and Park Ha Na had been the changed Ma Ri. PHB was entirely wrong for such a role; Ha Na was so much more better
Ma Ri the character itself was poorly written with no development - but PHB made matter worse by giving absolutely no soul to her performance. I got so fed up of PHB's sniveling and weeping.
The first half is somewhat ok but second half was awfully draggy with repetitive plotlines. I think I only watched for Ryu Soo Yung's performance which got really good towards the end when his character goes unhinged.
Incredible OST though - haunting and emotional, I have it on repeat
Just finished Sai, and wanted to thank you for your thoughtful translations and painstaking care in subbing. I particularly enjoyed how you played around with the placement of subs melding with the drama's striking camera work. Glad you subbed this exceptional drama. Thanks again!
I think Oh My Venus has lost favour because of its somewhat tricky premise, which is understandable. But if one…
- The chemistry is absolutely phenomenal. I did not anticipate So Ji Sub and Shin Min Ah to have such amazing chemistry so was quite taken aback. Great bantering and bickering scenes.
- 'Realistic' romance: The leads look genuinely happy to be in each other company - the aforesaid chemistry helping here of course. The romance is somewhat organic(as much as dramas allow!), lots of very natural skinship and flirting, the FL taking the lead multiple times, open communication and mutual trust/love that never wavers.
- No misunderstandings here but we do have noble idiocy which I simultaneously felt was unnecessary but could also understand why(if that makes sense!). No silly love triangle
- A fantastic FL – Kang Joo Eun is smart, sassy, independent, self-confident yet loving, loyal and kind. In whatever shape she is in.
- The topic of weightloss focuses on health and better lifestyle. And the makeover avoids cliches. No dramatic entrance scenes here. She loses weight in a very recognisable real way. Yeong Ho seeing Kang Joo Eun’s dimples for the first time is one of the cutest scenes.
- The bromance between the three friends, as well as the cute fluff scenes of the group that Joo Eun cobbles together.
- Lastly but not the least, the performances. Both SJS and SMA were superb. SMA is the second actor after Yoo In Na whose aegyo charmed me rather than making me wince. But she was even better with the emotional stuff eg. the scene where she is distraught after Yeong Ho's accident. I found SJS to be unexpectedly good in both the comedic and outright romantic fluff scenes even though I have seen his range across My Secret Terrius (which was very low on pure romance) and What Happened in Bali(where he kinda just brooded the entire drama!)
As for what didnt work for me:
- The second leads' romance: Oh Soo Jin was actually well-written but Woo Shik drew the short end of the stick so his character is very poorly sketched. Their romance suffers as a result. Woo Shik technically did not cheat even though MDL comments seem to keep referring to it, but i do wish I had seen more of them talking about themselves, rather than just the few scenes we get of them fighting or having tense chats.
- Sung Hoon’s half baked annoying romance plotline, though I did like his mother's plot line. He was largely wasted in this role.
- This is one of those dramas that would have best worked at 14 episodes. We got lots of filler flashbacks which could have been avoided.
- My biggest issue: The writing of the last 20 minutes got kinda messed up. the sudden childhood connection, the weight gain due to pregnancy seemed forced. As much as Koreans love the idea of inyeon, i wish it was used with more discretion! I hated the last scene were Yeong Ho hustles Joo Eun to exercise because she's gained weight. This is the only major misstep re:the weight gain angle.
Oh the whole: If you are okay with its basic premise, this is a lovely light-hearted drama with just the right level of emotional depth for a quick binge.
I think Oh My Venus has lost favour because of its somewhat tricky premise, which is understandable. But if one can possibly look past it it is an absolutely delightful romcom. And I personally thought the drama dealt with the topic in general thoughtfully, bar one major misstep. Detailed review under spoiler
A light easy watch, with a simple-ish plot that - like many such J-doramas do - addresses how we all need to be…
Umi was a bit annoying in the beginning, as her bickering with Kazao was often unwarranted and rude. Obviously writer's shortcut to showcase their bond. Still it improves from 3rd episodes, and their chemistry & interaction is genuinely nice. Until their last quarrel. As someone working for longer, Umi should have been able to understand that it was wrong of Kazao to consider his work at Animal Beauty as a money making project. Just because she thought Animal Beauty photos were amazing did not mean Kazao needed to find artistic fulfillment in them. The writing glossed over this and made Kazao say in the end that portrait work and not abstract were his interest. Whatever. Just my rant
A light easy watch, with a simple-ish plot that - like many such J-doramas do - addresses how we all need to be true to ourselves, and not compromise our happiness as we live life with its ups and downs. Chemistry is decent, the love triangle was very slight and there are no draggy parts with rather short episodes.
The bit I most liked was that there are no quick answers/ shortcuts to Umi's search become her best self and she like all of us will need to continue to work on it.
Since this drama revolves around a couple who are divorced but are unable to let go, I thought it would mature deep dive into why they broke up, how they realise they are meant to be together, work through the problems and then come together.
But no. What we get is a drama where a clingy FL and an ML with no self awareness snipe at each other non-stop but do not have even one honest conversation on their relationship. And then in the last episode they get together.
In between we have both dating to make the other mad, and then several episodes of the FL moping around depressed trying to be the Cool Girl as her ex goes on to date and marry another woman. And she still takes him back. The writing is perhaps a product of its time maybe but the spineless FL really annoyed me.
The basic plot itself left me confused - we never get to know why the miscarriage was such a big hurt that the husband asks for a divorce. The explanations given in a later episode were very unconvincing, both for their breakup and not getting back together.
In the very first episode, the FL tries to tell her ex-husband she wants get back together, but she is thwarted by a clueless ML which should have told me something. Because in succeeding episodes the lack of frankness and maturity in their relationship hurts several people. And I hated watching this unfurl.
No this is a maddening drama and I dont recommend it at all as much as I thought the actors did a good job. PS: I particularly want to give the sister a good shake she had no business interfering as she kept doing, however well-intended.
I know I am in the minority but somehow this drama failed to hit the spot like similarly themed dramas (When the Weather is Fine, My Mister etc) did. I found it the healing bit well done,very realistic but unfortunately the heart of the story - the Moon Soo–Gang Doo relationship/romance - failed to work for me.
I found Won Jin A - the FL - to be very bland and flat in her portrayal of Moon Soo. She had very little chemistry going on with both MLs and when things got emotionally intense, midpoint onward it got even worse with her blank expressions and one note reactions failing to get me engaged, often taking me out. And all that awkwardness during kiss/skinship scenes was just awful to watch.
Lee Jun Ho on the contrary was excellent as usual. He did a wonderful job portraying a self destructive and reckless Gang Doo who finds no reason for living except to pay off his debt and bicker with his beloved halmoni, but slowly finds Moon Soo enough reason to make an effort to live and heal.
Script-wise, I though the writer did a great job examining how the trauma of the accident affected different people in different ways. What I did have trouble was the noble idiocy trope ruining large parts of the 2nd half.
This was a solid crime show and the first 12 episodes were really engaging and intriguing. There were 2 reveals…
The doctor being Sang Eui felt right but him getting addicted just because JJG took away Jun Seo felt really silly when it was high school/20 years old childish jealously.
Also JJG getting Chairman to confess was badly written. Such a wily man wouldnt acknowledge regardless of the provocation.
This was a solid crime show and the first 12 episodes were really engaging and intriguing. There were 2 reveals that felt poorly done but that apart,, the plotting worked. More under spoiler
The best thing about the drama are the performances. Ji Sung is a given but the others that stood out include Kwon Yul (his final monologue!!), Kim Kyung Nam and Lee Kang Wook.
As a Kim Nam Gil fan, I was rather late, but finally watched this! Silly and goofy, this drama picked me up from a sorta kdrama slump. The humour was unabashedly slapstick and OTT which got too much at times but bearable. The pace was fast and plotting reasonably tight so you remained engaged. The fights were awesome with Go Jun's being the most amazing...shows he's a pro.
What I didnt like was the drama not managing tonal shifts. The cases dealt with pretty serious shit. Which meant that the drama randomly shifts between comedy and melo which felt abrupt. Some tracks got resolved too easily to keep the comedy going which felt wrong. In Chief Kim it wasnt literally life or death so the comedy seemed to blend more smoothly than here.
Performances - all around decent. Kim Nam Gil's surprisingly good at comedy but I have to say he overdid the cutesy/goofy bits in places. I personally was again most impressed by Go Jun - fantastic actor.
The first half is incredibly good but loses its way after that. The initial episodes will hold your attention…
The memory loss twist came out of the left field and IMO the weird shift in narrative styling happened here onwards. So much became a montage and no real story. And that final healing showdown was rather silly. Then the next tonal shift of the corporate battle was again so abrupt. Until then, we never hear of Dongyuan being in trouble and then suddenly it is on the brink of bankruptcy??! And Quan becoming the villain w/o Old Nie knowing was so lame and predictable. Bad writing.
The biggest issue of the drama is that the actor leads Wallace and Li Xiao Ran both look their age ie 40s. Visually this does not match with the story - the ML & FL separated when they just finished schooling & are heading to college, have been apart for 7 years current time, so they are in their late 20s. No way do Wallace & Li Xiao Ran look that age range, or even 30s. The only reason I didnt see that very obvious plot twist of Pingping being his child!!
Until the backstory is revealed I genuinely though the leads were in their late 30s and Yusheng still yearning over her was really romantic though surprising. But 7 years is nothing
The first half is incredibly good but loses its way after that. The initial episodes will hold your attention fast with the chemistry between leads, the angst and the mystery. But after that we get two plot shifts and both felt very abrupt. The drama has lots of regular melodrama tropes but the show runners did a wonderful job of keeping it realistic . But maybe the tone got too underplayed - after all I AM watching a melodrama!! The directors chose to gloss over many conversations which would have drawn viewers more into the narrative as things started unfurling in the 2nd half. More thoughts under spoiler on this.
Performance wise Wallace Chung takes it away. His is the most pitiful character, suffering from both his father's actions and his lover's reactions albeit much warranted. Wallace plays Yusheng Nie with a lot of sensitivity and feeling. Wonderful.
The FL I think played her character - a weary, disillusioned woman - with grace. I wish she was more communicative of her feelings but I guess her rough life gave her no chance.
Rewatched after 5 years and many many dramas - Before We Get Married still holds up. The magic I felt is still…
Chu Kehaun’s deep, abiding love for Weiwei still moves me. As does Weiwei’s desperate effort to do the right thing to save her relationship with Haoyi despite falling more and more in love with Kehaun. Feels very human.
Weiwei failing to acknowledge what is very obvious to others - that she & Kehaun undeniably have feelings for each other - is annoying as ever, but we have to understand who she is. Weiwei thinks of herself as someone living her life as per her values and principles. To be swept away by someone chasing her while neither are “free” agents is surely unacceptable by her rules. That’s why she fights her feelings so desperately and refuses to give up on her relationship with Haoyi. Kehaun obviously was emotionally dead before meeting Weiwei. He remained with Ziyuan through sheer apathy. The abortion issue should have made him leave, but I suspect he continued between not wanting to abandon her given his promise to her mother and comfortable routine. As he says later, meeting Weiwei made him realise what he was missing.
The issues I noticed the first time around did bother me this time too. 1] Kehaun gets a little too forceful at times. 2] Much of the corporate stuff in the second half is written primarily to ramp up the melodrama and does get a bit too much but ok, dramas are dramas, I can deal with it.
Puff, Jasper and Steven were phenomenal. The scene between Weiwei and Haoyi after his forced proposal is amazing acting wise. As I said in my comment years earlier, Kefei is the friend anyone would want to have, and Phoebe does an excellent job showing us a flawed but fiercely loyal and lovable character.
Rewatched after 5 years and many many dramas - Before We Get Married still holds up. The magic I felt is still very much there. The chemistry between the leads is still mesmerizing and no other drama for me matches the sizzle these two have on screen. Oh the looks they share, such feeling in them. More thoughts below:
I had to drop at ep 10. Zhao Lu Si is a good actress but unfortunately for 2 reasons I never felt drawn by her performance 1) Her dubbing voice - it consistently feels divorced from the scenes. Plus I want to give her a tissue and ask her to blow her nose properly before speaking 2) She is never natural and at ease. I dunno if its how she chose to portray her character (never seen her in anything else) but through 10 episodes I never stopped feeling that she's putting on an act.
The pacing is a real drag at times, and I didnt warm up to the serial problem solving superwoman narrative style. The only thing interesting was the sisters' relationship, but it wasnt enough to keep me going.
I found the first half entirely uninteresting with its endless gore and lack of tension. I may be in the minority but Lee Sung Min(who I usually think is amazing) failed to be a convincing timid scaredy-cat wuss. His affectations and acting felt put on so I couldn't just buy his character. It was made worse by he and Yoo Yoon Seok not having any on-screen chem as antagonist/protagonist when almost entire episodes had just them together
The drama for me picked up in the 5th episode when things finally got intriguing, and thereon I found it an enjoyable watch. Lee Sung Min's natural state is as a formidable, strong character, and that's why the 2nd half works. The ending was predictable but it is unnatural to expect Korean dramas to forgo kindly good-wins-over-evil endings.
Dare I say it - of the cast, it is Yoo Yoon Seok who knocked it out the park consistently . He was convincing as an smiley pleasant passenger and as well as a psychopath with murder in his eyes. Excellent excellent work.
Both the character of Ma Ri and Park Han Byul playing her were such an annoyance. I wish the actors were swapped and Park Ha Na had been the changed Ma Ri. PHB was entirely wrong for such a role; Ha Na was so much more better
Ma Ri the character itself was poorly written with no development - but PHB made matter worse by giving absolutely no soul to her performance. I got so fed up of PHB's sniveling and weeping.
The first half is somewhat ok but second half was awfully draggy with repetitive plotlines. I think I only watched for Ryu Soo Yung's performance which got really good towards the end when his character goes unhinged.
Incredible OST though - haunting and emotional, I have it on repeat
- 'Realistic' romance: The leads look genuinely happy to be in each other company - the aforesaid chemistry helping here of course. The romance is somewhat organic(as much as dramas allow!), lots of very natural skinship and flirting, the FL taking the lead multiple times, open communication and mutual trust/love that never wavers.
- No misunderstandings here but we do have noble idiocy which I simultaneously felt was unnecessary but could also understand why(if that makes sense!). No silly love triangle
- A fantastic FL – Kang Joo Eun is smart, sassy, independent, self-confident yet loving, loyal and kind. In whatever shape she is in.
- The topic of weightloss focuses on health and better lifestyle. And the makeover avoids cliches. No dramatic entrance scenes here. She loses weight in a very recognisable real way. Yeong Ho seeing Kang Joo Eun’s dimples for the first time is one of the cutest scenes.
- The bromance between the three friends, as well as the cute fluff scenes of the group that Joo Eun cobbles together.
- Lastly but not the least, the performances. Both SJS and SMA were superb. SMA is the second actor after Yoo In Na whose aegyo charmed me rather than making me wince. But she was even better with the emotional stuff eg. the scene where she is distraught after Yeong Ho's accident. I found SJS to be unexpectedly good in both the comedic and outright romantic fluff scenes even though I have seen his range across My Secret Terrius (which was very low on pure romance) and What Happened in Bali(where he kinda just brooded the entire drama!)
As for what didnt work for me:
- The second leads' romance: Oh Soo Jin was actually well-written but Woo Shik drew the short end of the stick so his character is very poorly sketched. Their romance suffers as a result. Woo Shik technically did not cheat even though MDL comments seem to keep referring to it, but i do wish I had seen more of them talking about themselves, rather than just the few scenes we get of them fighting or having tense chats.
- Sung Hoon’s half baked annoying romance plotline, though I did like his mother's plot line. He was largely wasted in this role.
- This is one of those dramas that would have best worked at 14 episodes. We got lots of filler flashbacks which could have been avoided.
- My biggest issue: The writing of the last 20 minutes got kinda messed up. the sudden childhood connection, the weight gain due to pregnancy seemed forced. As much as Koreans love the idea of inyeon, i wish it was used with more discretion! I hated the last scene were Yeong Ho hustles Joo Eun to exercise because she's gained weight. This is the only major misstep re:the weight gain angle.
Oh the whole: If you are okay with its basic premise, this is a lovely light-hearted drama with just the right level of emotional depth for a quick binge.
Until their last quarrel. As someone working for longer, Umi should have been able to understand that it was wrong of Kazao to consider his work at Animal Beauty as a money making project. Just because she thought Animal Beauty photos were amazing did not mean Kazao needed to find artistic fulfillment in them.
The writing glossed over this and made Kazao say in the end that portrait work and not abstract were his interest. Whatever. Just my rant
The bit I most liked was that there are no quick answers/ shortcuts to Umi's search become her best self and she like all of us will need to continue to work on it.
But no. What we get is a drama where a clingy FL and an ML with no self awareness snipe at each other non-stop but do not have even one honest conversation on their relationship. And then in the last episode they get together.
In between we have both dating to make the other mad, and then several episodes of the FL moping around depressed trying to be the Cool Girl as her ex goes on to date and marry another woman. And she still takes him back. The writing is perhaps a product of its time maybe but the spineless FL really annoyed me.
The basic plot itself left me confused - we never get to know why the miscarriage was such a big hurt that the husband asks for a divorce. The explanations given in a later episode were very unconvincing, both for their breakup and not getting back together.
In the very first episode, the FL tries to tell her ex-husband she wants get back together, but she is thwarted by a clueless ML which should have told me something. Because in succeeding episodes the lack of frankness and maturity in their relationship hurts several people. And I hated watching this unfurl.
No this is a maddening drama and I dont recommend it at all as much as I thought the actors did a good job.
PS: I particularly want to give the sister a good shake she had no business interfering as she kept doing, however well-intended.
I found Won Jin A - the FL - to be very bland and flat in her portrayal of Moon Soo. She had very little chemistry going on with both MLs and when things got emotionally intense, midpoint onward it got even worse with her blank expressions and one note reactions failing to get me engaged, often taking me out. And all that awkwardness during kiss/skinship scenes was just awful to watch.
Lee Jun Ho on the contrary was excellent as usual. He did a wonderful job portraying a self destructive and reckless Gang Doo who finds no reason for living except to pay off his debt and bicker with his beloved halmoni, but slowly finds Moon Soo enough reason to make an effort to live and heal.
Script-wise, I though the writer did a great job examining how the trauma of the accident affected different people in different ways. What I did have trouble was the noble idiocy trope ruining large parts of the 2nd half.
Also JJG getting Chairman to confess was badly written. Such a wily man wouldnt acknowledge regardless of the provocation.
The best thing about the drama are the performances. Ji Sung is a given but the others that stood out include Kwon Yul (his final monologue!!), Kim Kyung Nam and Lee Kang Wook.
What I didnt like was the drama not managing tonal shifts. The cases dealt with pretty serious shit. Which meant that the drama randomly shifts between comedy and melo which felt abrupt. Some tracks got resolved too easily to keep the comedy going which felt wrong. In Chief Kim it wasnt literally life or death so the comedy seemed to blend more smoothly than here.
Performances - all around decent. Kim Nam Gil's surprisingly good at comedy but I have to say he overdid the cutesy/goofy bits in places. I personally was again most impressed by Go Jun - fantastic actor.
The biggest issue of the drama is that the actor leads Wallace and Li Xiao Ran both look their age ie 40s.
Visually this does not match with the story - the ML & FL separated when they just finished schooling & are heading to college, have been apart for 7 years current time, so they are in their late 20s. No way do Wallace & Li Xiao Ran look that age range, or even 30s. The only reason I didnt see that very obvious plot twist of Pingping being his child!!
Until the backstory is revealed I genuinely though the leads were in their late 30s and Yusheng still yearning over her was really romantic though surprising. But 7 years is nothing
The drama has lots of regular melodrama tropes but the show runners did a wonderful job of keeping it realistic . But maybe the tone got too underplayed - after all I AM watching a melodrama!! The directors chose to gloss over many conversations which would have drawn viewers more into the narrative as things started unfurling in the 2nd half. More thoughts under spoiler on this.
Performance wise Wallace Chung takes it away. His is the most pitiful character, suffering from both his father's actions and his lover's reactions albeit much warranted. Wallace plays Yusheng Nie with a lot of sensitivity and feeling. Wonderful.
The FL I think played her character - a weary, disillusioned woman - with grace. I wish she was more communicative of her feelings but I guess her rough life gave her no chance.
Weiwei failing to acknowledge what is very obvious to others - that she & Kehaun undeniably have feelings for each other - is annoying as ever, but we have to understand who she is. Weiwei thinks of herself as someone living her life as per her values and principles. To be swept away by someone chasing her while neither are “free” agents is surely unacceptable by her rules. That’s why she fights her feelings so desperately and refuses to give up on her relationship with Haoyi.
Kehaun obviously was emotionally dead before meeting Weiwei. He remained with Ziyuan through sheer apathy. The abortion issue should have made him leave, but I suspect he continued between not wanting to abandon her given his promise to her mother and comfortable routine. As he says later, meeting Weiwei made him realise what he was missing.
The issues I noticed the first time around did bother me this time too. 1] Kehaun gets a little too forceful at times. 2] Much of the corporate stuff in the second half is written primarily to ramp up the melodrama and does get a bit too much but ok, dramas are dramas, I can deal with it.
Puff, Jasper and Steven were phenomenal. The scene between Weiwei and Haoyi after his forced proposal is amazing acting wise.
As I said in my comment years earlier, Kefei is the friend anyone would want to have, and Phoebe does an excellent job showing us a flawed but fiercely loyal and lovable character.
More thoughts below:
Zhao Lu Si is a good actress but unfortunately for 2 reasons I never felt drawn by her performance 1) Her dubbing voice - it consistently feels divorced from the scenes. Plus I want to give her a tissue and ask her to blow her nose properly before speaking
2) She is never natural and at ease. I dunno if its how she chose to portray her character (never seen her in anything else) but through 10 episodes I never stopped feeling that she's putting on an act.
The pacing is a real drag at times, and I didnt warm up to the serial problem solving superwoman narrative style.
The only thing interesting was the sisters' relationship, but it wasnt enough to keep me going.