秦岚 is a revelation

I tend to watch K-Dramas, despite being Chinese, so I came into this show without too many expectations. Whatever expectations I did have were completely overwhelmed by the third episode. This is one of the exceedingly rare shows where the chemistry between the actors works together so completely that you can't help but think they have to have at least some feelings for each other in real life. This doesn't just apply to the romantic relationships either, as the friendships, family, and work relationships all come across as genuine and captivating. Aside from the acting, the topic matter (young adult life in a competitive city) and story mesh together so well and is surely relatable for many of us.
For all of the special aspects of this show, the strongest by far is 秦岚's star power. It is beautifully ironic that her hobby in this show is stargazing, as her smile could light up the entirety of Shanghai ~~

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Moving and impactful but leaves a lot of its potential unfulfilled

I'm very conflicted writing this review, as the good parts of this show were really great, but there was too much that they left on the table by the end :(
The fight scenes were the spectacular and the best I've seen in any Korean show. The chemistry and acting of Woo Do Hwan and Lee Sang Yi was immaculate, and the supporting cast really shined. I found myself invested in almost every side character, and especially especially in Park Sung Woong's downfall. Characters who are enigmas at the beginning of some episodes are masterfully integrated throughout the show. Be warned, episode 6 will cause you to lose sleep ...

Now onto the negatives - mainly, it felt unresolved in a lot of ways, and some characters could have been actualized more.
After episode 6, we don't see Hyeon Ju again. She was one of the most interesting side characters and it would have been great to bring her back at the end or have her reprise her role during the revenge arc to bring closure for her character.

It's shown at the end through a montage that the villain Myung-Gil and all his associates are brought to justice through the justice system. But for all the awful things they did throughout the whole series, I felt like at least half an episode should have been devoted to documenting their downfall. The ending in general felt too rushed, and I would have liked to seen what could have been with 10 or 11 episodes to work with instead of 8.

Finally (spoilers) it was weird to me that after Myung-Gil killed their whole team, they left him alive at the end. The whole plot seemed to be about the dangers of leaving evil people like Myung-Gil alive, and after all they'd been through, it was kind of frustrating for them to leave him with the capacity to come back for revenge.

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