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Love Scenery chinese drama review
Completed
Love Scenery
1 people found this review helpful
by hey887984
Mar 14, 2023
31 of 31 episodes seen
Completed
Overall 8.0
Story 8.0
Acting/Cast 9.0
Music 8.0
Rewatch Value 6.0
This review may contain spoilers

as usual in rom-com - main lead's chemistry saves the show

The "Love Scenery" story concept feels familiar with existing dramas, whereas a celebrity female lead and genius male lead who great at playing video game. Ring a bell? Yes, it was "You Are My Glory". While "You Are My Glory" is a rom-com drama standard for me, this drama feels a tad lacking, thus I gave it a 8/10. I'm going to share my final thoughts of the drama overall.

Negatives:
- The online pen-pal thing was initially a smart move from the writers. It can bring a yo-yo effect to the viewers - push&pull in terms of encounters. There are many scenarios where FL and ML could've met, but because of certain circumstances, they failed at encountering. However, the virtual meeting between the leads started to become draggy - where it took 10 episodes to be MUTUALLY aware of each other's appearance in real life - approx. 8 hours combined! and it took them extra 4 episodes for them to actually know each other personally (like having conversations on a deeper level). It was honestly frustrating to watch and took me a while to finish this drama - as I often lost interest while watching.

- The gaming scenes take too much space in the drama. Love Scenery has 31 episodes with 40 minutes each. It could’ve been easily squished into 20 episodes focusing on the main leads "real life" interactions. In result, the drama feels more like a plain recorded game live-streaming rather than a romantic drama. It feels too IT/tech/action drama to me.

- I also don’t get why FL kept concealing her identity. Clearly, she is comfortable conversing with ML and according to her, he has a good first impression as he has a nice voice. Moreover, it’s not like she has a complex from her looks, after all, she’s a well-known celebrity and very good-looking. Thus, that part is the most confusing to me..

- Moreover, I don’t entirely dislike FL character but I’m not too fond of her either. The FL is somewhat a pushover, who basically can’t say no to everyone. Clearly, she knows SML likes her, why not make a clear line in the relationship, at least to make SML back the F off.

- The Second Male Lead character is too hard to digest. While age-gap dramas become immensely popular in Asian dramas these days, it can be quite sensitive to work with - especially when the age-gap is above 15-20 years. In this case, the FL and SML have a 24 years gap. Don't get me wrong, some age-gap dramas can be enjoyable to watch, but it becomes distasteful if one party is creating unwanted force in the relationship - it went terribly wrong and icky (to be blunt). The SML could’ve been just a sweet good-looking older character who sincerely takes care of FL (become a safe-space older brother), but his opportunist, possessive and manipulative character makes him look creepy and shameless - and gave me the “creepy stalker-ish preverted-uncle vibes”. (ok, i mean I kept thinking about how this guy could've been her father). If they're going to do a wide age-gap, why not do something sweet and not toxic? In addition, one of the most ickiest things was when ML quickly shuts down any male interactions with FL. Not only this “shut-down potential competition” thing kind-of turns me off no matter how good looking the ML is, when the male is 24 years older? Too much. Furthermore, he kept trying despite knowing FL attracted other man.
Not to be harsh, but if they decided to write SML like this, at least find an actor that is the same age - if not, slightly older (like 3-5 years) than FL - to make SML character less creepy.

- This is a plus, but I laughed my ass off how how ridiculous this scene is : when FL had a vocal polyps and needed surgery, she came to ML for comfort. SML found out her condition as went straight to her in case she needs comforting. SML asked her if she was okay, which, she said she's okay (because she has all the comfort she needed from ML). and you know what SML replied, he said, "how can you be okay when you can potentially lose your voice". I mean, thanks for the reminder? It's so PATHETIC, like she does not need any comfort, and yet, this creep is intentionally creating stress for her to come to him..

- The genre of gaming romance is overused in Chinese dramas.

- To be overly fuzzy, the drama poster is kind of misleading, yes the ML can play violin really well, but it is not the main characterization in the ML’s character. Before watching the drama, I thought the ML was a violinist with a side-hobby as a computer geek - and both FL and ML work in a classical music industry.

Positives:
- Though the leads has an age-gap (5 years), which is not much to begin with - but still they managed to act with overflowing chemistry. In reference to "Put Your Head On My Shoulder", the chemistry in this drama is on the same level - which I appreciate very much.

- I love how Lin Yi played a completely different character than other characters he had previously worked.

- ML isn't portrayed as your typical ice-god character - instead, ML is playful and sneaky.

- The story concept is warm and easy to digest. Though the plot-writing isn't perfect, the overall story itself is great. I gotta admit, the story concept feels a tad basic rom-com to me, but it is enjoyable to watch nevertheless.

- Bonus: ML is extremely good looking - especially in the scene where he overheard FL’s conversation in the changing room.
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