FL single-handedly carried the show

I dove into a whirlwind of Chinese mini-series last weekend, starting with "My Villain Husband", which had such a disappointing plot. I was really let down. Then there was "A Tale of Love and Loyalty", where the logic was absurd even without considering the plot. It seemed like the writers had no sense of reason. The only thing that kept me watching till the end was the good-looking main leads and their steamy kissing scenes.

Next, I tried "The West Wind Is Strong" and "The Everlasting Love" but found them so disappointing that I couldn't even finish.

Then I stumbled upon "Confess Your Love." Surprisingly, the female lead's acting was quite impressive. Her subtle nuances were smooth and natural. Despite the illogical setup around the villain and the overall acting in this series, I'd say this actress single-handedly carried the show. I managed to stick around till the end because of her charm; she really drew me in.

The plot was okay, but the storytelling was rather illogical. There were so many details that wouldn't make sense to anyone, yet they deliberately steered the story in that direction for convenience's sake. Still, this mini-series was much better than most in its genre. I've watched 8 in total over these couple of days, and 6 of them were a lot worse than this. There's only this one and "The Deliberations of Love" that are passable in my opinion.

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PS.1 - The ML's acting was super stiff. The FL truly carried the whole show.

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PS.2 - The list of my 8 binge-watched shows is as follows:

Passable:
1. The Deliberations of Love
2. Confess Your Love (2023)

So bad:
1. My Villain Husband
2. A Tale of Love and Loyalty
3. My Cat-astrophic Lover
4. My Fake Wife

Dropped:
1. The West Wind Is Strong
2. The Everlasting Love

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Top-notch! I can't find loophole at all.

1) Story [+]

Plot very strong, well-built and dynamic. The story moves forward the whole time which is incredible. There're things to learn, explore, discover, and be surprised in every episode. It progresses in fast pace but not hasty. The rhythm is so right to the point that there's no wasted time even for the preview. If you watched the preview of next episode at each episode's ending, you'd most likely be spoiled. All the happenings in this story are very reasonable from beginning to end, which normally is very hard to achieve in this kind of highly complex, suspense story. Most of the time, the writers/directors wouldn't be wise enough to make it perfectly suspense without loopholes (--some notable examples that failed on this point are W-Two World and Mouse). For this one, no loopholes at all. I also love the ending. It isn't romantically sugar-coated but leaning toward the side of being realisticly hopeful. The writer gave an interview that if there'd be one more episode, the audience would have the chance to see FL and ML being back together. I think so, too. But they're just clever to end it at the right timing. If there're one more episode, things would be cheesy instead as there's no point left in the suspense plot anymore, and then the tone of the series would shift a bit and might end up in the same way as many other Korean series that have strong start but usually tone down and fail toward the end.

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2) Acting [+]

Superb! There're so many actors in this series. They come in and out of the scene all the time. And I enjoy the acting of all of them. The acting of the three sisters should especially be praised. Kim Go Eun has the chance to show her true ability in acting through the role of the eldest sister here. Her performance in Goblin can't be compared to this at all. The actress who plays Wong Sang A, Hyorin's mother, also did a great job. Her fake smile and bubbly character is so annoyingly fake. Hyorin just says the right feeling of the viewers when it finally bears in her mind that things in her family are so fake. Before that, it always feels off but she can't really be certain at which point.

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*I'm not that expert in music so I avoid giving comment on that aspect and just gave the moderate/middle score when nothing wrong occurs.

*This series is one of a very few series I give this high score on Rewatch Value.

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I really want to like this series but there're some unacceptable loopholes.

I really want to give this series a good score for their strong will and good intention to pass on some important messages that have a social impact, but if I'd be honest to myself, this series still doesn't reach my satisfaction standard.

Story [~]
In spite of having strong main plot and subplots, the elements in their main and subplots have loopholes occurring from time to time. And they aren't just some small loopholes that we can pretend to close one eye and let them pass.

The most unacceptable loophole in the plot is right at the end which is the climax. The teacher doesn't want to commit suicide by jumping from the rooftop. He only jumps to repeat a student's traumatic experience when she couldn't help her best friend doing the same thing so that she can modify the outcome by saving him this time. But the hell to that idea! He really jumps and it's just by chance that the student runs to grasp his hand at the last minute when his whole body already dropped from the building. The student is a girl and comes alone, though... There's no way she can help him up by herself if she couldn't do it for her friend. And not to say about running to him in the first place, she might not be able to run or be in time to even catch his hand. The teacher risks beyond the acceptable limit in the process that he claims to help the girl. If he really jumped to death before the girl's eyes as she couldn't reach him in time or especially if he dropped to death after she already got hold of him, the result could turn out to be totally opposite and worsen the state of mind of that student. (In the end, other friends appear in time to help pull the teacher back up, but the teacher never knew other students were to show up esp. it's the last minute.)

Acting [~]
Suda Masaki acts wholeheartedly. Moka and Mei are not so good at acting. Their BFF's happy laughters are so fake. Ryota's acting isn't convincing, either. I doubt that Ryota might not be able to act in challenging roles and be stuck in rom-com high school films/series forever.

#

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Mundane old-fashioned melodrama, but compensated by the acting of the ML.

Note: I watched ep. 1, 2 and 8-10 with forward speed, so it's not really the whole series. I'm glad, though, that I didn't spend my time with every episode. I don't feel it's worth the full span of time it requested from the viewers.

1. Story [-]
The plot is super melodrama, which is too much. It's also cliche and out-of-date kind of a plot, which made it unmemorable.

2. Acting [~]
The younger actors, which are the main ML and FL, did a great job in acting, esp. the ML. I still cried in spite of being able to foresee what was coming in the storyline (that's how much the story was cliche, I can guess the whole story all right) because of their acting. The performance of the adult actors, though, are not on par with the younger ones. This is disappointing. I didn't feel along with the adults at all. And the job of the adults here drags the acting/cast score down.

3. Music [~]
Plain. It's a story particularly about a song, but that song as well as other OST and music in the story are just so-so. There are some live singing scenes on the stage and recording booth, and it should be moving if it's this kind of scene in a series that has the theme involving music but those scenes are so plain. The singing skills of those who sing in the scenes are not good enough, either. Anyway thanks to the production team. The director, cinematographer and editor here know how to do their job to obscure and compensate their weak points. Those scenes still come out passable.

4. Production [+]
Most part is artistic, but the technique they used to reveal the past story like college kids gathering around a bonfire to tell a ghost story is too unoriginal and lazy. Still, they have great skills in directing, cinematography and editing. This is another point combined that made the watching journey wasn't unbearable for me (other points are the ML's acting and I watched only half of the whole thing with forward button under my finger at all time.)

P.S. I don't really like the color filter in this series. Too much blue shade in the blue-filtered scenes and too much orange shade in the orange-filtered scenes. It is too intentional.

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Things are wrong from the start. A lot of details are beyond messed up.

(1) Bad taste in costume design despite the story being about fashion designer

The FL is a clothing designer, but every point about FL's costume in this series is absolutely tasteless. They shouldn't create an FL to be a designer if they don't have knowledge about this aspect at all.

In the first scene of the story, the FL observes the quality of a dress that forges a brand name by scrutinizing how cheap the quality and price the dress actually is. By the end of the same ep, she wears a dress to a luxurious party hosted by a renowned designer. Her dress is supposed to be the epitome of her own work, but what she wears is cheap from head to toe. Her hair ribbon is cheap. Her wavy hairstyle doesn't go along with the wavy necklace (which also looks fake and cheap). Her own dress is low quality without any trace of the design that can be praised. Her drop-dangle eaพrings pairing with her (limping) lacy dress and her wavy style make her look tangled and raveled. The costume team of this series just doesn't know what is good taste. It's very contradictory when the renowned designer genuinely admires the FL's style.

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(2) Improper (- some even get to the point of stupid) cause and effect of events scattering all over the place

Causes that affect events in this series irresponsibly come out of the blue - no root. no clue. at all. Like the writer is beyond lazy to place any solid background for the story and just finds the easiest way out to send the FL into the writer's designated events by throwing her into the situations like magic. Example:-

(2.1) The FL's close friend confidently tells the FL without any hesitation she will get the invitation to the high-class party hosted by the renowned designer for FL. This friend works as a 2nd-rated model but doesn't have proper knowledge about fashion design or the fashion circle. She doesn't have rich-family background. She doesn't have knowledge about the host apart from he is simply a renowned designer. She doesn't even know why he is famous (despite being a model - which totally deserves to be just a 2nd-rated). Where the hell is this confidence of hers to find the invitation to the party for her friend within the shortest time by the next day? As the connection of a no-name model can be that strong!?

(2.2) The FL drives a car in the rain and almost hits the 2nd ML who stands beside the pavement. He doesn't stand on her lanes, but he feels guilty as he thinks it's his fault standing there that causes the accident. What ridiculous is, despite being very good-natured the FL is, she accepts that it's kind of his fault. Excuse me?? It's you who are not skilled in driving!? Not to say that she bumps her car into a sidewalk tree. That tree is on the 2nd ML's side of the pavement. It's like when she sees him, she panics and dashes the car in his direction. My gosh, that can kill him considering her driving skills and the 2nd ML is still the one who says sorry while the FL accepting the apology.

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(3) Destructive details due to lack of knowledge and intelligence of the writer and production team

Example:-
- In an afternoon party of the high-class circle, when the FL says she majored in design, the others mention the top colleges in design as Columbia, Standford and UCLA. Hell to the writer and production team, you are unknowledgeable at all.

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(4) With the FL's dialogue, reaction and decision in each crucial event, it shows that she is pretty much stupid

Due to the intelligence level of the writer and production team, it can't help that finally it affects the FL character the most. This is a story told from FL's perspective, so the writer/production team's intelligence reflects her intelligence.

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No chemistry between the leads at all. FL acting is especially disappointing.

There's no chemistry between the ML and FL at all. I absolutely feel nothing in their love scenes Even when they kiss. The FL seems to not be able to act in this kind of relaxing, comedy drama. I've watched her in Royal Nirvana and admired her a lot, but her job in this one is very disappointing. All of her kisses are blocking. All of her smiles as well. You can see she kiss and smile in the same way in every scene. There's no specific feeling in her smile or kiss. Even the eyes, the ways she glances or looks are obviously not spontaneous but meticulously designed. It's not wrong to design or choreograph in acting but the actors/actresses must act as if it's spontaneous so that it'd be called natural. To sum up, all her acting is highly blocking. Nothing feels natural.

On the opposite, the second male lead does a really great job. His acting is all that keeps me watching until I can't anymore. The worst thing that happened is that I started to skip the ML+FL scenes to just watch the second leads' scenes. That's how failed this drama is.

*Watched the whole episode for 12 ep. After that, I hopped between scenes. About halfway through, I decided to watch only the important scenes.

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Instant formular of cliche storyline and artificial sentiment.

Unoriginal plot. Their story is like the instant noodles that just aims to finish things quick without creating anything worth cherish. Their story accumulates so many cliche plots that we've seen so often in other movies and make them even more cliche by not adding any new element into their own work. It's the pop star falling in love with an ordinary girl. Also a one-night falling in love in a foreign land. And Confessing love at a friend's wedding (by stealing the scene from the bride and groom -- which is very impolite in real life, I would say. And very cringey when it appears in the film.)

Things in this movie pass by in a very superficial style. Nothing deep but they try to force the audience to perceive what happen as something deep. There's almost nothing happen between the ML and FL during their time together, which is not more than 12 hours, apart from running in a spooky cemetery and baking a cake together. But ML, who is a celebrity, is so naively certain this is true forever love and ready to give up everything for FL.

So many things happen nonsensically and baselessly. The production team absolutely doesn't care to lay out any solid foundation for the leads' feelings. Until to the point that they kiss, I still don't feel they have feelings for each other. It's more like a suit-for-the-moment kiss than any deep-meaning kiss. Throughout the movie, from beginning to end, I don't feel any chemistry between ML and FL at all. And ironically, there's this dialogue of FL around the beginning saying it's funny for her that people in entertainment business can fakely love each other on a show because love can be portrayed through the eyes and when she sees the eyes, it tells whether the love is real of not. People can't fake love -- Yes, she surely can't fake it. I don't feel any feeling in her eyes towards ML at all, and to be fair, it's vice versa.

A few positive points about this movie is that they have proper production. They know how to use the camera and set the setting well. FL seems to be able to speak Italian as well. If she can't, she came prepared. Her mounth shape while speaking goes along with Italian language sound making it looks natural when she have a conversation.

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Surprisingly disappointing. Good story though the logic is super off. Terrible character design.

Story Plot [+]

It's a very good story - good plot on the ML's life, quite a few of thought-provoking/impressive/inspiring moments, but the character design on the villain side is the worst. It's a story full of clever people who are intentionally unprofessional and prejudiced.

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Logic of the story [-]

I don't understand why so many people in the story try to say that a person who can't feel physical pain due to an illness isn't approved to be a doctor as well as put all the blames on the person. This logic comes out so forcefully. The series tries super hard to make this claim valid, but it still feels super off.

I don't understand either why people like the prosecutor take the idea of euthanasia of consent, terminally ill patients as something to be so vengeful toward the doctor who is willing to help the patients. It's to the point that he wants to destroy the doctor's life and career as well as put him into jail even though the action of the doctor complies with the patient's desire. This topic of euthanasia is surely a socially debatable topic. But the opposing side in this series takes this issue very personally to the point of personal grudge and vengeance. It's so extreme without a proper root or cause that would help the viewers to understand and empathize with, thus their actions feel very off. It's like this series has devalued this social issue by portraying the opinions from the opposing side as illogical to the point of absurd and psychopathic. This topic that is worth being discussed has become some nonsense, personal issue of the irrational villains.

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Character Design [-]

The first one is the prosecutor who is competent but blindsided and has the habit of rushing to a conclusion. I don't understand his competence at all. These traits of his must prevent him from being clearheaded enough to be able to have an objective analysis on his cases. Not to talk about his vengefulness in destroying an ex-verdict without a proper cause. I don't understand his long-term vengeance towards the ML who has no personal issue with him. He often blames the ML that the ML euthanized his patient to make his own mind feel at ease by not having to see the patient being tortured from the terminal illness, but he also says the ML doesn't have the right to treat patients because ML has an illness that makes him not able to feel pain thus he wouldn't understand patients' pain and just does the scientific experiment on human's bodies due to curiosity via medical treatment. Is this kind of contradictory logic supposed to come from a character who is a competent prosecutor?

The second is the hospital-management-team doctor who openly attacks the ML on all sorts of unreasonable issues no matter how nonsense the issue is to start with. It's like he is clouded by a kind of hatred that doesn't have a cause, either. The ML isn't even a threat to his position. I don't understand his stupidity at all. In reality, all the blames he openly puts on the ML would normally harm himself back as a high-level doctor. It would easily cause people to be skeptical about his qualification in his position that needs objectivity and analytical skills. I don't understand at all how he's in the hospital management team with this kind of intelligence.

The third person is the female villain of the story. She's designed to be an extreme emo. She is a stalker who is vengeful towards a murderer who killed her daughter, but later shifts all the hatred and vengefulness to the ML who put the murderer to death. I understand her upset, but this vengefulness is so offset. I don't understand how it is shifted to the ML and even after the ML was imprisoned for 3 years, she still stalks him and is willing to destroy his career and his life after he was released - all of this because he killed the murderer who had killed her daughter?! I don't understand even more when the prosecutor agrees with this person's perspective (though his son was also killed together with the daughter, his character is positioned to be highly rational.) The prosecutor always believes that he is righteous in what he does, but all his actions contradict what he thinks he is. This female villain and the prosecutor make this series super absurd and drag the overall score of the series down immensely.

With this kind of character design, this story becomes too unreasonable, excessively absurd and overly melodramatic.

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Acting [~]

I would say the acting of the ML carries the whole series. I watch this series till the end only because of him and the struggle in his life with his illness and his profession's experience. The FL's acting is off from time to time. I watched her in Red Sleeve before this one and let me say her acting doesn't improve as the years passed. The second ML's character design contradicts itself at the beginning of the story and that contradiction makes me feel off about him for the whole series. The second FL's acting and expression are not good enough to be a second FL. All other supporting roles' actings are just so-so.

By the way, I don't feel any connection in the FL's family at all. They all work at the same hospital, see one another very often, and always have interactions, but these people who are FL's mother, uncle, aunt and sister don't look like they're related at all -- not related to the FL and not to one another. There's zero family relationship among them even when they're in the same scene talking face-to-face to each other.

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Justifiable logic at first but inconsistent and contradictory later. Weak Acting. Quite lagging.

1. Story [~]
The story makes the ML to be a bully / prey-predator at school - not the type to fall for nowadays, but he has to be popular at school according to the plot. However, the production team did a good job with their narrative to convey how severe bullying can be and how it shouldn't be accepted. Toward the end of EP1, the majority of floating comments from the online viewers all ask when this bullying gonna stop in the sense that the bullying is now too much - which, when the FL high-kicks him, it's truly justified. The viewers are all satisfied with that kick.

In general, this kind of plot that revolves around the bad guy and cute, fighting girl who has a crush on his friend instead can go down to the cringy side easily, but as of EP3, the production team has been avoiding the clinginess quite alright. I think their clear thought on the plot's logic is a part that helps.

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2. Acting [-]
It's a mix. If I'd be absolutely honest and straightforward, I'd say the acting of the main cast is much lacking. There're some scenes that come out quite well and show the charisma/charms of the characters, but that's because of the skills of the production and post-production teams.

Among the three main characters - the FL, ML and ML's friend that FL has a crush on - the FL did the best job. It's seen she tried and it helps making the character's fighting spirit shine. Her character's dialogue has the potential to make things come out cringy as well, but the way she acts until EP3 has been able to avoid that case (though very narrowly in some scenes.)

The ML's acting isn't convincing when it's the scenes about being dumb or noisy or bad. It seems like he doesn't wholeheartedly want to be the character, for example, he doesn't really yell when he's supposed to threaten people with a loud voice, and a lot of time he acts awkwardly, his facial expression in intense scenes can't make me believe. If he has to be in an intense scene with the FL, his expression is not up to her. Watching him makes me feel he's not in his element.

The ML's friend that FL has a crush on also has weak acting skills. When he cries, it looks more like he's about to laugh. I think you know that kind of expression when we see through a fake cry. It's not that the person is really going to laugh, but because it's a fake one, the expression is more to the side of a laugh. When he talks, it also still feels awkward.

The other two ML's friends sound awkward when they talk in their specific way as well. There's this kind of saying in Thai language when women normally end their sentences with kha for politeness while men end theirs with krub. Sometimes when guys want girls they talk with to feel being adored or when a much adult guy talks with a little girl with a large age gap, they would end their sentences with kha instead. The way these two characters say kha is very cheesy - not natural at all. It's obvious that they're not familiar with that way of talking. It sounds very off and so separate from being real.

Umm... I'm still quite stuck with the acting of the ML here. Let me mention a bit, if you ever watch the Japanese version, the ML in that version is beyond any other versions. Matsumoto Jun set the standard of this character so high.

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3. Pace [-]
Each EP is about one hour, which is quite long in my opinion, esp. if there's nothing much happening during the time interval or the acting is too boring to follow. I start to feel it gets lagging a bit in EP2 and it's real slow for me when I watch EP3.

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In conclusion, what caught my eyes in the first place is the looking of the cast. They are all good-looking on the same par. It's quite exciting to see them being introduced in the first EP, but their acting can't attract me longer than EP3.

Personally, among the total of 5 versions of Boys Over Flowers series (the others are from Taiwan, Japan, Korea and China), this version has the most good-looking cast. Five of them are all good-looking. None of the other 4 versions pays attention to the equality in good-lookingness of these 5 characters. In terms of the enjoyment with the series' overall, though, Season 1 of the Japanese version is the best, followed by the Chinese version. The other three are not to my taste.

By the way, I would say for the Boy Over Flowers series, the versions that get me get me from their acting. I'm not that much into the story, but it's fun to watch when they match a dumb bad ML with a fighting spirited FL. So, the score on acting weighs quite heavier than other aspects to make me enjoy this series.

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It's boring.

It's pretty much boring for me. I almost gave up after the first 12 minutes of ep.1 but saw a lot of early comments about how great this drama is with just the first ep so I watched it till the episode end, but this is all I'd give my time for this series. It officially is a dropped project for me.

****Edited 2: Due to quite a fuss about I dropped the drama and left my opinion only after "one" episode, I changed my mind to give myself and the drama some more chance and watched the 2nd episode. Anyway I still feel the same. Following is my original opinion without any edit. I reaffirm it without change.****

Brief opinion on some aspects:

Story: The plot is cliche, ordinary, guessable. The progress is very slow. Most part of the first ep is to give the background story - this background story has nothing new for the audience, just another same old kind of plot. The drama starts with the scene in the present before going back to tell the past story, so I kinda see how the story will become, not a difficult story to guess the storyline.

Character design: Simple and plain. The bad side is bad. The protagonist side is simply straightforward. There won't be the so-called character development in this story even though the time span is almost 10 years. The kids might grow up, be stronger and start to love each other, but it's just a straight-line walk. No interesting conflict. Just some revenge.

Acting: I like both actress and actor who play the main characters, but they can't make me feel along the characters with their acting esp. Ji Soo - this isn't the best version of the character he plays. The mother role that Kim So Hyun plays isn't portrayed that well either. She may be too young for that role.

Scene: For the CG part - it's not the best CG though acceptable. The shooting location in the nature is refreshing for a nature lover like me.

Music: Just so-so. Not much comment. It's not bad to be noticeable.

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Edited 1:
There're some fusses both on the comment sections of my review and of the drama itself over why some people already gave their review with the score only after 1 ep. Below is the reason on my part that I replied to one of those comments:-

I gave a review b/c this already a finished project for me. I drop it. It is done. I want to take a note to remind myself why I drop it and how much I (don't) prefer it - that's how the review comes.

In my opinion, the way Mydramalist designs the type of data to collect is quite good now, like scores from those who complete and drop the dramas. In the future when there's enough data accumulated to analyze deeper, they will surely categorize and show the result in more scrutinizing way. Just that people have to input data as detailed as possible for that to happen. You wouldn't feel much grumpy about the reviews from those who drop the drama if you understand data science.

Below I leave a link to another opinion about the way to collect data on the site and how to make use of them in case you're interested:
https://mydramalist.com/discussions/suggestions/28529-make-impossible-to-rate-uncompleted-dramas?pid=962745&page=6#p962745

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Interesting link about dropping a drama:
https://mydramalist.com/article/dropping-asian-dramas-is-ok-054182455

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Extremely boring. Nothing moves forward. Characters are superficial.

>> Plot:
It's the typical problem of Chinese rom-com series set in the contemporary era. The plot lacks substance. I've watched 5 episodes, and there's no significant progression. If you're considering starting this series, you can save yourself time by beginning at ep.6. Maybe you can start at ep.10 with no problem, but I'm not gonna be here to prove it as it wasted too much of my time already.

>> Character Design:
The main characters are superficial, lacking depth in their minds. For example, the FL is cheated by her bf, but after being caught and FL already prepared to break up with him, it's apparently him who suggests breaking up with the reason that he wants a rich gf instead of her. And FL is just whatever.

The issue here is twofold:
1) The boyfriend serves merely as a plot device for the FL. He's there just to portray one point of FL as a popular girl with a cool personality. This bf is a character that lacks meaning and is unnecessary to exist.
2) The FL character itself has no grasp of emotions. She just cooly sits and stands >> this point applies to the ML and 2nd ML characters as well. There's no depth of feeling in any of these characters. They just sit, stand, and act cool.

The lack of emotional depth and character analysis is the perilous point of no return for all of these characters. These characters are uninteresting and fail to evoke any genuine emotion. It's become even more problematic when these characters are not just random extras but the main roles.

>> Dialogue:
The dialogue is also unhelpful. What they talk are not interesting at all. They just say whatever without any meaningful contribution, and what is said does not help moving the plot forward.

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Added note: After being disappointed with this series and deciding to drop it, I consecutively started 'Twinkling Watermelon.' Wow... it grabbed my attention within 2 minutes. The dialogue moves the plot, and the opening scene introduces an interesting point in the story. The characters aren't ordinary, and even the way extras play feels like they actually have meaningful roles. Everyone feels real.

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Tempo super slow. Vague characters esp. in support roles. Selling point is just the scenery.

The story progresses super slow. I could watch it with full attention for only 10 minutes then I had to go with 2x speed, but that's still too slow. In the end, I had to go faster or else I wouldn't be able to get myself to the end of the episode. And at the end of EP.1, I didn't feel like I missed anything at all.

In EP1, it's the story of FL and her best friend - which is boring - really. They try to make it touching, but nothing in the girls' relationship moved me. The story between them is very loose. I don't feel attached to her friend or believe they're best friends at all. The script writer team did very less in building the foundation for the girls' relationship - I don't see where their strong bond comes from nor believe the bond exists or is even real. And with nothing to convey, the team still forces their way to drag the girls' story into a full EP. This sets a too lagging tempo for the series from the start - which is hardly a wise opening strategy for any series, I would say, as this means they imprint their 1st impression in the audience's eyes as a boring story.

Since the ML doesn't show up in EP1, I gave myself and the series another go with EP2. Here, the setting changes from the city to the pretty village in small town. The set is very relaxing. The atmosphere totally contrasts with EP1 (in a good way). The cinematography is decent and does justice to the location.

However, the same problem isn't solved. The story hardly goes forward. Nothing much happens along the way. I don't feel life in other characters apart from the main characters though they're close relative, colleagues or has long dialogue in their own scene. They're very puppet-like. The team has done a bad job in introducing their characters. And the huge problem is - I don't feel that any character (even FL or ML) is interesting. Until the end of EP2, they still can't make me feel engaged to their characters or story.

And when I glance to see the number of total episodes.... my gosh 40 is to many for this level of story. I imagine it's gonna get more dragging. They're going to squeeze all kinds of their bodily liquids into dragging it to 40. No matter those liquids are blood or tears, it's gonna turn into plain water half way.

So with that glance, I decide to drop this series.

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I've already tried hard to watch this, but really. really. can't bear to proceed on.

There're something really wrong with this drama for sure. I have tried to watch it for 3 times in the time span of approximately 2 years. For the first two times, I couldn't finish even a full episode. For the 3rd time, I determined to watch ep1 to the end and be done with it, forever!

I didn't know until just before watching for the 3rd time that this drama is an adaptation of a famous novel by Tong Hua, the author who wrote Scarlet Heart and Ballad of the Desert that I like pretty much. I enjoyed watching the drama adaptation of those two novels without even reading the original books.

So... whatever is wrong with this drama I don't think it's the fault of the original works at all. The production team just fails everyone.

(1) Starting from the bad plot and script - super draggy, lots of unnecessary scenes. There're 54 episodes in total to waste people's time, but I don't want to waste my life with it even with the 2x speed. If I had to invest my time watching this, I think it'd be more worthwhile and leave me a better impression of the story if I spent it with the book instead. The total time would be the same or even shorter.

(2) Apart from the plot... the acting of the main leads is so out of place. Victoria never improves her acting skills up to the bar, I would say. Her latest work I had a glance on is Find Yourself, which is the drama that introduces and makes me like Song Wei Long - I had to drop it after finishing ep11, though. Let me say it once more, I had really tried with that one as well. The FL's brother and her admirer in Find Yourself also acted really well. But the good acting of all these actors (at least three) surrounding her couldn't make me stick to the drama. She is so annoying to watch. She tries to act cute all the time in all dramas I've watched her, and she can't make it look natural. So instead, she looks awkward and pretentious. Here, in A Life Time Love, has the same problem - acting cute, unnatural and awkward - but for this one, it's not just one person but both the FL and ML do that. My, gosh... Especially the ML, I think he's about 10 years older than Victoria. So, when Victoria acts cute and doesn't work, think about him acts cute - anyone can imagine it would work?? He already looks quite advanced on his age and his physique is very muscular, yet he pretends to be a little cutie pie!?? They look so silly together and this silliness isn't a compliment.

(3) The production in general looks low-budget. The sets are not convincing, thus can't get me absorbed at all. The forest is fake. The rock mountain is fake. The fire is fake. The FL's jump into the ML's embrace due to the explosion of the volcano look fake for both the set and the acting.

I'm done with this drama, will not ever try to watch it again. And I'm done with Victoria as well. There're quite a few dramas of hers coming up with prominent MLs like Luo Yi, Xu Kai, Wang Yi Bo and even Rain! But the experience teaches me to not waste my time with her works anymore. Her acting truly isn't my cup of tea. I think I have to admit that I can't bear with her.

P.S. I've watched an impressive work of the ML before this. If anyone watches him for the first time and feels along with me here, maybe you might want to give him another chance with Nirvana in Fire 2 (you don't need to watch season 1 before watching season 2). That one is a work well done in all aspects.

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Lots of things go the wrong way, esp. those about medical details.

I'm not quite sure how to start with this, but I need to rant it out at least a bit. Most parts in this series seem to be touched by the wrong hands.

Let's not talk about the medical details which are the main and biggest problem here anymore, but the main character like Linlada. It's so annoying to watch this character. She looks pretentious both because of her kind-of-WOKE's selfish attitude and her acting skills.

What is WOKE kind of selfish attitude here, let me clarify a bit - she acts like she's a good person/philanthropist/good Samaritan in spite of being actually opposite to being helpful at all. For example, she's very slow in examining the patients - too slow with unneccesary examining procedure such as checking the eyes of the patient who comes in with the symptom of coughing.... You get how irrelevant this is? And you get my meaning when I mentioned that let's not talk about medical details anymore? There're too many profession-related mistakes to the point that let's not talk about it because wherever you touch it, it's all wrong. So, let's go back to examining too slow - after she finishes her shift and meets her friend who finishes his work before her at the break room, she initiates to reprimand that friend that he examines too fast it can't be thorough which can be disadvantageous to the patients...... Hellow? It's you, Linlada, who is the problem, not your friend.

If you watch this series for an episode, I think you can get what kind of self-centered viewpoint I say that Linlada has. And if you watch it for an episode, I think you can also get how annoyingly pretentious kind of WOKE attitude I say Linlada has. And the actress's acting skills don't help the character at all. Her acting makes Linlada look like a jealous loser, not a FL. Due to her annoying character design, I wasn't sure she was really a FL until I come here and see she pops up on the 1st order on the cast list.

By the way, not only this actress who is amateur. I actually disatisfy with the acting skills of all main characters except one who is acceptable (Best). Just that Lindala's the 1st in the order so I talk about her first and foremost, and then I don't think I would talk about other aspects/actors/actresses anymore. After ranting out a bit, I feel that talking about this is also a time waster. Let's sum up that it's another Thai drama that disappoints me.

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